Timely surprise.

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One of those unwelcome brown envelopes arrived with me today, the sort that comes from a department of His Britannic Majesty’s government. This one brought good news. Instead of the customary demand for payment, this letter heralded a gift of £100 from the Pension Age Fuel Support Fund. I get it because I’m old and it is cold. It’s something that all OAPs used to get when it was called the Winter Fuel Allowance. Under that scheme everyone in the UK in receipt of a state pension received £300 a year to help with fuel payments. It was an expensive gift so the government scrapped it, but our local government has stepped in and found the money to pay each retiree in Northern Ireland £100. Quite a timely gift because I’m running low on heating oil.