What is the winter fuel payment? Labour conference votes against cuts [Video]

While the vote is not binding, it puts more pressure on Prime Minister Keir Starmer. He has faced huge opposition over Labour’s contentious policy to remove the benefit from millions of pensioners by making the normally guaranteed payment means-tested.

Sharon Graham, the general secretary of Unite, moved the proposal.

She said: “The nation wants food, work and homes… It wants a high and rising standard of living, security for all, against a rainy day.

“Friends, that’s a quote from the 1945 Labour manifesto, written in the shadow of death, destruction and debt, caused by years of war. A manifesto of hope.”

Ms Graham said debt then was “nearly three times higher than it is now” but there was “no mention of cuts, no mention of austerity and certainly no mention of making everyday people pay”.

She added: “I do not understand how our new Labour government can cut the winter fuel allowance for pensioners and leave the super-rich untouched.

“This …