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LONG range weather forecasting is an inexact science but looking at the data on the net it seems that we could well be headed for the coldest winter since the early 1980s.

If that is the case then Gordon Brown should start thinking about saving our pensioners rather than fat cat bankers,

Every year in Britain thousands more old people die in the winter months than in the summer months and in colder winters it is tens of thousands.

It doesn’t happen in most other European countries and the fact that it does here is nothing short of a national disgrace.

This year there is the added worry that many old folk will be too worried about bills to turn on their heating because the tariffs are still so high, even though the price of oil has fallen by two thirds since the summer.

“Fortunately we are spared the very worst of the weather most years but many will recall the dire freeze up of 1981 when the temperatures dropped to minus 20 and the Queen was forced to delay her journey in a pub while crossing the Cotswolds.

“Those with longer memories will recall the weeks of snow in 1963.

“I was only five at the time and it was fun being pulled along Boreham Road on a sledge by my father as we went to the coal depot in Station Road.

Pictured: Warminster in the big freeze up of 1963 - the snow-covered yard of metal merchants S J Smart and Son in Station Road - in the background is Weeks’ Station Café. The yard is now the site of Homeminster House.