Category: #ToryWarOnThePoor

#ToryWarOnThePoor

Benefit delays leave hundreds of thousands penniless and reliant on foodbanks

From Welfare Weekly: Delays in processing new benefit claims are leaving tens of thousands of vulnerable adults and children without money for long periods of time and dependent on foodbanks to stave off hunger, damning figures from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) reveal.

Minister of State for Employment Alok Sharma confirmed in a written Commons answer that the DWP failed to achieve its own target of processing new claims within ten days on 214,000 occasions last year.

This is equivalent to more than 1 in 10 claims, leaving some of the poorest in society struggling to heat their homes and put food on the table.

The same figures also reveal how more than 970,000 claims took longer than a week to be processed.

Mr Sharma admitted 110,180 Jobseekers Allowance (JSA) claimants and 103,650 Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) claimants waited more than two weeks for their first payment.

More than 671,000 JSA claimants and 302,900 ESA claimants were made to wait longer than a week before hearing from the DWP, iNews reports.

[Read full article on Welfare Weekly…]

Councils forced to fund emergency help for universal credit claimants

From The Guardian: Cash-strapped councils are being forced to set aside extra resources to cushion the blow of switching to universal credit for vulnerable households, according to analysis by Labour.

Responses to a series of freedom of information requests submitted by the party have revealed many local authorities are allocating significant funds to support tenants with rent arrears and provide advice to help them navigate the new system.

Newcastle city council reported that it was spending £390,000 supporting UC claimants, almost a quarter of which was for additional rent arrears support.

Liverpool city council said it had spent £175,000 from its local welfare provision scheme on UC claimants, while Shropshire council said it had set aside £20,000 to help food banks to “diversify the type of help they are able to give specifically to suit universal credit.”

In London, Tower Hamlets council said it had set aside £5m over three years to help those affected by the shift to UC, while Barking and Dagenham is budgeting £50,000 from January 2018.

In total, 26 councils said they had set aside extra resources or anticipated increased demand for welfare support as the UC rollout reaches their area.

[Read full article on Guardian website…]

A mother given 50p a week for housing: the benefit cap one year on

The head of policy at the Chartered Institute of Housing writes in the Guardian: “A year on from the introduction of the lower benefit cap, its abiding legacy is to push people closer to homelessness.

“The cap, introduced on 7 November 2016, reduced the total amount any family can receive in benefits from £26,000 to £23,000 in London and £20,000 outside the capital, leaving families with significant shortfalls between the benefits they get and the cost of their housing.

“In our most recent research we spoke to 18 families with capped benefit across the UK and each time we heard a familiar story – one of stress, struggle and a daily fight to remain in their home.

“Half of those families said they had gone without food, fuel or were otherwise in debt as a result of the cut. Among a raft of other hardships a third said they had been forced to use food banks.”

Read more

“Forcing people into hunger does not incentivise work”: Mhairi Black’s Commons speech on Universal Credit goes viral

SNP MP’s Mhairi Black’s fierce speech in the House of Commons on Universal Credit has gone viral on social media, with over 9 million views on Facebook alone.

“Plunging people into debt does not incentivise work. Forcing people into hunger does not incentivise work. Causing anxiety and distress, and even evicting some families from their homes, does not incentivise work.”

SNP MP #MhairiBlack gives a fierce speech in the House of Commons on #UniversalCredit:"Plunging people into debt does…

Posted by Stop The Tories Channel on Wednesday, October 18, 2017

Tory Government won’t reduce the six-week wait for Universal Credit despite MPs’ warnings

From the Guardian: Theresa May will not reduce the six-week delay faced by many Universal Credit claimants despite being warned by Conservative MPs that the policy is hurting vulnerable families, sources have told the Guardian.

On Wednesday, Labour will reveal new figures, that suggest Universal Credit cuts could push 1 million more children into poverty by 2020. Read more

Surge in demand at foodbanks in Universal Credit trial borough as claimants wait 13 weeks for cash

From Southwark News: Demand at foodbanks in the London Borough of Southwark has surged due to waits of up to three months for people starting on Universal Credit to get their first payments, it has been claimed.

More than 4,000 Southwark residents have joined the Universal Credit system since it was introduced at local Job Centres in early 2016. Labour councillor Fiona Colley said claimants have “dropped off a cliff” for periods of twelve to thirteen weeks, forcing them into rent arrears.

Universal Credit (UC) – which groups six types of benefit into one payment – was touted as the Conservative Party’s big hitting welfare reform after they came to power in 2010. Read more

DWP Universal Credit case manager: “What I’ve witnessed is shocking”

A DWP manager writes in the Independent: “Many of my colleagues feel out of their depth with the quantity of claims they manage, resulting in a vast amount of crucial work never being completed until claimants contact us when their payments are inevitably paid incorrectly or not at all.”

[Read full article on the Independent website…]

Tory Cabinet Minister is ill-informed and dismissive when questioned about the 55p-per-minute Universal Credit helpline

From The Independent: Liz Truss, the Tory minister who thought Britain’s level of cheese imports was a ‘disgrace’, had a paltry answer when it came to charging welfare claimants 55p-per-minute to call the government helpline.

