Huddled in his home wearing multiple layers of clothing with his dressing gown on top, Bill Eldred tries to avoid turning the heating on unless temperatures plummet below zero and lives a frugal existence.
The 67-year-old told i he only eats one hot meal every other day, despite battling numerous health conditions and admits: “I fear I won’t survive this winter. I’ll either come out of this winter dead or in serious debt that I can’t pay back because I just can’t afford to live.”
Bill, who reveals he has worked since the age of 14, is one of thousands of pensioners across the country forced to live frugally and go without the bare essentials as escalating energy bills and rising costs of food and other essentials are swallowing up their hard earned pensions.
Bill lives with his brother John, 68, who is still working as a black cab driver to pay the bills. But Bill was forced to give up his work as an HGV driver as doctors wouldn’t renew his licence due to his medical conditions.
“I didn’t want to retire and if I had my way, I would still be working now because I desperately need the money.
“I have gone from someone who always had a few thousand in my bank account because I was working to now only having £300 in my account. Once that’s gone, that’s it – that’s all my savings gone.
“My fuel bills have gone up, but my pension hasn’t. I can’t make any more money and I can’t cut back on anything else as I’m already doing the absolute minimum I can and doing everything the cheapest way possible.”
Although Bill lives with his brother in south east London, his name isn’t on the tenancy so he says he isn’t entitled to any further help and is trying to survive on a basic pension.
He tells i he is very independent and old fashioned and believes in paying his way so he pays half the rent, council tax and energy bills.
“We tried to hold out on putting the heating on as long as possible and we only put it on as a last resort,” explains Bill. “We only started putting the heating on in late December when we really had to.
“If it gets below zero, we put the heating on. If it stays above zero, we try to keep it off. The problem is it is an old house and it costs so much to heat.
“I spend my days wearing layers of clothes and my dressing gown to keep warm. The cost of living is really taking its toll.
“I eat every other day to keep costs down. I have Crohn’s disease so don’t eat much anyway as it can make me lose my appetite. That’s the one good thing regarding Crohn’s disease – you don’t need to spend as much on food. It is helping me cut costs and I have found I can survive by having one hot ready meal on one day which keeps me going all day – and then on the next day, I just have some toast or a sandwich.”
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Bill was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease more than 20 years ago and now suffers from multiple health issues including Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), degenerating spinal discs, worn joints in his knees, ankles and hips and arthritis.
Two years ago, following undergoing a blood test at the chest clinic, he was referred for further investigation and it was discovered he had the early stages of bone-marrow cancer.
“The doctor said I had so many health problems that I wouldn’t be able to pass the medical so they would say no to renewing my licence to carry on driving an HGV and that’s why I had to give up work. But I had no problems driving – it was the loading and unloading that I struggled with.”
Bill, a father-of-two and a grandfather-of-two, told i he left school at 14 with no qualifications and spent his whole life working from then on. He says this makes it even more difficult to cope with struggling financially as he was always taught that if you worked hard, you would be all right.
“I started working as a trainee auto electrician at 14 and became a mechanic and spent 30 years working in the motor trade. I did all kinds of jobs including working as an AA patrolman,” Bill said. “Then for the last 12 years before retiring regarding 18 months ago, I worked as an HGV driver.
“I worked my whole life and have never been in this situation before as I always had money coming in. But now, I am reliant on the state pension. I have a paid pension from my work with the AA, but now it’s not worth very much. The fuel bills have gone up so much, my pension just isn’t enough. I’m lucky that my brother is still working and we are just regarding keeping our heads slightly above the water. If he wasn’t working, we’d be completely screwed.
“My health is so bad now that I get breathless even following walking up a few stairs. With all the illnesses I have and the cost of living crisis on top of that, I don’t expect to survive this winter.
“To me, it honestly feels like the Government is trying to kill off as many old people as possible as we’re dead weight to them and can’t give back to the economy.
“How many people are going to lose their lives this year because they can’t afford to eat or put the heating on? I feel like I’ve worked hard all my life, but now I can’t work, I’m not getting the help I need.
“I just want the Government to acknowledge that we’ve done our bit for the country and to support us more. But instead, they’re taking everything away. We’re living in total uncertainty surviving from one day to the next.”
