NextDoor is an advice line and casework service for households effected by reductions to thier housing benefit. Last week we were very pleased to be mentioned in a front page story of the Guardian. It highlighted the number of families in Westminster to be affected by the policy and schools that are now likely to close as children are forced from the area.
Our Chairman, Rev Paul Nicolson, had the following letter published in The Times this morning.
Sir, Maria Miller (letter, Feb 7) claims that the Universal Credit will lift 350,000 children and 550,000 adults out of poverty — but she comes to this conclusion by using the income threshold before housing costs have been deducted (BHC), below which people are deemed to be in poverty. However, poverty is at its harshest when measured after housing costs have been deducted (AHC). Using the latter measure the Universal Credit cap will add to the misery already created by the housing benefit caps. The higher the rent which is capped, the worse the misery. The level of a single adult’s Job Seekers Allowance is now £67.50 a week and will continue at that level as the Standard Allowance in the Universal Credit in 2013. The two caps create rent arrears which have to be paid out of that £67.50, if the children’s or disabled people’s additional benefits are not to be reduced by the debt. It is already half the governmental poverty threshold and is expected by the Centre for Research in Social Policy to be reduced by £1 a week every year as a result of the coalition moving the annual uprating from the retail prices index to the consumer prices index. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation estimates that a healthy diet costs £47.31 a week. The Royal College of Psychiatrists reports that poverty and debt are trigger factors for, and part of, the experience of those with poor mental health. It is an impossible struggle to pay bills as prices rise and AHC welfare incomes fall.
As the debate around the £26,000 household benefit cap lasted late into Monday night, Z2K’s two amendments [62A and 62ZC], which aim to protect benefit claimants from unfair sanctions and any resultant damage to thier mental health, will be moved early in Wednesday’s session. We are pleased about this as many Crossbench peers we hope will vote for our amendments had left the chamber by the end of last night.
Read about the amendments in Sunday’s Observer.
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Over the last few days Government Ministers have been presenting a lot of misinformation around the £26,000 household benefit cap. As this is debated in the Lords (along with two of Z2K’s amendments) later today our Chief Executive Joanna Kennedy has responded to some of the points made by Iain Duncan Smith.
Those who support the caps all seem to do so on the basis of misleading information fed to them by Iain Duncan Smith and the government,
No campaigners are arguing on the basis that homelessness means having to share a room and it is completely dishonest to say that they are.
The policy is expressed to be about driving people into work but of the 56,000 families affected only a proportion are capable of work. The rest are mothers of young children ,other carers or those who are ill but not long term disabled . Many are also already working part time.
Comparing £ 26000 benefit income with the gross average income of someone in work is a completely false comparison. The only kind of household which would receive that level of benefit is one with a number of children living in the private rented sector London or some other very expensive area. An equivalent family in work would be likely to receive substantial benefits on top of its earned income because it is not possible for a family of that kind to live on that income. The only meaningful comparison is between the household income of a similar household in a similar region in and out of work.
£26000 is not a lavish income for those relatively few who receive it because almost all of it goes to a landlord. A family with 3 children living in London in a 3 bed roomed property ( i.e with 2 children sharing ) would be likely to pay £340 pw ( the capped level of housing benefit) rent i.e £ 17680 in rent.. The average gas and electricity bill for that size household n London is £1200 and the average council tax £1200. That leaves them with £113 ,84 pw for food ,clothes , travel , household expenditure and phone for 5 people. It is very difficult indeed for anyone to manage on that income .
No one with any sense would come to England for our benefits ( leaving aside the fact that it is almost impossible to do that ). Our benefit levels are amongst the lowest in Western Europe and our cost of living amongst the highest .
The answer is said to be for these households to move to cheaper areas .However apart from the whole problem of breaking up support networks , disrupting children’s education etc the areas with low rents are those with no jobs which undermines the stated aim of the policy.
If Iain Duncan Smith really believes that this policy is in the best interests of the poor as he proclaims then it is difficult to understand why he describes it so misleadingly. It is also disappointing that these points never seem to be put to him in interview which is one of the reasons why there is such widespread misunderstanding about this issue
Yesterday the government was defeated by Labour and Crossbench Peers three times over the Welfare Reform Bill. Z2K is very pleased that these excellent ammendments that protect the disabled were passed and we hope that they survive when they return to the commons. They also give us hope that our own ammendments, which are still to be debated, do well.
