Don't Think Hypothermia, Think Opportunity

The Department of Human Resource Flexibility and Pensions Crisis has some good news for the Government; namely that the economic downturn is still affecting mainly those who don't matter very much. The number of pensioners living in poverty has risen by three hundred thousand in the past year: three times the figure expected by the Institute for Fiscal Studies. The number of children living in poverty has increased by one hundred thousand, presumably because the Government is pledged to reduce it.

Predictably, the figures induced the requisite eructation of managerial positivism from the pensions minister Mike O'Brien: "Pensioners are facing challenges with rising food and fuel costs." When shareholders in a bank have their profits wiped out, it's a crisis; when pensioners have to choose between cold and hunger, it's a challenge. "We need to build on the progress of 2 million pensioners taken out of absolute poverty since 1997" - the pre-Blair experience of absolute poverty being presumably rather less comfortable than the New Labour experience of merely living below the poverty line.

O'Brien also pointed out that New New Labour is "working with energy companies to lower pensioners' fuel bills", provided that the energy companies are not unduly inconvenienced; and that there will be a one-off payment this winter, totalling fifteen per cent more than the cost of eight nearly functional military helicopters.