Bore Da a croeso, Good morning and welcome to this Policy Forum for Wales Keynote Seminar on “reducing poverty in Wales - welfare reform, local approaches and long-term strategies”.
Last October’s Equality and Human Rights Commission Report “Is Wales Fairer?” found, “poverty and deprivation still remain higher in Wales than other British nations; Wales is the least productive nation in the UK, and median weekly earnings in Wales are lower than in England and Scotland.”
ONS figures on ‘Employee earnings in the UK: 2018’ showed that average earnings in Wales were lower and had grown slower than other UK nations.
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation “Poverty in 2017 Report” found that 60% of working-aged adults in workless households were in poverty, compared with 16% of those in working households.
AND February’s Bevan Foundation ‘State of Wales’ briefing on Low Pay found that both the number and percentage of workers paid below Real Living Wage in Wales has increased – and with women, disabled people and BAME groups at heightened risk of being in low paid work.
With nearly 1.5 million people on out of work benefits for nearly a decade, Universal credit was designed to help people into work and support people who need help or cannot work.
According to the DWP, evidence shows people are more likely to get a job as a result, move into work faster and stay in work longer.
However, as the UK Government states “any issues in its roll out should and will be addressed”.
As the UK Work and Pensions Secretary stated last November:
“I know that there are problems with universal credit, despite its good intentions. I will be listening and learning from the expert groups in this area who do such good work. I know it can be better”.
She recently stated "already we have introduced 100% advance payments, budgeting support, direct rent payments to landlords and an extra two weeks' housing benefit payment for people moving from Housing Benefit to Universal Credit”.
Community Housing Cymru have also stated that some of the issues surrounding Universal Credit could be targeted by improving communications between DWP, tenants and landlords – and called on the Welsh Government to respond positively to their call for Welsh Government and Local Authorities to work with Job Centre Plus in Wales to co-locate services and enable applications for Local Authority benefits to be made at the same time as Universal Credit.
Under Personal Independent Payments, 31% of disabled claimants are now receiving the highest rate of support, compared to 15% under Disability Living Allowance.
However, I have supported many constituents in successfully challenging PIP decisions, where the assessors have not understood the barriers their conditions create for them.
Noting that 72% of PIP appeals ruling ruled in favour of the applicant last summer the Work and Pensions Secretary stated this was 'too high' and that the appeals system would be examined to ensure that fewer claimants have to seek redress.
Her other announcements include:
- proposed integration of PIP, Universal Credit and ESA into a single information sharing service, to reduce the need for applicants to submit information multiple times,
- an end to regular reviews of disabled pensioners and reassessments for those with the most severe and lifelong conditions
- and scrapping of plans to retrospectively extend the two-child benefit cap to new universal credit claimants.
The Children Commissioner’s report this month, “A Charter for Change: Protecting Welsh Children from the impact of poverty” states that although the Welsh Government’s Child Poverty Strategy outlines its long-term ambitions, there is no clear plan that the Welsh Government should publish a new “Child Poverty Delivery Plan” including concrete, measurable steps - and that although Welfare levers are at UK Government level “we can make a difference, but this can only be achieved with both a bold vision and a deliverable action plan”.
This parallels wider calls for a Welsh Government plan to tackle poverty, with clear performance targets and progress measures.
In this context, from next Month, for the first time in over 800 years, variable income taxes paid by people living in Wales will directly fund public services in the country – and there will much debate about how to maximise revenues.
With last March’s Joseph Rowntree Foundation finding that more than 700,000 people in Wales were living in poverty, should we perhaps revisit the 2013 statement by the Wales Council for Voluntary Action that “Welsh Government and the sector need to refresh current engagement mechanisms to develop, promote and monitor a “Programme for Action” based upon co-production and common ground”?
