TENS of thousands of households in Inverclyde are set to lose out on a vital benefit helping to keep them warm this winter, according to a local politician.

Chris McEleny says the cut to winter fuel payments will have a devastating impact on the area if the measure is voted through by MPs in the House of Commons today.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced last month that winter fuel payments would be means-tested and would only be available to pensioners on certain benefits.

Ms Reeves said the move was essential to plug what Labour have described as a '£22bn black hole' in the public finances.

The Scottish Government has said the Chancellor's decision left it with no option but to make the Scottish version of the benefit, the Pension Age Winter Heating Payment, means-tested when it is introduced this autumn.

Mr McEleny, the Alba Party's general secretary and a former Inverclyde councillor, said 12,500 households across Inverclyde, and 15,000 in the Inverclyde and West Renfrewshire constituency, would lose out, and called the Labour plan "a cruel blow to pensioners".

He said: "This will not only see pensioners who are already living in fuel poverty deprived of a vital financial life line of up to £300 a year; it creates the very real prospect of more pensioners dying this winter through excess winter deaths. 

“It is a matter of real concern that this decision has been announced with no prior warning. 

"There was a reasonable expectation on the part of pensioners themselves, as well as the Scottish Government, that this benefit would be paid this coming winter."

The winter fuel payment pays pensioners £200, while those over the age of 80 receive £300.

But the new Labour government defended the decision to make the payment a means-tested one, saying they have to take tough decisions to balance the books after the last government left a financial black hole.

Stuart McMillan MSP (SNP, Greenock and Inverclyde) said: “The SNP has been calling on Labour to U-turn since the Chancellor announced that thousands of pensioners across the UK would lose out on the Winter Fuel Payment – at a time when the cost of living crisis continues to squeeze household budgets.

“Former Scottish Labour Leader Richard Leonard has even joined our calls – saying that the proposed cut should be scrapped.

“I am urging Inverclyde’s MP Martin McCluskey to put his constituents first and vote against his Labour Government’s plans to raid pensioners’ incomes by means-testing the Winter Fuel Payment.

“If he refuses to do so then Labour’s values will be clear for all to see, and we’ll know once and for all that Scotland will always come second to the command of his Westminster bosses.”