One in 7 Britons skipping meals in cost of living crisis, says TUC

Posted on October 18, 2022 by Admin

UK heading for ‘Victorian levels of poverty’ unless pay and benefits rise with inflation, says union body

One in seven people in the UK are skipping meals or going without food, according to new polling data released by the Trades Union Congress (TUC).

The data from an MRP poll by Opinium reveals that more than half of British people are cutting back on heating, hot water and electricity in the cost of living squeeze, and one in 12 have missed the payment of a household bill.

Inflation and inadequate welfare fuelling Australia’s food insecurity crisis, Foodbank finds

Posted on October 16, 2022 by Admin

The charity’s annual Hunger Report estimates about 500,000 households on any given day struggle with getting enough to eat

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The cost-of-living crisis and inadequate welfare payments are fuelling a rise in food insecurity in Australian households, according to a new report.

The charity Foodbank’s annual Hunger Report, to be released on Monday for Anti Poverty Week, surveyed more than 4,000 Australian adults, finding the problem extended beyond those on fixed incomes and was affecting many people in work.

UK food banks at breaking point urge Liz Truss to boost aid to poorest

Posted on October 16, 2022 by Admin

As cost of living crisis bites, 3,000 volunteers across several organisations sign letter of warning to the prime minister

Thousands of food bank volunteers will warn Liz Truss on Monday that they are having to ration provisions, as their services have become “overstretched and exhausted” because of an influx of people needing their help.

In a sign of a continuing cost of living crisis that was building even before the economic crisis that followed the government’s mini-budget, a letter signed by more than 3,000 food bank workers will be delivered to Downing Street.

Billionaire MacKenzie Scott donates $15m to help provide glasses to farmers in developing countries

Posted on October 12, 2022 by Admin

Donation is believed to be the largest single donation towards helping solve the problem of uncorrected blurry vision

MacKenzie Scott, the billionaire philanthropist and former wife of the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has donated $15m (£13.5m) to a social enterprise that helps provide glasses to farmers in developing countries.

Scott’s donation to VisionSpring is believed to be the largest single private donation towards helping solve the problem of uncorrected blurry vision which leaves hundreds of millions of people in poverty.

Poorer families risk £1,000 hit from earnings-related benefits rise

Posted on October 12, 2022 by Admin

Below-inflation rise would save exchequer tenth of £40bn to be given out through tax cuts, says thinktank

If the government raises benefits in line with earnings rather than inflation next year, it would drastically cut the incomes of poorer working-age families, while saving less than a tenth of the cost of recent tax cuts, a leading economic thinktank has calculated.

Such a change, which would mean a significant real-terms cut given that wages are rising at 5.5% with inflation close to 10%, could see the effective income of some families reduced by up to £1,000 a year, the Resolution Foundation said.

One in five families in Liz Truss’s seat would lose out under real-term benefit cuts

Posted on October 11, 2022 by Admin

Research from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation shows impact of increasing benefits in line with earnings, not inflation

At least one in five working-age families in most UK constituencies – including in Liz Truss’s seat – would lose out by hundreds of pounds on average if real-terms benefit cuts go ahead, a study has found.

The scale of the impact of a below-inflation rise on already struggling households and by extension, local shops and businesses, is revealed in a study by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF). It would amount to the biggest-ever real terms cut to benefits in a single year.

Liz Truss on verge of major U-turn on real-terms benefits cut

Posted on October 9, 2022 by Admin

Exclusive: Tory MPs warn PM she would lose vote on increasing benefits only in line with earnings rather than inflation

Liz Truss is teetering on the edge of performing another big U-turn as Tory MPs warned she would lose a vote on delivering a real-terms cut to benefits while new research showed the move could push an extra 450,000 people into poverty.

Despite desperate pleas for party unity from senior ministers after weeks of bitter infighting, the row over welfare threatened to overshadow the prime minister’s attempt to reassert her authority when the Commons returns from recess on Tuesday.

