Category Archives: Benefits

Labour would keep two-child benefit cap, says Keir Starmer

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Leader says party in power will stick with Tory policy seen as driving low-income families into deeper poverty

Keir Starmer has confirmed that a Labour government would keep the Conservatives’ controversial two-child benefits cap, despite unease among his top team and leading academics over the policy, which has been blamed for pushing families into poverty.

Starmer said on Sunday that he was “not changing that policy”, when asked if he would scrap it if Labour wins the next election. His shadow work and pensions secretary, Jonathan Ashworth, had condemned it as “heinous” just last month.

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Labour urged again to vow to scrap Tories’ two-child benefit limit

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Exclusive: Data shows policy, deepening poverty among low-income families, affects about 1.5 million children

Labour has come under fresh pressure to vow to scrap the two-child benefit cap after it emerged one in four children in some of England and Wales's poorest parliamentary constituencies live in families left at least £3,000 a year out of pocket as a result of the policy.

The party’s stance on the policy, which critics say has been a major driver of deepening poverty among low-income families, is estimated to affect about 1.5 million children and is seen by some in Labour as an indicator of the strength of its determination to tackle child poverty.

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Benefits claimants in UK were underpaid by record £3.3bn last year

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National Audit Office criticises Department for Work and Pensions over its ‘material fraud and error’

Thousands of people in the UK could receive a payout after official figures revealed that benefit claimants were underpaid by £3.3bn last year, the highest level on record.

The Department for Work and Pensions also admitted that as many as 330,000 people, some of whom have since died, may have missed out on as much as £1.5bn of valuable state pension entitlement – a disclosure that prompted some commentators to warn of a new scandal. Steve Webb, the former pensions minister, said: “The scale of these errors is huge.”

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Keir Starmer refuses to commit to free school meals pledge

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Labour leader says ‘money is a big factor’ as he also declines to promise 6.5% pay rise for teachers

Keir Starmer has refused to commit to supporting free school meals for all primary school children, as he stuck to a tough fiscal position despite pressure from inside and outside of his party.

The Labour leader also declined to commit to a 6.5% pay rise for teachers as he urged the government to resolve the dispute at the centre of strike action.

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Chances were missed to save man who starved in Nottingham, report finds

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DWP, GP surgery and social landlord failed to spot risks for Errol Graham, who had benefits cut despite being severely mentally ill

Welfare officials failed to properly identify the risk of harm to Errol Graham, a severely mentally ill man whose disability benefit payments they cut off and who died of starvation eight months later, an official report has found.

An independent safeguarding review into the “shocking and disturbing” events leading to Graham’s tragic and lonely death concluded that multiple failings by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), his GP practice, and social landlord meant that chances to save him were missed.

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UK households missing out on £19bn a year in unclaimed welfare benefits

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Complexity of system and perception of government handouts as ‘shameful’ stopping people from accessing much-needed support

Millions of UK households are collectively missing out on at least £19bn a year in unclaimed welfare benefits, at a time when many are forced to use food banks or run up debt as they struggle with rising living costs, according to new estimates.

Lower income households are failing to claim benefits and other cash support for which they are eligible, according to a study by the consultancy Policy in Practice. Some families could be forgoing as much as £4,000 a year.

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Dominic Raab bullying claims: deputy PM refusing to resign after reading report – as it happened

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Dominic Raab denies wrongdoing after report on his behaviour delivered to Rishi Sunak this morning

Today’s announcement by the Association of School and College Leaders that it is to hold a formal ballot for national strike action for the first time in its history (see 9.49am) marks a significant development in the ongoing dispute between teachers and the government.

Up until now only members of the National Education Union (NEU) have taken strike action in England, with five more days of strikes planned for later this term. In addition a fresh ballot is to be held to provide the NEU with a mandate for further strike action up until Christmas.

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Food banks supported 800,000 UK children in 2021-22, data shows

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One-fifth of UK population was in relative poverty after first year of pandemic, when support measures scrapped

Families including 800,000 children were forced to turn to food banks to feed themselves as poverty levels started to rise again after the first year of the pandemic, the first official figures on UK food bank use show.

The statistics came in official poverty data, which revealed that the reduction in relative poverty achieved during the first year of the Covid crisis in 2020-21 was temporary and was reversed after ministers scrapped support measures.

In-work poverty remains high – half (54%) of people in poverty lived in a household where at least one adult was in work, while more than two-thirds of children in poverty (71%) lived in working families.

Child poverty rates were much higher among black (53%) and Asian (47%) families than white families (25%). About 44% of children in single-parent families, and 36% of children living in families where someone has a disability, were in poverty.

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Disabled people left short in universal credit move may get compensation

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Court rules against DWP in case where move to universal credit deprived claimants of £2,100 a year

Tens of thousands of disabled people across the UK wrongly deprived of benefits by the Department for Work and Pensions could share in compensation potentially totalling about £150m after an appeal court ruling.

Lawyers for two disabled men who first took the DWP to court five years ago have written to the government asking them to set out how they will compensate them and others who were left hundreds of pounds out of pocket each year after being moved on to universal credit.

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No 10 refuses to deny Sunak was given informal warning about Raab’s behaviour before he made him deputy PM – live

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Dominic Raab under increasing pressure as civil servants’ union calls for him to be suspended until bullying inquiry concludes

MPs have been told that paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland have coerced young people with drug debts to take part in rioting, PA Media reports. PA says:

A community worker gave an example of a user’s debt being reduced by £80 for doing so.