[Read full story with video on the Independent website…]

Universal Credit: Theresa May flannels when asked “How are people going to eat?”

The BBC’s Andrew Marr asks Theresa May about the rollout of Universal Credit, which is denying many destitute people any money at all for six weeks: “How are people going to eat?”

To paraphrase May’s rambling response: “We’re looking at it.”

Britain under the Tories. A Prime Minister unable to answer the question: 'how are people going to eat?'

Posted by Durham Miners' Association on Sunday, October 1, 2017

Universal Credit claimant: “I don’t even have 4p to my name”

Kelly tells the BBC she applied for Universal Credit two weeks ago, and has been told her first payment will be on 28th October. She has no money at all. She says: “It’s a lot of weeks to wait. I’m relying on food banks. My friends have had to wait 12 weeks.”

Gail says: “I knew that it would be at least six weeks before I got any money. I knew I’d be without money… [Debt] ruins your life. It spirals out of control so fast when you’re in debt.”

[View video on BBC Online…]

Universal Credit: a personal story

A personal story sent in over the recent Bank Holiday weekend by a #StopTheTories Channel reader who doesn’t want to be named…

“I’m on universal credit. I’m currently unable to work, same with my partner, and we have a 3-year-old son and are expecting our next just after Christmas.

“We only get £723 in benefits between the three of us for a month. We tend to spend that on food, gas and electric for the month on the day we get it and are usually left struggling by the last week or so before our next benefit payment.

“I’ve recently had to sell most of my possessions just to get us through those last weeks. We’ve got nothing left to sell and our refrigerator broke down during the night on Monday. We were able to salvage the frozen food but all fridged goods were lost. As a result we currently haven’t eaten [for nearly three days] (we have food for our child). Read more

GP: “Poverty is at the heart of the mental health crisis”

Dr Maureen Tilford and Rev Paul Nicolson write on the Guardian letters page: “There has been a massive increase in calls to the Metropolitan Police involving mental health problems, with as many as one every five minutes.

“Psychiatric conditions not only occur at higher rates in the poorest areas, but also cluster together, usually in disintegrating inner-city communities… Poverty can be both a cause and a consequence of poor mental health.

“Poverty and social inequality have direct and indirect effects on the social, mental and physical wellbeing of an individual. It is clear that poverty and inequality are closely linked and that income inequality produces psychosocial stress.”

[Read full letters on Guardian website…]

Poundland ‘gets jobless to work for free under government scheme’

From The Guardian: Poundland has been criticised for employing jobseekers, without pay, for up to two months under a deal with the Tory government.

Several of those who have wo rked on the scheme told the Guardian they had worked up to 30 hours a week for at least three weeks stacking shelves in Poundland. They were told that the work experience was voluntary but one said: “I had no say in it really.”

“Considering it is supposed to be work experience you’d think they would teach you how to work the till. But we have just been stacking shelves all day,” one person on the scheme told the Guardian.

Poundland paid no wages and made no other contribution. Participants said they were not provided with any paperwork to record the time they had spent in a store.

Read more

Mhairi Black on the Tory manifesto

Well said Mhairi, England and Wales need to vote Labour

Posted by Against Tories and Tory Austerity on Sunday, May 14, 2017

Millions of poor UK households face massive cuts to their incomes under Tory benefit cuts, warn researchers

From The Independent: Nearly 3m working households with children on tax credits would be an average of £2,500 a year worse off under Conservative benefit cuts in the pipeline, independent researchers warn today.

[Read article on Independent website…]

#ToryBritain #ToriesForThe1Percent Source: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/poor-uk-households-incomes-tory-benefits-cuts-dwp-conservatives-ifs-fiscal-studies-research-brexit-a7705556.html

Posted by Stop The Tories Channel on Friday, April 28, 2017

A woman using food banks breaks down on live TV: “I need to let the nation know what it’s like”

From The Canary: Tracey Culham said using food banks is “the most degrading thing”, especially when “you’ve worked all your life”. Her intervention on national television is a glimpse of the reality for many under the Conservative austerity programme.

The Conservative government is directly responsible for pushing ordinary people into food poverty. The number of three-day food packages sent out by the Trussell Trust alone increased from 40,898 to 1,182,954 between 2010 and 2016-17. That’s a record-breaking increase of 2,792% since the Conservatives came to power.

But it’s worse than that. A report by the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Hunger estimates that over half the emergency food issued comes from organisations independent from the Trussell Trust’s figures. This means the real numbers are much higher.

Read more

DWP ‘tells disability benefits assessors to discriminate against people with mental health conditions’

From The Independent: New guidelines from the Department for Work & Pensions (DWP) to assessors for the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) benefit appears to explicitly single out those with mental health conditions who suffer identical impacts as those with physical conditions.

[Read article on Independent website…]

Homelessness at record levels as numbers rise at ‘appalling rate’ since Tories came to power

From Daily Mirror: Rough sleeping in England has hit record levels, doubling under the Tories, as a homelessness charity say numbers are rising at an “appalling rate”. The number of rough sleepers has risen by 133% since 2010, and by 51% in the last two years, according to official figures released this morning.

[Read article on Daily Mirror website…]

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