When I give food to the poor, I’m propping up David Cameron’s Big Society programme. When I ask why the poor have no food, I sometimes wonder what I’m doing in the Labour Party any more. Recent weeks have seen the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, 42 other Church of England bishops, the Baptist Union […]
Posts Tagged ‘poverty’
Unequal wealth – the best illustration ever
Mar 5th, 2013 by Jon Lansman.This film will take just six minutes of your life. It is a fantastic illustration of just how unfair is the distribution of wealth. Not only is there a massive gap between the way people think things are and the way they think they should be (left and right alike), but there is an even bigger gap […]
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How is this avalanche of cuts really hitting the poor?
Jan 16th, 2013 by Michael Meacher.My own constituency, Oldham West, is one of the poorest in the country. How are they being affected by the cascade of cuts? Housing benefit cuts in April will particularly impact on pensioners, families on low incomes, disabled people (many already traumatised by Atos assessments of their alleged capability for work), the long-term sick , […]
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Simplicity of state pensions is not the issue: it’s how much and when that matters
Jan 15th, 2013 by Michael Meacher.IDS’ side-kick, Steve Webb, unveiled the £144 a week single-rate state pension yesterday, triumphantly noting its simplicity. So which would you have – a simple pension or a decent pension? And £144 a week, less than £7,500 a year, is not a decent pension. It’s a shameful fob-off after a lifetime of working which is […]
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Poverty Britain
Jun 20th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.The Experian Public Sector survey released today of families in work but at risk of a slide into destitution is very telling. There are 7 million adults in this category, in addition to the 5.5 million working-age adults already living in poverty (i.e. less than 60% of the national median income) – a total of […]
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Asking the right questions about the payday lending industry
Feb 29th, 2012 by Carl Packman.It’s amazing what you can find on the internet sometimes. Just looking around I found an American-based website offering people toolkits on how to create their own payday lending business. In big, bold capitals one of the headers reads: “You can make a tremendous amount of money in the payday loan business and help people […]
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Something on income mobility to consider
Feb 22nd, 2012 by Carl Packman.I am currently reading a book called Changing Fortunes by Stephen Jenkins and one of the main findings in the book notes that around one fifth of the UK population are poor at any one time – that’s the same as in Saudi Arabia. (The figure confirms, though, that this is a static figure – see here) […]
