A furious row has erupted after the Tories refused to rule out means testing the state pension if they win the next election.

Kemi Badenoch admitted her party would “look at” the pensions triple lock - which guarantees the payment goes up by at least 2.5% every year - as part of a policy review.

At the moment, every old person gets the same level of basic state pension, regardless of their wealth.

But speaking on LBC on Thursday night, she said: “We’re going to look at means testing. Means testing is something we don’t do properly here.

“I’m someone who always said that millionaires should not be getting the winter fuel payment, but what Rachel Reeves has done is the extreme version of that, where people who are on the breadline have had their winter fuel payment taken away.

“We don’t have a system that knows who should get what. That’s the sort of thing that we need to be looking at.”

Asked by HuffPost UK whether the Tories could means test the state pension in government, Badenoch’s office refused to say.

Tory co-chair Nigel Huddleston also failed to deny it could be cut for some pensioners when quizzed on it this morning.

A Labour Party spokesperson, said: “Kemi Badenoch and her Tory Party chair have let the mask slip: they’d cut your state pension. 

“The Conservatives are still in chaos, announcing policies on the hoof that would mean a raid on pension pots.”

The Liberal Democrats also launched an attack ad saying Badenoch would “scrap the triple lock”.

A source said: “First Kemi Badenoch came for the mothers and now she has set her sights on the grandmothers.

“Millions of pensioners felt betrayed by Labour’s cut to the winter fuel payment, now it’s clear their pensions aren’t safe with the Conservatives.

“We will be reminding pensioners at every opportunity that Kemi Badenoch wants to take an axe to the triple lock.”

A Badenoch ally told HuffPost UK: “Kemi literally said yesterday she is going to take her time building policy, and she wants to look at everything: means testing, tuition fees, immigration and so on.

“The fact that Labour are rushing out fake press releases to pretend that these are policies rather than debates we need and must have, shows Starmer and Reeves are the old, dishonest politics and they’re already out of ideas.”