UK leading anti-poverty organisation, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF), has warned that the Tory government’s plans to axe the Universal Credit uplift will be the biggest overnight cut to the basic rate of social security since the welfare state was created.
The SNP’s Work and Pensions spokesperson has said that the Chancellor, the Prime Minister and the rest of the Tory government should use the summer recess to consider the devastation their cruel plans will cause.
The JRF has estimated that the cuts will see the incomes of around six million families slashed, undermine the Scottish Child Payment, and plunge half a million more people into poverty – 200,000 of which are children.
Commenting, David Linden MP said:
“Rishi Sunak and Boris Johnson should use their summer recess to think about the impact this huge cut will have on the six million families across the UK, many of whom are already struggling to keep a roof over their heads.
“I am urging them to re-think their decision to go ahead with one of the biggest cuts in history, which will plunge 200,000 children into poverty, as well as undermine the positive impact the Scottish Child Payment is having, at a time when the UK is still reeling from a decade of Tory austerity, Brexit and a global pandemic.
“Instead the UK government must give support and put money in people’s pockets by making the uplift permanent and extending it to legacy benefits, scrapping the two-child cap and sanctions regime, and matching the Scottish Child Payment.
“Beyond this they must bring in a Real Living Wage.
“The JRF’s new data, which reveals that working families make up the majority of those who will be hit by the cut, trashes the Tories’ rhetoric that ‘working pays’.
“The Tories at Westminster continue to show they cannot be trusted with Scotland’s recovery and to protect the families that live here.
“The only way to build a strong, fair and equal recovery is for Scotland to become an independent country – with the full powers to create jobs, boost incomes and tackle poverty and inequality head on.”
