Age Scotland response to Autumn Budget 2025

Responding to the Chancellor, Rachel Reeves' Autumn Budget. 

Katherine Crawford, chief executive at Age Scotland, said:

"The State Pension rise is necessary and welcome. It will help the hundreds of thousands of pensioners in Scotland living on low and modest incomes and are almost wholly reliant on the State Pension to cope with the extraordinary financial pressures they face. But we must remember that the headline increases to this only affect a small number of pensioners as 60% are on the old State Pension and around half of those receiving the New State Pension don’t receive the full amount.
 
"A reduction in the cost of energy bills will also help older households as they are among those most significantly impacted by fuel poverty and this has been one of the most challenging expenses over the last few years.
 
"Social security is an important investment and the uprating of these payments will have a positive impact on people’s lives. We hope that the Scottish Government increase devolved and linked payments such as the Pension Age Disability Payment by at least this amount."