Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of paying winter fuel allowance to recipients in more frequent instalments to assist people who have pre-paid for gas and electricity usage.

Winter Fuel Payments are made annually, and largely automated, to ensure that administrative costs are kept to acceptable levels across 12 million payments. Although we have made no assessment of this specific proposal, we know that each level of complexity in the system increases the costs of delivery. Recipients are free to use the payment in the best way for them.