A 'sweet and sour Budget' for over-50s

Michelle Mitchell, charity director for Age Concern and Help the Aged said that in a Budget for jobs, "workers over 50 have once again slipped under the government's radar".

"With today's figures showing unemployment among the over 50s rising at a higher rate than among any other age group, without targeted help for over 50s, ministers risk creating a lost generation of older people shut out of the job market and walking into a retirement blighted by pensioner poverty," she added.

"Maintaining the Winter Fuel Payment, measures to help grandparents and help for low-income savers will provide cheer to pensioners in an otherwise gloomy Budget. But the failure to do more to tackle fuel poverty will continue to leave many pensioners out in the cold.

"More traineeships are welcome but the failure to provide emergency funding for our creaking social care system will exacerbate the current crisis. In an era of difficult financial choices, ministers must not use the recession as an excuse to starve the care system of funds it urgently needs or be distracted from much needed long-term reform."