£20 benefit cut? Just work extra hours to make it up
Coffey blasted over Universal Credit claims
PEOPLE who lose £20 a week from their Universal Credit payments under Tory Government cuts should work extra hours to make up for the cut, the Work and Pensions Secretary has suggested.
Therese Coffey said on Monday that she is “entirely happy” with cutting Universal Credit by £20 a week for over six million claimants, many of whom will be plunged into poverty as a result.
And she claimed hard-up claimants could make up the loss by working more.
The Work and Pensions Secretary was confronted in a TV interview over the impact of the plans, which a Government analysis has warned will lead to a surge in homelessness and food bank demand.
Forty per cent of Universal Credit claimants are already in work, and recipients could lose £1040 annually if Prime Minister Boris Johnson goes ahead with the cut next month.
But Coffey told BBC Breakfast: “I’m conscious that £20 a week is about two hours’ extra work every week – we will be seeing what we can do to help people perhaps secure those extra hours but ideally also to make sure they’re also in a place to get better paid jobs as well.”
Labour’s shadow child poverty secretary, Wes Streeting, blasted Coffey’s comments on social media. He tweeted: “Low paid workers in our country will lose £20 a week. Including the 10 per cent increase in National Insurance they will lose £1300 a year.
“For these working families, this will hurt. More children will end up in poverty. Yet Therese Coffey is ‘entirely happy’.”