It’s the elephant in the room during this ‘Brexit election’...
SOME people are billing this as “the Brexit election”. It suggests that the top issue that will decide how people vote is Brexit. But all the political parties are actually keen to bring other issues into the debate.
Conservative leader Boris Johnson presents Brexit not as an end in itself but as the key to carrying out his domestic agenda, which includes increasing funding for schools, hospitals and police.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn says that this election is a "once-in-ageneration chance to transform our country”.
One of the issues that all the major parties could focus on is poverty.
Research by Loughborough University for the End Child Poverty campaign found that parts of Birmingham have the highest levels of child poverty in the country.
Academics identified the 20 UK constituencies with the highest rates of child poverty.
They include Birmingham Hodge Hill, where 23,985 children or 53.5 per cent of the total are in poverty.
They also include Birmingham Ladywood, where 19,364 children or 49.6 per cent are in poverty, and Birmingham Hall Green where the figure is 19,628 children, 47.2 per cent of the total.
A particular concern is the number of people who find themselves in poverty even though they work.
Research by the House of Commons found 15 per cent of working age adults in the West Midlands who live in households where at least one adult works is in poverty. That’s nearly one in six people.
Poverty is defined as a household income which is lower than 60 per cent of the median household income.
It’s sometimes said that work used to be a route out of poverty, but that this is no longer the case.
However, it’s worth nothing that the chances of being in poverty are still much higher for households where nobody works.
The statistics show 55 per cent of working-age adults in this situation are in poverty.
One vivid example of the impact of extreme poverty is the level of homelessness and rough sleeping in the city.
Earlier this year, official figures revealed that 23 homeless people died in Birmingham in just one year.
That was up from 18 people the year previously.
The Office for National Statistics revealed that 17 people who died in Birmingham in 2018 were officially identified as homeless.
But the Office for National Statistics says that it believes that other people died in the city who were also homeless, despite not being officially listed as such, bringing the total figure to 23.
And it warned this was a “conservative estimate, so the real numbers may still be higher.”
In the West Midlands region, including the West Midlands Combined Authority and the surrounding shire counties, 64 homeless people died in one year.
Nationwide, an estimated 726 homeless people died in England and Wales in 2018, the highest year-to-year increase since records began, the Office for National Statistics has said.
Most of the deaths in 2018 were men, 88 per cent of the total, the government body revealed.
Birmingham had the highest number of deaths of any local authority in the country, but it also has the largest population. Once population size is taken into account, the city had a lower death rate than many other places including Newcastle, Sheffield, Manchester and Liverpool.
And it also emerged earlier this year that the homelessness, poverty and the impact of Universal Credit, the new benefits system, is making people ill.
According to NHS trusts, rising demand for healthcare is linked to a shortage of housing, employment and the changes to the benefit system.
The point was made by Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, the body that represents NHS trusts, when she spoke to MPs at Westminster.
She said: “The causes of that demand include things such as housing, employment and the changes to benefits and universal credit, which came out as one of the highest issues.
“We are really looking at the wider socioeconomic impact on raw demand for services in trusts. I think that is really important.”
A report published by NHS Providers warned: “Ninety two per cent of trusts tell us that changes to universal credit and benefits are increasing demand for services, as are loneliness, homelessness and wider deprivation. Cuts to services funded by local authorities also mean that preventative approaches and early intervention services are less available.”
Health managers also said that drug use was a growing problem – made worse by cuts to council-run services designed to help drug users.
The chair of one mental health trust, quoted in the NHS Providers report, explained the situation this way: “Main impact is from high and increasing levels of deprivation in this post-industrial area – so the main determinant is economic.
“Locally, substance misuse is rising rapidly and funding of provision for care and treatment via local authorities has more than halved
– the consequences were and are self-evident.”
There are plenty of issues that could come up in this election.
And it’s fair to say that they are already being discussed to some extent. But fighting poverty could certainly be more in the spotlight than it has been so far.