A pensioner has teamed up with charity Independent Age to raise awareness about pensioners struggling during the winter.
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00:00Turning on the heating was once standard practice for many pensioners during
00:06winter months but today it has become a luxury that many can no longer afford.
00:12According to a recent study this winter just 23% of pensioners will not have
00:17turned their heating on. One of them is 68 year old Rob from Cornwall who is
00:22working with the charity Independent Age to raise awareness for the dangers of
00:27cold homes and what they pose to older people. To shine a light on this urgent
00:33issue the charity has unveiled a striking eye sculpture of Rob symbolising
00:38pensioners on low incomes facing these conditions. The sculpture depicting Rob
00:43sitting in a cold home will be placed right here in London to highlight how
00:48many people feel frozen and forgotten. So the eye sculpture is of our campaigner
00:54Rob and he lives on a low income and he's just over the threshold to receive
00:58pension credit so he's living on low income he's making really tough choices
01:01during these colder months and the eye sculpture is here to represent that
01:04there are two million people in a similar situation to Rob all making
01:07decisions where they can't turn heating on they can't use warm water they can't
01:11use their cookers all to save money so we're here to draw attention to that.
01:15And we're still trying to highlight the fact that a lot of people a lot of
01:20pensioners are living in poverty and with the loss of the winter fuel
01:24allowance etc you know people are deciding whether to turn the heating on
01:28or whether they eat and this depiction of me here is to show that people are
01:35freezing cold and it highlights the fact that although I don't wear a hat
01:44this is me. Well I had the winter fuel allowance for a couple of years it was
01:50250 pounds which I was very grateful for and I put it straight into a
01:54housekeeping account so that it was there for what it was meant to be.
02:02An awful lot of people didn't need it but in this sweeping change that was made the same
02:09week that he announced a 15% pay rise for train drivers who are on sixty
02:14seventy thousand pounds a year they took away 250 pounds from pensioners who've
02:19worked all their lives paid their national insurance paid their tax and we
02:23just seem to be forgotten. Every person I've spoken to be it here or be it at
02:29home have been disgusted and supportive and a lot of support towards me so you
02:41know because I've got a voice now and I tell my story and I'm trying to get
02:49people to see sense that with the reduction in well with the annihilation
02:54of the winter fuel allowance I can guarantee you there's going to be people
02:58dying through cold.