The older people’s commissioner for Wales called for funding to alleviate the impact of winter fuel payment cuts amid “extreme anxiety, anger and distress” over fuel poverty.

Rhian Bowen-Davies urged the Welsh Government to set up a distinct fund for older people to mitigate against Westminster’s decision to introduce means-testing.

Ms Bowen-Davies warned the withdrawal of universal winter fuel payments will have a “significant impact.”

She told the Senedd’s equality committee: “I felt that this decision was the wrong decision… it should have been reversed.

“I felt the approach was wrong in terms of it being rushed through and I also felt the timeline was unrealistic for people to apply.”

Giving evidence to an inquiry on fuel poverty, she told the committee an estimated 50,000 households in Wales are eligible for pension credit but do not claim the extra income.

Warning the eligibility criteria for the Welsh Government’s discretionary assistance fund is too narrow, she urged ministers to follow the example of Northern Ireland and Scotland.

Ms Bowen-Davies pointed to a £100 payment for all older people in Northern Ireland this winter, with no application needed and a similar scheme set to follow in Scotland.

Age Cymru highlighted a “huge” 1,144 per cent increase in calls to its advice line about winter fuel payments and a 99 per cent rise for pension credit enquiries from 2023 to 2024.

Rebecca Hill, a senior public health specialist at Public Health Wales, said: “We know that colder homes are linked to heart and lung conditions, infectious respiratory illnesses such as flu.

“We also see higher rates of deaths in cold months … and we know a majority of those deaths accrue amongst our oldest population.”

Ms Bowen-Davies warned older people are experiencing “extreme anxiety, anger and distress" as she called for interim targets in the Welsh Government’s fuel poverty plan.

She told the meeting on 9 December: “What older people are saying to me is they are having to make really difficult decisions in terms of how much they are eating on a daily basis and the individual rooms that they are heating.”