Good Morning Britain’s Susanna Reid clashed with a Home Office minister on Monday as the MP repeatedly excused the government’s latest controversial move.
MPs will be voting on whether to restrict winter fuel payments to those on pension credit on Tuesday.
It means around 10 million elderly people could lose out on the allowance to help them pay their heating bills.
The divisive proposal could see scores of unhappy Labour MPs rebelling and voting against the government, or abstaining.
Despite repeatedly acknowledging that it is not a proposal they want to push through, the government claims this is one of the “unpopular” measures necessary to fill the ”£22bn black hole” in the UK’s finances left by the Tories.
On ITV’s Good Morning Britain, the policing, fire and crime minister Dame Diana Johnson was asked if she thought it was “fair” to cut the winter fuel allowance.
She just replied: “I think it’s a really difficult decision.”
So presenter Susanna Reid, looking exasperated, cut in: “Can I just ask, on behalf of our viewers, can you stop saying it’s a difficult decision?
“We all understand you have to make choices.
“You made this particular choice.
“You didn’t find it difficult because you made it.
“So is it the right decision?”
Johnson replied by saying the move comes from the Treasury, not the Home Office, so she does not have the “overview” of government.
After admitting she would be “reluctantly” voting for it, Johnson added: “I recognise that we are making some really difficult decisions because of the inheritance [from the Tories].”
Reid cut in again: “Honestly, I am going to say, can you stop saying it’s a difficult decision!”
“It’s a hard decision,” Johnson replied, smiling.
Reid looked incredibly frustrated, but asked again: “Is it the right decision?
“You’re voting for it tomorrow, so you must think it is the right decision. If you thought it was the wrong decision, you would vote against it.”
But the minister just referred to chancellor Rachel Reeves’ discovery that there is a £22bn black hole within the government finances which needs to be filled.
PM Keir Starmer told the BBC on Sunday that he has accepted his government will have to be “unpopular” with some of these decisions, but claimed this is better for the country in the long run.