Older people at risk from overcharging and mis-selling ‘scandal’

Posted on October 9, 2022 by Admin

Unnecessary policies and overpayments for services are draining the accounts of vulnerable customers

Elderly and vulnerable customers are being routinely overcharged by utility and insurance firms in a hidden scandal highlighted today by one of the country’s senior financial services executives. Unfair practices are putting them at risk of being unable to afford food and heating, he warns.

Michael Donald, a former director of Visa UK, said he was staggered to discover hundreds of pounds of overcharging when he carefully checked the direct debits on his 79-year-old mother’s accounts.

Teaching assistants quitting schools for supermarkets because of ‘joke’ wages

Posted on October 9, 2022 by Admin

Headteachers fear impact on children of unfilled vacancies as support staff say rising bills force them to leave jobs in education

Headteachers across the country say they cannot fill vital teaching assistant vacancies and that support staff are taking second jobs in supermarkets to survive because their wages are “just a joke”.

Schools are reporting that increasing numbers of teaching assistants are leaving because they will not be able to pay for high energy bills and afford food this winter. And with job ads often attracting no applications at all, heads fear they will be impossible to replace. They warn this will have a serious impact on children in the classroom, especially those with special educational needs, and will make it increasingly hard for teachers to focus on teaching.

Phoenix could see deadliest year for heat deaths after sweltering summer

Posted on October 8, 2022 by Admin

With 22 days hitting 110F or higher, suspected heat deaths in the Arizona capital topped 450

Extreme heat contributed to as many as 450 deaths in the Phoenix area this summer, in what could be the deadliest year on record for the desert city in Arizona.

The medical examiner for Maricopa county, which includes Phoenix, has so far confirmed 284 heat-related deaths, while investigations into 169 more suspected heat fatalities are ongoing. The highest number of deaths – and emergency hospital visits – coincided with the hottest days and nights.

Sudan faces ‘generational catastrophe’ as millions of children miss school

Posted on October 5, 2022 by Admin

Floods, militia raids and hunger mean a third of children are not in school at all, while the rest have too few teachers, aid groups warn

Nearly every school-age child in Sudan is missing out on education, either completely or facing serious disruption, aid organisations have warned.

Schools in some states reopened this week after delays due to severe flooding but millions of children are still unable to go, leaving the country facing a “generational catastrophe”.

Hypothermia deaths of unhoused people rise sharply in Los Angeles, records reveal

Posted on October 4, 2022 by Admin

Data obtained by the Guardian shows at least 14 unhoused people froze to death in 2021, part of an overall surge in homeless deaths

At least 14 unhoused people froze to death on the streets of Los Angeles in 2021, new county data reveals, marking a sharp increase in reports of hypothermia fatalities and a grim sign of how dire the region’s homelessness catastrophe has become.

Out of 14 deaths where the LA coroner’s office cited “cold exposure” and hypothermia last year, six victims died on sidewalks, according to public records obtained by the Guardian. Four died in hospitals, and the others were found at a bus bench, a parking lot, a dried-up riverbed and an abandoned building. The death toll is significantly higher than previous years, with six reported hypothermia deaths in 2020, nine in 2019, seven in 2018 and three in 2017.

Private rental market ‘the epicentre’ of Australia’s housing affordability problem, report finds

Posted on September 29, 2022 by Admin

Productivity Commission finds rent prices are driving demand for social housing and homelessness services

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A $1.6bn agreement to help facilitate affordable housing in Australia has failed to reduce inequity and national reform is now imperative, the Productivity Commission has found.

The commission on Friday released the findings of its review into the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement (NHHA), the key document that governs federal funding to the states for housing services. The sharply worded report urges the government to overhaul commonwealth rent assistance, focus on fixing the rental crisis, and wind back concessions and grants for homebuyers in favour of funding stretched homelessness services.

Mini-budget 2022: pound crashes as chancellor cuts stamp duty and top rate of income tax – live

Posted on September 23, 2022 by Admin

Tax cuts to cost Treasury around £37bn in 2023-24, official figures reveal

Mini-budget 2022: what does it mean for your money?

