The government has moved to defend Budget plans to end age-related tax allowances for pensioners after receiving criticism about it being a "raid" on their incomes.
HMRC has said that the measures could lead to 4.4 million pensioners being an average of £83 a year worse off than they would have been under the previous guidelines.
The change to the pensioners' tax allowances has dominated the newspaper coverage of Wednesday's Budget speech and has been widely dubbed as "granny tax".
Chancellor George Osborne told BBC Breakfast his job was to do what was best for the country and denied that pensioners were being hit to pay for a tax cut for the very rich.
Shadow chancellor Ed Balls added on BBC Radio 4's Today: "The cumulative effect is to hit pensioners now, a big tax rise, families on £20,000 worse off, families on working tax credit on £17,000 massively worse off."
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