On the same day there was also a demonstration outside the houses of parliment. Here’s a video where you can see our Chairman, Rev. Paul Nicolson, taking part.
Dear all, The following two letters are published by The Guardian this morning. The first letter expresses my experience of OCCUPY exactly. The first text I quote is from the first five verses of the 5th chapter of St James’s epistle; not the first five verses of the epistle. My slip not The Guardian’s. With my very best wishes for Christmas and 2012; and thanks for everything in 2011. Paul
Please sign our e-petition on http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/25438
Stop the housing benefit and universal credit caps.
St Paul’s and the right to protest • guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 20th December 2011
How I wish I could have been called as a witness for the defendants in the St Paul’s protest camp prosecution (Bid to evict St Paul’s protest camp begins at high court, 19 December). I am an 80-year-old lady from a quiet rural area, who visited the protest camp on a recent visit toLondon and was struck by the order, cleanliness and safety of the camp; and the courtesy, kindness and willingness of the protesters to explain to visitors their reasons for being there. As a result of various discussions with marvellously friendly young people, I was won over, with a far better understanding than I had from the media coverage of why they wanted to continue to demonstrate. I noticed several country vicars also there in quiet conversations with the protesters. And I felt safer there that night than in any other street in London. So for me, and others visiting, the impact of the camp has been positive, and not detrimental, and I would think completely in keeping with the guarantees for freedom of expression and association laid down in the Human Rights Act.
Margie Baron Owen Salisbury, Wiltshire
Events at St Paul’s echo events in Sheffield in the 1840s when the Chartists marched on the parish church demanding that the vicar preach on the first five verses of St James’s epistle which begin “Go to now ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries shall come upon you … Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you.” The clergy preferred Proverbs 24: “My son, fear thou the Lord and King, and meddle not with them that are given to change.” There were no seats for the poor of Sheffield because all the pews were rented, so they were thrown out promising to come back the following Sunday; then they were arrested by the police to appear before the magistrates, who were the vicar and church wardens.
Rev Paul Nicolson Chair, Zacchaeus 2000 Trust
The following statement will be sent to Peers considering the Welfare Reform Bill. Please sign it below no later than the 7th of January. Alternatively if you are an NGO and would like to add your name, inform us at benjenkins@z2k.org.
To Peers considering the Welfare Reform Bill.
A statement opposing benefit caps in London.
2012 and 2013 will be two of the unhappiest New Years ever experienced by many of the poorest citizens of the richest parts of London. Even under normal circumstances moving house can be traumatic. Nevertheless the government’s Welfare Reform Bill will force people to move house by making their accommodation unaffordable and putting them into rent arrears, which will in turn generate severe stress and mental health difficulties. It started with the housing benefit caps, which will be taking effect from the 1st of January 2012, and is repeated in the second wave of distress to be caused by the cap on the Universal Credit beginning in 2013.
It is our view that it is impossible to implement the UC cap in London without damaging the health and wellbeing of individuals, parents and their children, and should not therefore be implemented in London.
We ask Peers, and other comfortable tax payers, to consider where the unfairness lies, in their pockets or in the resulting ill health and misery of the victims of these policies. London Councils have estimated that 133,000 households in London will suffer an average loss of £105 a week if the planned cap on the Universal Credit goes ahead alongside the current housing benefit changes. The government has also estimated that 670,000 families will lose on average £676 a year if the planned reductions in benefit for under-occupying go ahead. But research from the National Housing Federation suggests a household under-occupying a three-bedroom home in London faces losing up to £1,385 a year. In the north west a family in a three-bed could lose up to £854 a year. It is unlikely there are enough one bedroom properties to take these tenants, this will also lead to evictions.
The Government Office for Science recognises the relationship between debt and mental illness. On top of that other researchers at the London School of Economics have found a clear link between anxiety and depression among parents and an increased chance of the children being ill and having a high temperature. The research helped in "understanding the biological impact of multiple sources of chronic stress in families on specific immune functions in a sample of generally healthy children", the team wrote in the Journal of Brain Behaviour and Immunity.
Schools in Westminster and Kensington have successfully spent tax payers money on services to parents and children who have been excluded from society and education by the cruel misfortune of being born poor. These families have made real progress and their children have begun to accept the education so vital to their lifelong wellbeing. They are about to be forcibly uprooted from friends, family and therapeutic services, and forced into the trauma of entry into a new, possibly unwelcoming, community and school.
