Cost of Living — House of Commons, 2022-07-05
Topic: Social Welfare
Deborah Angela Elspeth Marie Abrahams (Labour, Centre-left): I recognise what the hon. Member says. I visited Glasgow last week—the constituency of my friend the hon. Member for Glasgow South West is there—and it was interesting to see the reforms being introduced there, particularly those for disabled people. Many hon. Members will not be aware of yesterday’s report from Deaths by Welfare, which provided even more evidence of the impact of the so-called reforms on premature deaths and suicides. It had a timeline that showed when there had been reforms and further cuts, and what they meant in terms of deaths of vulnerable social security claimants. Another recent report shows a detrimental impact on social cohesion. The University of Newcastle quantified that, between 2013 and 2015, for every £100 lost in income per working age adult, motivated hate crimes increased by about 6%. The effects are much wider than the Government recognise My second point is about the pandemic. We know that people on the lowest incomes, and particularly those reliant on social security support, were disproportionately and negatively affected by covid. They were more likely to be exposed to the virus and to be infected, and they were more likely to be seriously ill and die. Within that group are disabled people. After adjusting for a range of factors including health, the Office for National Statistics has estimated that disabled people were between 1.3 and 1.6 times more at risk of death from covid. The reasons for those disproportionate deaths must be investigated in the covid public inquiry, but given the context that I have just described—the inadequacy of our social security system—the contribution of the cuts in social security support cannot be ignored On the cost of living package and its impact on the DWP spending estimates, of course I welcome the package, but I have just spent the past few minutes describing the context and, much though the Government congratulate themselves on what they are doing, it just about scratches the surface of the cuts that they have made. I must, as others have done, highlight some of the gaps in the package. As support is on a household basis, larger families will not get the same support as smaller families. As the Resolution Foundation suggested, in the light of inflation, a 9.5% uplift to all social security support would have been more progressive than the 3.1% awarded at the beginning of the year, and would have taken us beyond the Chancellor’s stop-start, ad hoc approach My concern is that the cost of living will not just be an issue this year; it will carry on—and what will the Government do then? We need principles that ensure that all social security support is uplifted to account for inflation As my friend the hon. Member for Glasgow South West mentioned, there are huge issues with deductions. We asked the Secretary of State about that last week. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation, StepChange and many other charities have pointed out that 4.6 million households are in arrears on at least one bill, so what is handed out with one hand will be clawed back by another. I join those charities and hon. Members in their calls to reduce the amount that can be deducted from the universal credit standard allowance; it is now 25%. I would like it to be less than 15%. When the deductions are for debts to Government—figures indicate that the Government are the largest debt collector—it would only be reasonable to reduce it to 5% My final point is that given the cuts in spending and the culture in the Department, our social security system does not provide the safety net that everybody thinks it does. I really like the approach being introduced in Scotland, which is not about people proving that they are entitled to support; there is trust. We should try to make that the basis of the culture in England as well.