I APPLAUD the efforts of Coun Sue Galloway in her quest to encourage pensioners to apply for pension Credit.

Having spent very many years visiting sick people, disabled people and pensioners in my job within social security and social services, one of the hardest tasks was to encourage pensioners to claim what in effect was their right of entitlement. There is a stigma attached to making a claim for benefits that is as strong today as it ever was.

The problem is that successive governments have reduced the value of the pension so much that Pension Credits have had to be introduced.

Having been born in the time of the Great Depression before the war, I know what poverty really is and now many of today's pensioners, through mismanagement by successive governments, are suffering poverty levels at an unprecedented level.

As Sue Galloway remarks, "rather than forcing pensioners to apply for means-tested benefits, the government should make sure that every pensioner gets a good basic pension".

I believe the Government should now restore the earnings-linked pension increases. When the Conservatives in power broke that link, the Labour representatives shouted from the rooftops "disgraceful".

They also, in their manifesto, said that if they were to be elected to office, they would restore the wages to pensions link. What happened?

Les Sweeney,

Dalmally Close,

York.

Updated: 11:04 Friday, February 18, 2005