Covid-19: People Living in Poverty

Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted Excerpts

Thursday 30th April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)]

My Lords, we went into this crisis with a chronic savings deficit, many households having no savings at all, and the poorest are unable to make cutbacks, with the shopping basket for essentials having already risen by some 5%. Universal credit is the backstop for more than 1 million people left out of other measures. For them and generally, encouragement to work is an impossible mantra right now, with lost jobs, lost hours and no childcare. This crucial backstop deserves more changes: raising or removing the benefit cap so that everyone can get the increases already announced; removing the two-child limit while children are at home missing school meals; suspending repayment of past overpayment—now is not the time for that; a quick “silver hello” initial payment; and recognising the need for forbearance periods longer than three months for arrears.