The Tories’ universal credit has to be axed
» Brown says halt roll-out » ‘5m kids facing poverty’
GORDON Brown today calls for a halt to the roll out of “cruel and vindictive” universal credit, warning it will plunge a record five million children below the breadline.
The Mirror is backing the former Prime Minister by launching our Stop Universal the Credit Cruelty campaign and we ask readers to support us.
In trials, the new benefits system has already plunged families into debt and rent arrears – yet the Tories are rolling it out nationally from July.
Mr Brown, architect of Labour’s tax credits programme to take children out of poverty, predicts that left unchecked, UC could lead to a repeat of the poll tax fiasco which triggered riots and toppled Margaret Thatcher.
Writing in this newspaper, Mr Brown says that after 50 years in politics, he never expected to see poverty and hardship returning on such a terrible scale.
He warns: “With the convulsions of Brexit in March and universal credit four months later, we face a summer of division and despair.”
Mr Brown is the most prominent voice among a growing number of public figures demanding an end to the national roll out of a complicated, meaner system which experts say leaves families shortchanged.
Critics complain UC, merging six benefits into a single one, is harsher on people both in and out of work and is effectively a near £3billion welfare cut.
Campaigners have said some families could end up £200 a month worse off.
In trial areas, claimants have waited up to six weeks for payments with many relying on foodbanks for handouts.
Mr Brown, who describes UC as “cruel and vindictive beyond austerity”, says four million children are already in poverty and that figure is set to hit five million by 2022. He an d the Mirror are demanding a halt to the expansion of UC and for a review to take place. We say there are three options: ■ Redesign UC to be fit for purpose.
■ Axe it in favour of the old system if UC is unfixable.
■ Introduce a brand new system. Mr Brown is also challenging Tory Chancellor Philip Hammond to unveil a “Budget for Children” on October 29 with higher child benefit and tax credits. The ex-Chancellor will tonight emphasise his demands in a speech at Edinburgh University in memory of motor neurone disease campaigner Gordon Aikman.
He will say: “For the first time that any of us can remember, the safety net is not now the welfare state but charity and the lifeline for families in need is not social security but foodbanks.
“Voluntary groups are being swamped with desperate and almost unanswerable requests for help.” Theresa May sidestepped the UC controversy in her Tory conference speech last week. Work and
Pensions Secretary Esther McVey presented it as an “up-to-date system” which “ensures that work always pays”.
“I have listened to the concerns of claimants, constituents, charities, welfare organisations and colleagues and I have made significant changes.”
Yet her arguments convinced few, if any, critics. Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has called for a halt to the scheme.
And today Unite trade union’s Liane Groves will call for UC to be completely scrapped. The Mirror revealed two weeks ago Labour was considering axing the benefit reforms.
Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said on Sunday: “I think we are moving to a position now where it is just not sustainable. It will have to go.”
■ You can back our campaign by sending us the coupon printed on this page or signing online at mirror.co.uk/ stopuniversal credit
THERESA May would be wise to listen when predecessor Gordon Brown warns the callous universal credit benefits system risks repeating the Poll Tax fiasco.
The grotesquely unfair council tax introduced in the late 1980s by Margaret Thatcher saw her forced out of Downing Street.
The current PM could see her own fingers prised from the gates when the nation discovers the unjustness of making life significantly harsher for low-income families and pushing millions more children into poverty.
Universal credit is a wholly self-inflicted wound, igniting a fresh burning injustice to underline the hollowness of May’s claim to fight exactly that.
So we urge our army of readers to join the Mirror’s campaign to stop universal credit.
And in its place we want a modern welfare state, helping instead of hurting children.