Cruel and disastrous

The Tories plans to limit benefits to just ÂŁ20,000 (ÂŁ23,000 in London) a year could see vulnerable people lose their homes.

Charities and housing associations yesterday (January 26) issued a warning to the government that those such as victims of domestic violence, veterans and dementia sufferers will be most at risk.

“The benefit cap is nasty,” said Unite community coordinartor Liane Groves.

“It punishes the poor and the vulnerable for the government’s failure to tackle our housing crisis,” she added.

The government’s own figures revealed that almost two thirds of victims will be single mums.

Once funding cuts come in to force it will hit sheltered housing, warned Women’s Aid and Mencap.

They say 50,000 of the most vulnerable households, including domestic violence victims and dementia sufferers, will be hit by ÂŁ68 a week if the government includes them in the cap.

“There’s a severe shortage of housing, especially affordable housing, which is only going to deteriorate further if the Tories go ahead and sell off our social housing stock,” said Liane.

“At the same time they’re sitting back and letting landlords take advantage of vulnerable renters by allowing them to charge whatever they please,” she added.

Campaigners have called for vulnerable groups to be excluded from the cap. However Unite says the policy damages more than just the vulnerable.

“It is an unfair and disastrous policy that takes families away from their support networks, rips children out of their schools, disrupts their studies and forces families away from areas of employment,” said Liane.

Polly Neate, chief executive of Women’s Aid warned that with an estimated 12,000 women staying in refuge every year, more often than not, with their children, the policy puts them in grave danger.

“Uncertainty about the future of housing benefit payments is already directly impacting on services plans for the future and a risk to the future of refuge provision is a risk to women and children’s lives,” she said.

Liane went on to warn that policies like this one prevent people from the opportunity to work their way back out of poverty too.

“Much of the south of England is so badly affected there soon won’t be places where people can actually move to,” she said.

“This is the Tories social cleansing of our cities. They’re forcing people in to areas of low employment and poverty making it near impossible for them to climb out of unemployment,” she added.

The plans to cap housing benefit will be debated in the House of Commons today (January 27).