{"id":16964,"date":"2019-01-11T15:29:47","date_gmt":"2019-01-11T15:29:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=16964"},"modified":"2020-11-12T12:57:48","modified_gmt":"2020-11-12T12:57:48","slug":"government-u-turns-universal-credit-high-court","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=16964","title":{"rendered":"Government ‘running scared’"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

The government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s controversial welfare reform, Universal Credit, suffered another defeat today (January 11) after four single mums took on the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) in court and won.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In a decision which is expected to have wide-ranging implications for Universal Credit (UC), the High Court ruled that the way in which the DWP has assessed income from employment to calculate UC payments for these women was unlawful.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The women had lost hundreds of pounds a year and endured extreme hardship in months when they were paid by their employers on dates that \u00e2\u20ac\u0098clashed\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 with their UC payments. \u00c2\u00a0For example, when they were paid early because of a weekend or a bank holiday, the system counted them as being paid twice in one month and so their benefits would be vastly reduced.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The judges concluded that the \u00e2\u20ac\u015bsecretary of state had wrongly interpreted\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 regulations over UC payment assessments and that in so doing had caused \u00e2\u20ac\u015bsevere cash flow problems for the claimants living as they do on low incomes with little or no savings\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Two-child policy<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The high court ruling comes as DWP secretary Amber Rudd announced yet another major U-turn on Universal Credit in a speech today (January 11) in which she said the government would scrap the extension of the so-called two-child policy.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The policy caps benefits for families who have more than two children which has slashed benefits for many families by nearly \u00c2\u01412,800 per child each year.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Currently, the policy only kicks in for children born after April 2017 when it was first announced, but the government pledged to extend it to all families from February of this year.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But now, just three weeks before the extension was to be implemented, Rudd said the policy would remain as it is and only apply to families with children born after April 2017.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rudd also confirmed that the DWP would pause the \u00e2\u20ac\u0098mass migration\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 of 3m people onto Universal Credit, which roles six benefits into one, from the legacy benefits system and instead undertake a pilot with 10,000 people.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Other changes to UC announced today include a new system for private landlords to request direct rental payments from tenants and provisions to pay childcare costs for claimants in advance if needed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rudd moreover said that the benefits freeze implemented by chancellor George Osborne in 2015 would end next year.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Child poverty<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The latest changes come at a time of a growing public backlash against Universal Credit, which has caused untold suffering \u00e2\u20ac\u201c claimants have faced spiralling debt and evictions, with many forced to resort to foodbanks.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Child poverty has also risen in lockstep with the roll-out of Universal Credit, prompting calls from trade unions, schools, charities and the public to scrap the reform altogether.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Most recently, a head teacher of a school in Moracambe, Lancashire, told BBC Breakfast<\/a> that one in 10 pupils at her school came from families using foodbanks \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a problem that she believes has been exacerbated by Universal Credit.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Siobhan Collingwood told of the heart-breaking encounters she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s had with pupils who are suffering from hunger.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

“When children are food deprived it alters their behaviour and they do become quite food obsessed, so we have some children who will be stealing fruit cores from the bins,” she said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

“We have children who have nothing in their lunch boxes and children who are just fixated upon food,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she added, recalling parents “arriving at school literally bursting into tears telling me they have no means of feeding their children”.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Scrap Universal Credit call<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Unite Community national co-ordinator Liane Groves said that it was stories like these that demonstrated the need to scrap the failed Universal Credit system.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s all well and good that the government has scrapped an extension of the two-child policy but this does not go far enough \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the policy must be scrapped altogether because it is based on an inherently flawed premise,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she told UniteLive. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe two-child policy essentially amounts to punishing children for having siblings.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThere\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s absolutely no evidence either that families will have fewer children based on this two-child policy \u00e2\u20ac\u201c all it does is plunge innocent kids into poverty.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Groves added that it was apparent why the government is now suddenly performing U-turn after U-turn on Universal Credit.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis is a government running scared of another general election,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThey know that if they rushed through the mass migration to UC for three million people \u00e2\u20ac\u201c that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s three million people losing their current benefits and moved to an inherently cruel and chaotic system \u00e2\u20ac\u201c they would lose any election by a landslide.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Commenting on the recent high court case, Groves said that the flawed way in which the DWP has calculated UC payments demonstrates how \u00e2\u20ac\u015bout of touch this disaster of a government is with the world of work\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThat the DWP doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t understand something as basic as how salary payments work \u00e2\u20ac\u201c that in some cases people can be paid twice in one month — shows that it is simply out of its depth. It also shows that Universal Credit is not fit for purpose \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a rigid system totally lacking in the flexibility needed for it to work.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bUnite has raised these issues time and again and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s disappointing that it takes a full-blown court case for this government to listen,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Groves added as she reiterated Unite\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s call to scrap UC altogether.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe failure upon failure of Universal Credit which has caused unspeakable suffering for countless people from its very inception shows that it simply cannot be made to work.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s controversial welfare reform, Universal Credit, suffered another defeat today (January 11) after four single mums took on the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) in court and won.   In a decision which is expected to have wide-ranging implications for Universal Credit (UC), the High Court ruled that the way in which the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8115,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[910,1082,462],"wps_subtitle":"More government U-turns on Universal Credit amid high court case win","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16964"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16964"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16964\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25637,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16964\/revisions\/25637"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}