As certainly as the moon pulls on the tides, Labour governments improve the lives of the poorest children. Just as surely, Conservative governments pull back and reverse the good done. Here we go again: despite the social devastation caused by George Osborne’s cuts last time, Kemi Badenoch announces that she wants to impose cuts to universal credit for the poorest if she gets the chance.
She doesn’t do subtle, none of Iain Duncan Smith’s cruel-to-be-kind routine, but goes straight for populist rabble-rousing, stirring up fact-free contempt for anyone on benefits, with a proposed ban on buying cigarettes and alcohol, or gambling, with benefit money. Welfare, she says, must not be “a lifestyle choice for those who can’t be bothered”. As with all crude rightwing populism, the harm she does spreads hatred of the weak.
In this most unequal country, it encourages bullies to kick downwards, stifling more generous human instincts. Here’s how the pendulum swings: New Labour lifted nearly a million children out of poverty and set up 3,500 Sure Start centres, which supported families from birth. David Cameron and Osborne swept all that away with billions of pounds in benefit cuts directed at families, tipping more children into food-bank poverty.
Naturally, this Labour government has swung the pendulum back, taking 450,000 children from destitution by removing the Tory two-child benefit cap – albeit with too much delay. For the first time ever, the universal credit standard allowance will permanently rise above inflation, with free breakfast clubs for all primary schoolchildren in England, half a million more children eligible for free school meals in England, cheaper school uniforms and Best Start family hubs opening. But Labour has been bequeathed the worst fallout from 14 Tory years.
The nearly 1 million Neets – young people not in education, employment or training – are a legacy of Tory rule. Labour has made turning the tide on those aged 18 to 24 its flagship goal, hoping that numbers fall fast by the next election. The man who says it can is most in demand at meetings around the Labour conference next week.
Alan Milburn’s encyclopaedic report on the problem revealed the myriad reasons why so many of the young get left in limbo. Next month, before the budget, he will publish the plan for what’s to be done. I hear intense negotiations are in progress, down to the wire because this is in effect a white paper, not a report to gather dust but one ready to be implemented at once, with costings pre-agreed with PM, chancellor and relevant ministers.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
