As long as a third of children are living below the poverty line, the government cannot justify keeping the pensions triple lock
I
t’s that crucial week when millions discovered how much their benefits and pensions would rise by next April. Generally, the increase is pegged to inflation, which this month is 3.8%. Recipients will be lucky if inflation falls by April, unlucky if it rises. Because this is a Labour government, this year’s universal credit gets an extra 2.3%, the first time ever the rate will rise regardless of inflation. The day passed without much comment, yet this is a time to stop and contemplate what we, the taxpayer, the state, consider adequate to exist. How much does someone really need? What is penury? And who should we prioritise?
No government in history has ever been unwise enough to spell out exactly what standard of living, what food, heat and clothes a benefit sum should cover, for the obvious reason that it has never been enough. I used to hear Tory ministers say, “We don’t tell people how to spend their money. It’s their choice.” Labour ministers over the years tend to mumble.
I came across one brief moment in our history when the outlay approached adequate food: strangely, I read it in a Leeds workhouse’s accounts. Not gruel, but precisely weighed amounts of meat, bread, vegetables and beer per head were listed. There was also an entry with fuel for heating. But that was just after a parliamentary scandal concerning another workhouse where people had died of cold and starvation. It didn’t last long. Feeding people enough was too expensive for the parish, so workhouses closed, poor laws relaxed and a little “outdoor” money was dispensed to old, sick and unemployed people instead. Handing out too little benefit was, and still is, far cheaper than grappling with housing, feeding and heating people.
