In reply to john arran:
> The problem really is that it's called a winter fuel allowance, so people get peeved at the idea of it being used for anything else. If it was just called a pensioners' tax rebate, intended to redress the balance of taxation in favour of older people likely to have been relatively short changed by the rest of the complex tax system, then it would be far easier to accept. Of course, that begs the question of why such a rebate should be necessary in the first place, which is the real issue here. >
In many respects a general increase in pension would indeed have been simpler (and cheaper to administer) but it was introduced (in part I presume) so as to be a highly visible way in which the government was seen to be helping 'vulnerable' people and once introduced it then becomes very hard to remove it without being seen as 'mean'.
The pensions triple lock of the last 7 years seems to have been an effective fix and as such the fuel allowance is mostly unnecessary.
I assume the political calculation now is that regardless of what they put in the manifesto they'll get a large majority anyway so its a good time to loosen the straightjacket that these commitments (and a few others such as no NI or tax rises) impose on the government, a gamble but probably a wise one.
In reply to the OP, my father in law always put his winter fuel allowance towards his annual skiing holiday which is not atypical and shows it was a nonsense as a universal benefit.