State Pension petition calling for £380 weekly payments signed by people from every council area in UK

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A petition calling on the UK Government to increase State Pension payments to match the new National Living Wage rate has been signed by more than 35,300 supporters across every council area in Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

An interactive map, hosted on the petition-parliament website, shows a colour-coded map of the UK with the number of signatures of support by council area.

From the top of Scotland in Orkney and Shetland down to St.Ives in Cornwall and across to Northern Ireland via Wales, thousands of people have shown their digital support in asking the UK Government to increase State Pension payments to £19,760 per year, the equivalent to £380 each week.The suggested increase would bring State Pension payments into line with the recent rise on April 1 to the National Living Wage, which is now £9.50 an hour for people aged over 23 working a 40-hour week - the equivalent to an annual salary of £19,760.State Pension payment rates increased by 3.1% on April 11, 2022, which means the basic State Pension will go up to £141.85 per week from £137.60 and the full, new State Pension will rise to £185.15 from £179.60 - payments are made in arrears so the uplift will not been seen straight away.But the cost of living crisis, heightened by soaring energy bills, is putting additional pressure on household finances, which cannot keep up with rising inflation which now sits at 7% and is expected to jump even higher next month.For many of the 12.4 million people across the UK claiming their State Pension, including 981,399 living in Scotland, it is potentially going to hit them hardest as this could be their only source of income.