Pandemic to Double Poverty

 

The supporters may applaud themselves for the speed of the Covid-19 vaccine development, after all, necessity is the mother of invention. However, the capitalist system has far less success at avoiding the economic effects of the pandemic. 

Destitution levels in Great Britain are expected to double in the wake of the pandemic with an estimated 2 million families, including a million children, likely to struggle to afford to feed themselves, stay warm, or keep clean as the recession deepens, according to a study carried out for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF). 

It describes “increasing, intensifying” levels of extreme poverty experienced by some of the country’s poorest households in recent years, and highlight a social security system increasingly failing to protect society’s most vulnerable.

Cuts in social security rates over the past decade, together with design flaws in universal credit and disability benefits, as well as the harsh impact of welfare reforms such as benefit caps, were driving sharp rises in extreme poverty even before Covid struck, the study said. Around 1m households experienced destitution in 2019, up 35% since 2017, equivalent to 2.4 million people. These rates were likely to have doubled in recent months, it said.

Over half of destitute individuals most commonly lacked food, followed by suitable clothing (49%) and basic toiletries (43%). A third of destitute households reported no income at all. While single people were most likely to be destitute, families – especially lone mothers – were increasingly at risk, the study said.

Although around one in five destitute people have complex needs such as homelessness, or drug and alcohol problems, most do not. One in seven destitute people were in insecure work or on zero-hours contracts. Over half (54%) of people in extreme poverty had a chronic health problem or disability.

Helen Barnard, director of JRF, said: “Our social security system should act as an anchor to hold us steady when we’re pulled down by powerful currents like job loss, illness or relationship breakdown. But, right now, our system is not doing enough to protect people from destitution.” She added: “It is appalling that so many people are going through this distressing and degrading experience, and we should not tolerate it. No one in our society should be unable to afford to eat or keep clean and sheltered. 

Over one in every 100 households in Blackpool, Kingston upon Hull, Liverpool, Manchester, Middlesbrough, Newcastle upon Tyne, Nottingham and Salford were in extreme poverty.

The underlying fragility of the welfare system was highlighted by the finding that half of destitute households in 2019 were in receipt of universal credit or had applied for it. The need to repay advance loans taken out to tide them through the five-week delay for a first benefit payment often left people with little to live on, the report said.

It was striking how Britain was increasingly reliant on charity food banks as a “core welfare response” to growing poverty destitution, the report said. “It seems unwise to rely on this voluntary effort to ensure that the basic physiological needs of large numbers of UK residents are met.”

It highlights long-term concerns over the adequacy of the UK social security system after a decade of austerity and with months of economic recession lying ahead.

“That all those present on UK soil during a national (global) health emergency should have access to the basic essentials for survival is the minimum that a rich and human society should undertake to ensure,” the study concluded.

Covid-driven recession likely to push 2m UK families into poverty | Society | The Guardian