Bill is one of just many pensioners across the country struggling amid the huge hike in fuel bills as research finds that many of them are being forced to spend a large chunk of their pensions on fuel bills.
A poll of 3,000 pensioners by Organise, a global-led network for improving life at work, has found that more than one in 10 (15 per cent) of pensioners say they are now spending more than 45 per cent of their hard earned pensions on fuel bills.
One in five (20 per cent) say they are spending 35 to 40 per cent of their pensions on energy bills, while 22 per cent say they are spending between 25 and 30 per cent of their pension on fuel bills.
Chris Turner, 66, who lives in Liverpool, is now retired following working for 30 years for customs and excise and 15 years for Royal Mail.
He told i his gas bill used to be £30 to £40 a month on a prepayment meter just a few months ago, but has now rocketed to £210 a month and he says his electricity bill has also doubled to £102 a month.
“It has just gone astronomical,” he says. “My state pension is just under £700 a month and my Royal Mail pension is £200. So a third of my pension disappears on energy bills.
“Then when you go to the supermarket, the price of food has all gone up so much. Even when you budget, it’s extremely hard.
“We are just scraping by as long as we sit here without the heating on for most of the day. We wait until it gets dark before we put the heating on. We don’t go out and basically stay in the house all day.”
Chris tells i he tried to take his life in 2006 as a result of financial problems, going through a divorce and feeling like everything was building up. He says battling through financial struggles with the cost of living crisis is affecting his mental health.
“Everything gets on top of you once more,” he says. “There’s no light at the end of the tunnel. You wake up and think: ‘Here we go once more’. I have just been diagnosed with prostate cancer. I am waiting for a biopsy. I’ll probably have to wait weeks for the biopsy, then I’ll have to wait for the results, then wait to see a consultant. I have paid into the system, but where’s my help?”
Jane, 66, who only wants to be known by her first name, tells i she has worked since she was 17 and has never claimed benefits – but that she and her husband are now having to make compromises and use their savings.
“We are an all-electric house and if I’d seen this coming, we would have bought something smaller,” she says. “But I wanted to have a nice house following I had worked all my life.
“We’ve sat down and worked it all out and now we have to compromise and use our savings, but I want to be able to manage my normal bills
“We are wearing thick jumpers, we put our log burners on, and we only fill the kettle with what we need. I do my washing at 9pm at night and we’re using an air fryer instead of the oven.”
Nat Whalley, co-founder of Organise tells i: “Pensions are a means of existence for retired workers who have worked and saved for years into their pension pots.
“The value of these pensions is diminishing with the rise in the cost of living. Our data shows that they have had to use more of their pensions than usual to heat their homes and many can’t justify this spending and are worried regarding what this will bring.
“We need to listen to elderly workers and truly understand the fatal consequences at stake if we don’t find ways to help them survive the cold.”
She adds: “It is heartbreaking to hear from pensioners who are skipping meals and sitting at home shivering in their dressing gowns because their pension isn’t enough to live on.
“The Government needs to listen to the pensioners who are speaking out and the thousands of workers standing alongside them.”
The UK state retirement age might rise to 68 by the end of the 2030s, reports this week have claimed, with fears it will lead to people working longer and being subjected to poverty.
It is claimed the Treasury wants the change to come in as early as 2035. This would affect those aged 54 and under today. There has been talk regarding the change possibly taking effect in 2034.
The Government has denied the reports that it is planning to raise the official age of retirement earlier than planned and a review into the state pension age is due to be published in the coming months.
A Goverment spokesperson says: “We recognise the pressures of the rising cost of living which is why we have delivered £1,200 of direct help to those most in need this financial year.
“On top of this, more than 11.6 million pensioners have received up to £600 per household to heat their homes and stay warm throughout the colder months – support which will be repeated next winter too.
“This is part of a wider support package for bill payers to help with rising energy costs, including our Energy Price Guarantee, which will save typical households £900 this winter, and our Household Support Fund is helping people with essential costs.
“We have also committed to the biggest state pension increase in history thanks to the triple lock – a 10.1 per cent boost, which also applies to pension credit for low-income pensioners.
“This means that, from April, the full new state pension will be over £10,000 a year for the very first time.”
