by Nick Bailey
In July this year, the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) published the Listening to Troubled Families report with a great fanfare. Its stated aim was ‘to inform [government] thinking and policy development’. At its launch, Secretary of State Eric Pickles hailed the report as providing ‘real insights into these families’ lives’ and as offering a ‘true understanding of the challenges local authorities face’. The government had set aside £448 million to tackle the problems identified. In short, the report was portrayed as a solid piece of research driving an ‘evidence-based’ approach to policy making.
The new universal credit system is likely to increase financial help for working families on low incomes more than middle-income families, especially in the case of couple families. That's the conclusion of a 'preliminary assessment' of the government's planned scheme by think-tank researchers.
Plans to cut a further £10 billion from social security spending by 2016-17 were signalled by Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne in his speech to the Conservative Party conference. These cuts would come on top of the £18 billion savings already announced by the government in 2010. In a joint newspaper article with Iain Duncan Smith, Work and Pensions Secretary, Osborne suggested that steps would be taken to limit the number of children in workless families for whom benefits are paid, and to withdraw housing benefit from young people under 25 who have never worked. Prime Minister David Cameron also specifically referred to housing benefit cuts for young people in his own conference speech a few days later.
Anonymous 'sources' have told the BBC Newsnight programme that the government is considering ending the automatic annual increase in benefits in line with inflation.
According to the report, senior government figures are proposing a two-step change to the payment of benefits. At first there would be a freeze to a wide range of working-age benefits to last for two years. After that a new link would be introduced between benefit payments and increases in wages. The change would not be implemented quickly, but could be in place by 2014 – in time for the next General Election. Potential savings are 'simply mind-boggling' – as much as £7 billion a year.
But one benefit not being targeted is the state pension. Pensions are currently protected by a 'triple lock', rising each year by either inflation, earnings, or 2.5 per cent – whichever is highest.
The government's decision to change the way benefits and tax credits keep up with rising prices will cost the typical family with children £614 a year, says a think-tank analysis.
In the 2010 Budget the Chancellor announced that from April 2011 the uprating of benefits, tax credits and public service pensions would be based on the consumer prices index (CPI) rather than the retail prices index (RPI) - typically producing a lower figure. The think-tank report looks at what this change will mean for family budgets in the five years after the introduction of the new universal credit.
The proposed new universal credit system is on a 'disaster course' because of overwhelming practical problems, according to the government's former 'poverty tsar'.
Writing in the Guardian newspaper, Frank Field voices concern over 'unrealistic' timescales for implementing the computer system needed to make the government's scheme work; and he accuses the Department for Work and Pensions of 'burying its head in the sand' over the risks involved. He also reveals that he has asked the National Audit Office to carry out a special enquiry.
The UK’s wealthiest people could be asked to pay more tax for a limited period, under a suggestion from the Deputy Prime Minister. He said people of ‘very considerable’ wealth should contribute more in order to preserve social cohesion.
Nick Clegg was being interviewed by the Guardian newspaper ahead of the Liberal Democrats’ annual conference. He suggested new taxes should be drawn up going beyond his party’s existing proposal to impose a ‘mansion tax’ on properties worth more than £2 million. The new tax would also fall on wealth, rather than income. He said:
‘If we are going to ask people for more sacrifices over a longer period of time, a longer period of belt tightening as a country, then we just have to make sure that people see it is being done as fairly and as progressively as possible... The action is making sure that very high asset wealth is reflected in the tax system in the way that it isn’t now.’
Young unemployed people in London will be forced to do three months of unpaid full-time work or face having their benefits cut, under a new pilot scheme. The plan was unveiled in a joint announcement by the government and the Mayor of London.
Under the pilot, those aged 18–24 who had spent less than six months in employment since leaving education would have to work unpaid in order to qualify for their jobseeker’s allowance. They would do work experience placements in charities or social organisations such as care homes for 30 hours per week over a 13-week period. They would also have to spend 10 hours per week searching for a job.
The government said the purpose of the scheme is to help young Londoners to ‘improve their career prospects’ and ‘enable them to contribute to their communities’. The Mayor added that early intervention will reduce the ‘risks of benefit dependency’.
The Europe 2020 project has so far failed to promote coherent anti-poverty strategies, campaigners say. And the UK is ranked below the average on its approach to most poverty and social exclusion issues.
The European Anti-Poverty Network has looked at all the available reports submitted by member countries on progress towards the Europe 2020 goals (to reduce poverty and/or social exclusion by at least 20 million by 2020). They then rank countries on issues such as the effectiveness of policies to tackle child poverty, and measures to ensure an adequate minimum income and social protection.
There is a great deal of academic debate around the measurement of child poverty. The PSE: UK research provides the opportunity to gain a more nuanced picture of child poverty, drawing on three measurement approaches that can be investigated individually and/or combined to form composite measures. These approaches include income poverty, deprivation and social exclusion.