We have one meal a day and use candles for heat... it's not living, it's existing

PEOPLE ON UNIVERSAL CREDIT AND PENSIONS TELL OF COST OF MVING PAIN

- PAIGE OLDFIELD

RISHI Sunak is yet to commit to raising benefits in line with inflation potentially leaving thousands of families in Greater Manchester facing an even more difficult winter.

While benefits are usually raised in line with consumer price inflation each April, the rocketing rate of inflation has thrown this into doubt. So far, ministers have refused to be drawn on their plans.

And claimants aren't the only ones s worried, the prime TE, minister and chancellor are yet to confirm a whether the pensions 4 triple-lock the promise to raise state pension payments every year by either 2.5 percent, average earnings or in line with inflation will be honoured.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt was due to set out the government's tax and spending plans in a Halloween Budget on Monday last week. But, just days before the announcement, he revealed there will be an Autumn Statement on November 17 instead.

While millions of pensioners and claimants face an anxious wait to see whether payments are going to change,

the M.E.N. visited Bolton, where pensioners and people in receipt of Universal Credit told of us their experiences.

“I can’t look forward to the future,’ mum-of-one Sarah Stanton says. It’s not living it’s existing”

Trying to use candles for warmth and eating just one meal a day. It’s a bleak reality in Greater Manchester in 2022. Living off Universal Credit, it’s all

_ Sarah says she can afford.

Me The 260 payment lands meeepa in her bank account every fortnight. Supporting a child, it’s gone within days, forc-

ing her to rely on