Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit

Alison McGovern Excerpts

Monday 18th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab) [V]]

The best reason to shut down food banks that I ever heard was given to me by a woman who ended up starting her own food co-operative—a mum of four. Following the Osborne benefit cuts, money was just too tight. She was advised to go to the local food bank, but when she got there, she sat outside and cried. She could not go in; she just could not do it. That is why no one in our country should have to beg for food, and why there has been public outrage about child hunger during this crisis. It is wrong.

However, today’s debate is not about Marcus Rashford’s child food poverty campaign; it is not about scrappy food parcels, or whether a child ought to be able to survive for two weeks on dry pasta and a loaf of white bread. Today’s debate is a result of what happens if we ask ourselves why that campaign exists at all. It is a result of daring to ask the bigger question: “Why do we have food banks in our country?” If we ask ourselves what the cause of poverty is, we reach the following conclusion: too many people have jobs that pay too little, or for family reasons cannot work enough to pay for the necessities of life. This trend has been exacerbated greatly by the covid-19 pandemic, but it was set from 2010 onwards. Rising self-employment and uncertain, often low, income have undermined our battle against low pay; covid has made this 100 times worse, and many of those facing poverty are families with only one wage coming in, or where disability affects work prospects. That is why the social security system needs to support them, and make sure the indignity of food banks is no more.

What is the truth about social security today, and why does it fail to protect? Child benefit—the most dependable, easy-to-process family support—was cut in real terms by 22% from 2010 to the end of the decade. Proportionally, that was the largest welfare cut of all, and it fell on our children, meaning that all families with children have been squeezed for a decade. For those in low-paid work, the consequences have been severe, as we have heard from other Members. That is why we should welcome the extra money for families in this crisis, which went some way towards addressing the problems created over the past 10 years. I want the Government to go much further now, with no third or fourth child being sent the message by our country that the state does not care about them. Every child should be invested in through child benefit, and should never have to see their parents in distress because of an enforced visit to a food bank.

The contribution principle that Beveridge set up in our social security system is being undermined. We pay in when we are able and we take out when we need, but a generation is now being robbed of that promise. If the Minister does not know this, let me tell him that the anxieties we face in childhood echo on through our lives; they never leave us. That is why protecting our children is always the right thing to do.