Submission 223

Green Paper Submission

May 08

I am an 81 year old pensioner living with my spouse who is 77 years. We do not
have any savings. We have an income of €120 per week from a pension scheme which I contributed into for 30 years. This pension is extra with our contributory O.A.P. of €433.30 per week. Because of my work pension being more than €100 per week we can not qualify for Free Fuel Allowance, I believe a private pension from work should not deprive old age pensioners on low incomes of such schemes.

It is strange that if you can have savings of €54,000 and qualify and a lousy €120 deprives you of qualifying. It is not very encouraging for employees on small wages to contribute. In the 70’s and 80’s I made sacrifices to pay into that scheme and we are now being discriminated against because we are €20 per week over the set amount.