Megan Phair, coordinator of the Journey to Empowerment Programme and member of the Stop Attacks Forum, said both loyalist and dissident republican groups use the tactic to force people on to the streets.

It’s time for the prime minister to come out of hiding and face the music. The public deserves to know the truth about what he knew and when, including the full disclosure of any advice given to him by the Cabinet Office.

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Labour plans to embed career advisers in health services to help people into work

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Exclusive: employment strategy aimed at those ‘written off’ by society like young people with mental health issues, says Jonathan Ashworth

Labour will “put health and wellbeing” at the heart of its employment strategy by embedding career advisers in health services, including addiction clinics, rehab centres and primary care, the party has said.

In an interview with the Guardian, Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow work and pensions secretary, said the strategy would help people who had been “written off” to access work.

Devolving employment support to local authorities to target the best routes into work.

Tailored extra support to work flexibly for those with caring responsibilities or chronic conditions.

Offers of “in principle” decisions for access-to-work funding for disabled people.

Change the work capability assessment regime to allow people to accept a job without fearing they would not be able to return to the benefits they were receiving.

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Disabled people among hardest hit by cost of living crisis, finds study

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People with disabilities more likely to cut back on energy use and food, Resolution Foundation says

Disabled people in the UK are much more likely to struggle to heat their homes and cut back on food this winter, according to a report highlighting “massive” income gaps amid the cost of living squeeze.

Research from the Resolution Foundation found people with disabilities had an available amount to spend that was about 44% lower than that of other working-age adults, exposing them hugely to the rising cost of essentials.

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Free preschool childcare for all would boost UK growth, report finds

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Labour-endorsed study finds initiative would save families thousands of pounds, cut benefits spending and raise tax revenues

Free universal preschool childcare and more funding for after-school clubs could increase government revenues and save a family with young children between £620 and £6,175 a year, a joint report endorsed by the Labour party has revealed.

The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) and the charity Save the Children have called for a universal childcare guarantee for all families until the end of primary school to allow more women to get back into work and reduce the attainment gap between rich and poor children in their early years.

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BT asks ministers to help pay for low-cost broadband for poorest customers

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Critics say telecoms firms such as BT – which made £1.9bn profit last year – can afford to keep customers on benefits connected

BT has warned that the telecoms industry cannot afford an estimated potential loss of up to £2bn annually providing low-cost broadband to millions of the UK’s most financially pressured households, but critics have said they have an obligation to do so.

Marc Allera, the chief executive of BT’s consumer division, which includes the mobile company EE, said the industry needed government support to help cover the ongoing cost of providing cheap tariffs, the same way households have been helped with energy bills.

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Bank of England left in the dark ahead of new interest rate decision

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With fiscal statement deferred and mixed government messaging on tax and spending the BoE has little to go on

The Bank of England will next week consider how much to raise interest rates without having received any guidance from the government about its tax and spending policies, after Jeremy Hunt pushed back the date for this year’s “autumn statement”.

Its policymakers meet on 3 November to decide the increase in the cost of borrowing required to tackle a rate of inflation that climbed above 10% in September.

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Pensions triple lock and benefits in spotlight as Sunak delays fiscal plan

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No 10 not committing to keeping triple lock or inflation-linked benefits rise in 17 November statement

Ministers are to re-examine the pensions triple lock and increasing benefits in line with inflation over the next fortnight, according to No 10, after Rishi Sunak delayed the announcement of the government’s fiscal plans from 31 October to 17 November.

The Treasury has said the new date will now be a full autumn statement, with Sunak telling his cabinet that time needed to be made to do things in the proper way.

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Suella Braverman replaced by Grant Shapps; Labour motion calling for fracking ban fails – live

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Home secretary departs after sending an official document by personal email but uses resignation letter to criticise PM

Plans to create Great British Railways, a public sector body to oversee Britain’s railways, have been delayed, MPs have been told.

Anne-Marie Trevelyan, the transport secretary, told the Commons transport committee that the transport bill, which would have set up the new body, has been delayed because legislation to deal with the energy crisis is being prioritised. She said:

The challenges of things like the energy legislation we’ve got to bring in and various others has meant that we have lost the opportunity to have that [bill] in this third session.

What we are continuing to pitch for will be what I would call a narrow bill around the future of transport technologies, the legislation around things like e-scooters.

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

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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.

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

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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.

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Liz Truss meets European leaders in Prague as Irish deputy PM says NI protocol ‘a little too strict’ – as it happened

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This live blog has now closed, you can find our latest political coverage here

In his interview with LBC Jake Berry, the Tory chairman, was asked if he was channelling When Harry Met Sally when he described Liz Truss as the “Yes, yes, yes prime minister” in his speech to the conference yesterday. (Robert Hutton is very funny about this, and much else, in his sketch for the Critic.) Berry said he was referring to Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister when he delivered that line.

In the same interview, Berry revealed that his joke-making has not improved since yesterday. Talking about the conference in general, Berry said:

I think colleagues saw yesterday that when the going gets tough, the Truss gets going.

I do think my language was a bit clumsy in that regard and I regret it.

The point I was making ... is that the government needs to go for growth to ensure that it can grow the economy and Britain can get a pay rise. You don’t have to tell me how hard people graft in this economy. I know how hard people work.

We’ve got to wait until those figures are available … You simply cannot make a decision on figures you do not currently have.

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