10% of UK pensioners stay in bed longer to beat high heating costs

One in 10 pensioners is forced to stay in bed longer to keep warm due to rising fuel bills, according to a poll, while one in eight said they planned to stop using some unheated parts of their homes in the cold weather to keep energy bills down.

The survey polled over 12,000, 50 plus people, across the UK, of whom almost 8,000  had retired, for over-50s company Saga.

A third of the people said they were heating fewer rooms in their homes and 64 per cent of people said they had to wear extra layers of clothing to avoid  heating their homes to beat rising energy costs.

One in five said they were planning to cut back on other spending so as to afford heating their homes. Also, a little over two-fifths who responded to the online poll said they would struggle harder than in the past with energy bills this winter.

Rising cost of fuel was a concern with 84 per cent of the respondents.

In a recent move, the so-called big six firms dominating the energy supply market, announced above-inflation price hikes.

The Scotsman quoted Paul Green, director of Saga, as saying, as the cold winter months approached spiralling fuel costs were striking fear in the hearts of some, but not all, pensioner households.

He added, for some the fear could mean they would not turn their heating on, and in so doing, risk their own health and welfare.

The rising cost of energy had dominated the news agenda in recent months, with interventions from Labour Party leader Ed Miliband and the former prime minister John Major.

According to Jane Vass, head of public policy at charity Age UK, high energy prices along with poorly insulated homes were some of the factors that caused cold homes - a major cause of excess winter deaths, ibtimes.co.uk reported.

She added, those living in the coldest homes were three times more likely to die a preventable death than those living in warmer ones.

She said, long term Age UK strongly believed that the only sustainable solution was investment to increase the energy efficiency of the housing stock so cold homes became a thing of the past.