0:00
Brilliant. Let's come on to the politics. It's my fault
0:04
These plans to perhaps U-turn, more likely that it's going to be watered down than scrapped altogether, isn't it
0:10
I think that's right. It was £1.4 billion in savings that the government was looking for
0:16
with the policy when it came in last July. It was one of the early announcements by the government
0:21
within three weeks of the election. Immediately there was backlash and that hasn't gone away
0:29
As you say, with the local election results, it came up on the doorstep quite a lot
0:34
So it's one thing in the mix for whether the government could water down eligibility criteria
0:40
maybe make it available to more pensioners than is currently the case
0:44
I think it's part of a bigger story, though, because we have the largest welfare reforms in a decade being planned by the government
0:53
and primarily around adult disability benefits called the PIP. And they're looking to save something like $6.5 billion, which is quite a sizable amount of money
1:07
And that's coming to a head in Parliament. And the government is looking, despite its big majority, for its first potential defeat in the comments on the back of that
1:17
So there's moving parts here in terms of what can the government do to head off this rebellion
1:24
Maybe they can do something around those adult disability payments. But again, they need the savings
1:29
What could they do about winter fuel allowance? Could they move the threshold
1:33
So it's all up for discussion. I mean the problem with it is that even with the winter fuel payments if they think changing that is going to win them some support back it just seems like complete political ineptitude
1:48
In the middle of a cost-of-living crisis, which they said they were going to tackle
1:53
and in the run-up to winter, and fuel bills rising anyway because of the off-what
1:58
No, not off-what. The price cap. Off-jem. Off-jem. Doing this in the first place
2:05
It's going to be very hard to be forgiven for it. Well, I think that's right, and it could get worse
2:12
with some of these changes to welfare more generally. But from the government's perspective, I mean, they are in a tight place
2:18
because we see what happens when the markets aren't happy and don't consider the government to be fiscally credible
2:25
or fiscally responsible. So, you know, in terms of balancing the budget
2:30
there are pressures on the public purse that continue to grow. We do need to commit more to defense spending because of what's happening geopolitically and the fact that the U.S. is pulling back
2:42
We've had some news very recently around the U.S. not wanting to pay as much for drugs
2:51
Because at the moment, America subsidizes medications pretty much for the rest of the world
2:56
because we get cheaper prices for our drugs because the NHS negotiates on behalf of all UK citizens
3:08
And so US taxpayers or US consumers pay a lot more for drugs
3:14
than we do in the rest of the world. And so Trump has said that's going to stop and they're going to pay less
3:18
So that's going to actually make the cost here go up for the NHS and for taxpayers
3:23
So the government is trying to balance the books
