Struggling pensioners who own their own homes or have an interest in property are still being denied state financial aid, Opposition politician Louise Jackson claimed.The One Bermuda Alliance MP said despite amended regulations which came into effect on April 1, some seniors were still failing to get the help they needed.And she accused Government of lacking any commitment to community-based care for “our poor and our vulnerable” — prompting a fiery response from Families Minister Glenn Blakeney.Mrs Jackson, speaking during the motion to adjourn debate in Parliament, said organisations such as the Salvation Army were having to step in to fill in the gaps left by Government.The charity revealed this week its monthly costs for basic food staples were now about $18,000, compared to $10,000 just six months ago, and that it had been inundated with pleas for help to pay household utility bills.Mrs Jackson, the OBA’s spokeswoman on seniors, asked: “Where is Government here? What are they doing? What is their commitment to the poor and vulnerable in this Country?“I didn’t want to do this: to put it out there nationally and internationally that we have a government that is so uncommitted.”The MP bemoaned rising healthcare costs for seniors, citing one patient who was recently told a home visit from a GP would cost $650.And she said Government had failed when it came to rest and nursing homes, with Lefroy House still waiting after years to be renovated. “It’s absolutely disgraceful,” she said, adding that some rest homes were below standard and were not being inspected.Mrs Jackson referred to a 2004 change in the law which prevented struggling seniors who owned their own homes or held an interest in a property from claiming state aid.The change has since been rolled back by the Financial Assistance Amendment Regulations 2012, but Mrs Jackson said pensioners had suffered for almost nine years and were still suffering.She cited the cases of “Mrs O” and “Auntie Em”, whose plights were revealed by The Royal Gazette, and referred to a recent court case involving Lenice Tucker, whose granddaughters stole almost half a million dollars from her.Mrs Jackson said Ms Tucker was left with just $200 to live on by her abusers but had been unable to claim anything from Government.“She had her cable turned off. This is the only entertainment she had. She still does not have her money. She can’t get financial assistance because she owns her own home. How long do we have to go on? How many people have suffered as a result of this?”Mr Blakeney rose to make a point of order, explaining: “This Honourable House just passed an amendment that rescinded the seniors who were homeowners or who had an interest in homes not being eligible for financial assistance.”Mrs Jackson replied: “They are still being denied. I have the proof. There are people who are being denied financial assistance because they are owners of their own homes and I think the Honourable Member knows this.”She said there had been just two convictions under the “weak” Senior Abuse Register Act 2008 and claimed the National Office for Seniors and the Physically Challenged (NOSPC) was “not quite cutting it”.Mrs Jackson said the OBA, if elected, would reopen the medical clinic for the poor, improve legislation on residential care, introduce an ombudsman for seniors and make health insurance affordable for seniors.Mr Blakeney said it was unfortunate that in her efforts to criticise Government, Mrs Jackson denigrated the work of the NOSPC and others.He said Government had rolled back legislation to make sure seniors with an interest in or ownership of property could claim financial aid. “If that’s not sensitive and compassionate — well, what is?”The Minister said Mrs Jackson “arbitrarily painted a broad brush” to suggest Government wasn’t helping its people.But he said the opening of the state-of-the art Sylvia Richardson home and the emergency care facility in the East End proved that wasn’t true.He said Health Minister Zane DeSilva was “conveniently away” when Mrs Jackson decided to take a “potshot” at his Ministry, to which she responded: “I’m not scared of him.”Mr Blakeney said: “I find it so disingenuous to paint a broad brush as though the Government hasn’t done anything right or anything good for our people. How in good conscience could you even begin to suggest that?”He said the Opposition member should pick up the phone or e-mail him to get the facts, such as the millions of dollars Government was spending this year on helping those in need.“I see my people every single day,” the Minister said. “I feel people and I see tears and I hear stories. Guess what? I do proactively follow up with my people, who do a great job to the best of their ability, as understaffed and challenged as they may be.”He said the average monthly pay out to those on financial assistance had risen to $1,720 and the average number of clients seen by each Department of Financial Assistance worker daily was 149.Seniors who couldn’t afford healthcare could get assistance from Government to pay their premiums, he added.Mr Blakeney said Mrs Jackson’s criticisms suggested “there must be an election in the air”. He said she’d gone to the extreme of making a political point “based on false information and hypothesis and conjecture”.Mrs Jackson said he was impugning her name. “You can’t say that anything I have said is not true,” she added. “I have the evidence. Would you like to see it?”Mr Blakeney repeated his remark, prompting Shadow Transport Minister Patricia Gordon-Pamplin to chide him for being inappropriate when Mrs Jackson had told the House she had evidence.Later in his speech, Mr Blakeney said: “We aren’t fools over here and you better stop insinuating that we don’t know what we’re doing.“You know why? Because our people for the last three elections have said exactly what they feel about who should be running this Country with the vision, with the plans, with the commitment, with the credibility. We’re here and we’re not going anywhere fast.”Those comments prompted heckling and laughter from the opposite side. Mr Blakeney went on: “I would implore the Opposition to be a little bit more measured and a little bit more mature in the political dissertations when it comes to politicising issues, when our people are hurting, just to make political points.“Get your facts, speak to the Ministers, speak to the Government benches and we will give you the facts and information you require to know and not assume and that way you won’t get up and sound foolish.“It’s better to be thought a fool than to stand up and remove all doubt, as a general rule of thumb.”Mrs Jackson objected to his comment, telling Speaker Stanley Lowe: “Again, I’m speechless. This is unparliamentary, it’s unethical, it’s un-everything.”Mr Lowe said: “You can object to something but you can’t make another speech.”He said the Minister had not called Mrs Jackson a fool though “he may have implied it”. He told her to take her seat and warned Mr Blakeney to “be careful”.Mr Blakeney said: “The Honourable Member, Ms Jackson, if you do take offence, I’m man enough to humbly apologise, because it wasn’t intended or directed at you per se. It was a general comment.”He said Government had a commitment to the Country and had been serving to the best of its ability since 1998.The Minister said that included making the electoral system fairer.In an apparent reference to Opposition leader Craig Cannonier, he said members on the other side now wanted to “rebrand and rename themselves and choose leaders and give them fast tracking rights and access to leadership without having necessarily earned it through a political process”.Shadow Attorney General Trevor Moniz interjected: “I think this member is forgetting which member put his hands around another member’s neck.”Mr Blakeney responded: “I wouldn’t expect anything less from that Honourable Member. That’s just that Honourable Member’s way. He always gets personal and he thinks he’s going to provoke people over this side to act out of character.”