Heartless Sunak
Universal credit clawback will hit three Glasgow constituencies hardest
THE combination of austerity and the Covid lockdown has pushed more families towards poverty.
But with the end of furlough and the scrapping of the £20 a week uplift to Universal Credit, a cliff edge is looming.
The figures from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, showing that one in three Scottish families with kids will lose out, are staggering.
They are a signal of how deep and endemic poverty is and how precarious life is for working parents struggling to make ends meet.
It should be clear to the Tories that the Universal Credit uplift has to be maintained.
But chancellor Rishi Sunak’s failure to change course just confirms that his Government’s callous attitude to the poor.
More than a third of Scottish families with children will be £1040 a year worse off if the planned Tory cut to Universal Credit goes ahead in october.
This impact will be felt by 37 per cent of these households all across Scotland, according to research by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
And figures show that chancellor Rishi Sunak’s clawback of the £20 a week increase to UC and Working Tax credit will hit hardest in Glasgow that contains the three constituencies in which over half of all families with children will be impacted.
In Glasgow Central, a massive 63 per cent will be affected. In Glasgow South West 55 per cent and in Glasgow North East 54 per cent of families will lose out.
Alison Thewliss MP, the SNP Treasury spokeswoman, said: “My Glasgow Central constituency will be the hardest hit of any in Scotland... and so I am once again urging Rishi Sunak to U-turn on his plans.
“The fact that Tories continue to bury their heads in the sand over the impact these cruel cuts will have on families up and down the country shows their true colours – they really are the nasty party.”
Scottish Labour’s Pam Duncan-Glancy MSP said: “The Scottish Government can’t sit on their hands either. They must urgently use the powers they have to immediately double the Scottish Child Payment and work quickly towards a Minimum Income Guarantee.”