Our country is on the verge of a housing crisis as a result of universal credit, and I know because it is unfolding right now in Newcastle. The government is pushing ahead with a benefit reform that has a built-in wait for financial support averaging six weeks. This causes uncertainty, debt, and an unavoidable feeling that this “reform” is designed to punish.
The experiences of residents in Newcastle today stand as a warning to others. We are a trial roll-out city for universal credit. The impact here has been dramatic. Tenants living in council housing who have been moved to universal credit have accumulated £1.2m of rent arrears. That figure is alarming enough, but we are only about 25% of the way through our roll-out, so that figure is almost certainly set to rise. And that is just the tip of the iceberg – there are many more in the private rented sector who will be suffering alone, without the help offered by a responsible landlord such as the council.
The consequences will be far-reaching. Austerity has led to a rise in homelessness and begging. On our streets we can see what happens after seven years of ideologically-driven assaults on the welfare state. Housing and welfare support are intertwined and you cannot change one without an impact on the other. Beyond housing, how can we expect those on universal credit to get to the jobs the Tories assume recipients will seek out, if there is no money for bus fare? And what about the children of those on universal credit? Families making new applications for free school meals are being told they can’t have help feeding their children until the six-week waiting period for the new benefit passes.
As we witness the stress and hardship universal credit is causing, there are serious questions for ministers to answer. In theory, a staggered approach to introducing the benefit should give the government a chance to correct its mistakes, but there is no indication that ministers are prepared to pause the introduction, or offset the six-week delay in benefit payments for those moving on to the new system. What is the point of a phased roll-out if you do not adapt to the lessons picked up along the way? And what is the point of a benefit reform that pushes people further into debt?
It is hard to avoid the feeling that the next housing crisis is right now being made in Downing Street. Those living on the edge are about to be pushed out of the safety net that the welfare state is supposed to provide for everyone’s good.
It’s no accident. This government simply does not value those who need the help of the state to succeed – a stance that is most obvious in the housing policies forcing the sale of good-quality council homes, or limiting lifetime tenancies.
What we are seeing is a systematic assault on the welfare state that is returning us to the days of the Cathy Come Home society. There are two lessons the government appears not to have learned from back then. First, if you do not take a comprehensive approach to housing and welfare, you create a system in which wherever the less fortunate turn, they are faced with further misery.
Second, this downward spiral costs the state. It is self-defeating. By imposing benefit cuts, housing uncertainty, and additional debt on those claiming universal credit, the government is simply asking another part of the state to pick up the mess it creates.
Now is the time to learn, to pause the roll-out and correct the damage done so far.