Pensioners in crisis: ‘I begged them not to raid my energy bill’ | Personal Finance | Finance

The Army veteran, 77, who has a heart condition, lives in Hartlepool, where the mercury this week plummeted to below zero. Yet grandmother Pamela is terrified of putting her heating on for more than two hours a day because she cannot afford her energy bills.

When she tried to cut back before Christmas she was rushed into intensive care with pneumonia.

“They sent me home but I still wasn’t well,” she says. “I’m still frightened to put the heating on because I don’t want to pay the exorbitant bills.”

Pamela, who has five grown-up children, believes her pneumonia was linked to only heating her home for “short bursts”.

Threatened “My partner Ian was telling me off,” she says. Pamela has been with Ian for 20 years but lives alone. She gets £638 a month in state pension and pension credit. After monthly bills of £537, she has £100 for food and other necessities.

Her energy provider recently threatened to raise her £80 charge. She phoned and begged and eventually got them to delay the rise.

Pamela’s financial situation is helped by a grant each year from the Women’s Royal Army Corps Association.

Born in Kent, she became an Army cook. After having children she worked as a cook, carer and cleaner until a heart attack forced her to retire in 2013, aged 67.

“I’ve never sat on my backside expecting things to land in my lap,” she says. And Pamela told ministers: “Treat pensioners with the consideration they should get.”