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UK on track for ‘biggest overnight social security cuts since Second World War’, says thinktank
Government plans to reduce Universal Credit by £20 a week will inflict the biggest overnight cut to the basic rate of social security in the history of the modern welfare state, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) has warned.
The basic rate of Universal Credit was raised by £20 per week in April 2020 as part of a raft of government welfare changes to support low earners during the COVID-19 pandemic, but new proposals could see the weekly allowance drop back to pre-pandemic levels from 6 October.
JRF analysis shows that around six million families could be impacted by the cuts, with a total of half a million people, including 200,000 children, forecasted to be pulled below the poverty line as a result.
Working families will be the most heavily affected, according to the thinktank, suffering cuts to both Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit this year. Single-parent families are also disproportionately affected, with six in 10 seeing an income reduction equivalent to £1,040 per year.
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The proposals call into question the government’s commitment to “levelling up” poorer areas of the country, the JRF said, with the impact of the cuts forecasted to be greatest across the North of England, Wales, the West Midlands and Northern Ireland.
Before the April 2020 increase, basic rate social security income had been frozen for five years at £251.77 per month for single Universal Credit claimants under 25, and £317.82 per month for single claimants over 25 years old.
Publishing the findings, Katie Schmuecker, deputy director of policy and partnerships at the JRF, said: “Universal Credit has been a lifeline that has helped keep millions of heads above water, but the new analysis should act as a stark warning of the immense, immediate and avoidable consequences of what amounts to the biggest overnight cut to the basic rate of social security since the Second World War.”
“We all accept governing is about priorities but cutting the incomes of millions of the poorest families and sucking money out of the places in which they live flies in the face of the government’s mission to level up our country.”
Inside Housing has contacted the Department for Work and Pensions.
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