There are no urgent questions in the morning, and so Kwasi Kwarteng, the chancellor, will be delivering his statement soon after 9.30am.

The Commons starts sitting at 9.30am, but they always begin with prayers in private, and so Kwarteng will be up a few minutes later.

The last time they did it one third of the beneficiaries were people buying second homes or buy to let, so we are sceptical that this is the magic bullet to increase homeownership. What we really need to do is to build more houses and to help get people onto the property ladder by increasing the supply of housing.

When this has been done before, it has often fuelled an already hot market and many of the beneficiaries have been people buying a second or third home, rather than the first time buyers that we really want to help who are often trapped in private rented accommodation where they’re paying as much in rent every month as they would in a mortgage.

‘We’re in a moral crisis’: US faith leaders urge lawmakers to combat poverty

Posted on September 22, 2022 by Admin

Coalition gathers on Capitol Hill to deliver impassioned demand to improve life for low-income Americans

A coalition of faith leaders gathered on Capitol Hill on Thursday to deliver an impassioned demand for more congressional action to combat poverty, telling lawmakers they have a moral obligation to improve life for low-income Americans.

The faith leaders called on the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate to take at least three votes on major progressive issues before midterm elections in November.

Bring back eviction ban or face ‘catastrophic’ homelessness crisis, ministers told

Posted on September 21, 2022 by Admin

Sir Bob Kerslake calls on government to protect at-risk tenants as it did during pandemic

The former head of the civil service has warned of a looming “catastrophic” homelessness crisis caused by the cost of living unless the government reintroduces the eviction ban that protected tenants during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Sir Bob Kerslake, who chairs the Kerslake Commission on Homelessness and Rough Sleeping, said a failure to act “could see this become a homelessness as well as an economic crisis and the results could be catastrophic; with all the good achieved in reducing street homelessness since the pandemic lost, and any hope of the government meeting its manifesto pledge to end rough sleeping by 2024 gone”.

Demand for crisis support soars even in wealthy UK towns

Posted on August 31, 2022 by Admin

Citizens Advice in affluent Wokingham says requests for help have nearly doubled in a year

A growing number of people in one of the most affluent areas of the country are struggling financially because of a huge spike in energy bills and the soaring cost of living, according to the chief executive of Wokingham Citizens Advice.

Many people who have been “just about managing” are now slipping into poverty and debt in Berkshire, said Jake Morrison, making him fearful for poorer regions throughout the country.

Food banks warn surge in demand will prevent feeding hungriest this winter

Posted on August 30, 2022 by Admin

Exclusive: Nearly 70% of providers say they may need to turn people away or shrink the size of emergency rations

Food banks across Britain have warned of a “completely unsustainable” surge in demand that will prevent them feeding the hungriest families this winter.

Organisations representing 169 food banks told the Guardian the number of people seeking emergency help had already grown “dramatically” and predicted “bleak and disturbing” weeks ahead.

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Category Archives: Poverty

Inflation and inadequate welfare fuelling Australia’s food insecurity crisis, Foodbank finds

Billionaire MacKenzie Scott donates $15m to help provide glasses to farmers in developing countries

Poorer families risk £1,000 hit from earnings-related benefits rise

Liz Truss on verge of major U-turn on real-terms benefits cut

Older people at risk from overcharging and mis-selling ‘scandal’

Teaching assistants quitting schools for supermarkets because of ‘joke’ wages

Sudan faces ‘generational catastrophe’ as millions of children miss school

Hypothermia deaths of unhoused people rise sharply in Los Angeles, records reveal

Private rental market ‘the epicentre’ of Australia’s housing affordability problem, report finds

Mini-budget 2022: pound crashes as chancellor cuts stamp duty and top rate of income tax – live

‘We’re in a moral crisis’: US faith leaders urge lawmakers to combat poverty

Food banks warn surge in demand will prevent feeding hungriest this winter