The madness of this policy is illustrated in Waltham Forest where the council is coping with the influx of families from Westminster and Kensington, who were advised to get moving before the axe falls. Landlords are increasing their rents because of the increased demand, some times higher than the caps. The council’s own deprived families are being shunted out of London altogether to Luton, where the council has made a deal with private landlords.
Comfortable taxpayers should not be taken in by talk of transitional arrangements; the temporary discretionary housing payments do not mend broken lives. Nor should they countenance the government’s naïve suggestion that landlords will lower their rents to meet the caps where there is a healthy demand for rented accommodation. They are in fact increasing their rents where they are lower than the caps thus increasing the cost of housing benefit to the tax payer. Caps will only act as rent controls where landlords have no alternative, non-housing benefit market within which increase them. This is simply not true of most Inner and many Outer London boroughs where accommodation is in such high demand that working individuals will pay extortionate prices, even if this limits the amount of money they have to spend on other items such as a healthy diet.
The Welfare Reform Bill is being discussed by Peers in January. We call on you to prevent the mass changing of locks by bailiffs as tenants are evicted to an uncertain future; to abolish the cap on the Universal Credit; to call for a reform of the Housing Benefit Regulations; and to insist on the creation of a policy for affordable housing in all tenures which will improve the wellbeing and security of every one of London’s citizens.
Tariq Abu Rahma,
please help us from this resolution useless humanity
xxxxxxxx,
I am totally opposed benefit cuts and agree with the petition.We need representation in parliament to put our case.
Yesterday we held an event in conjunction with 4in10 (a Save the Children initiative which campaigns to reduce London poverty) exploring the effects of reductions to Housing Benefits on London. Speaking at the event were Camila Batmanghelidjh, of Kids Company, Karen Buck MP, Jenny Jones AM, the Green Party’s mayoral candidate, Nigel Minto, of London Councils, and our own Joanna Kennedy.
(Camila Batmanghelidjh, Karen Buck MP, Romin Sutherland [Z2K's Housing Benefit Expert], Jenny Jones AM, Joanna Kennedy)
(Jenny Jones AM, Rev. Paul Nicolson [our Chairman], Camila Batmanghelidjh)
As announced in today’s Guardian, Z2K are launching a dedicated advice line and casework service, NextDoor, that will help people forced to migrate to and settle in more affordable areas.
The event was extremely well attended by a number of people from Local Government and the Third Sector. While the atmosphere was glum, given the likely negative effects these policies will have on vulnerable people in London, in the discussion groups a number of positive potential policies were formulated.
UPDATE
Dave Hill has written about the event on his blog. On it he transcribed a section of Camilla’s speech:
There are many young people who have had to flee their family home from a very young age, and they are prematurely living independently – on their own, without family support. What is very, very important is to understand the implication of this cap in relation to some of those young people.
The truth is that a six-foot boy without a job, without prospects of employment is going to find it very hard to rent a room in a house. Very few people are going to rent their space to such a young person – male or female. They will be worried about whether the person can sustain the bills, what kind of entourage of friends the person is likely to have and bring into the house. And those are legitimate anxieties in the context of some of the challenges that our young people are enduring at street level.
I suspect that we are going to be at the edge of an enormously risky situation, as more and more vulnerable young people aren’t going to be able to rent places to live, or find accommodation. I think it is imperative for government to wake up to the special needs of lone young people. I think the riots of the summer, whatever narrative you put on it, whether you blame the police or anyone else, were profoundly about revenge – about young people’s revenge about society, because they felt so powerless and so not thought about.
Moving forward, I think these caps run the risk of leaving out yet again the special needs of vulnerable young people…they present [themselves for help] with great bravado, and they survive by appearing tough, but fundamentally they are some of the most sensitive individuals in our community, enduring a period of flux both economic and emotional, often on their own, and who do deserve out support.
Our Chairman, Paul Nicolson, had the following letter published in the times this morning. It has long been argued that the Billions paid in housing benefit each year would have been better spent increasing the supply of housing and keeping it affordable for all.
Sir, It is unfair, says Anushka Asthana, (“Clegg is on the wrong side of the fairness divide”, Opinion Dec 2) that the rent of a council house is £440 a week and the rent charged by a private landlord is £750 a week for a similar house next door. It certainly is but the private tenants’ indignation should be aimed at landlords, who have been the beneficiaries of billions of pound of their taxes in housing benefit every year since lending was deregulated in the 1980s, rising to £21 billion last year. It is not the welfare system which is to blame but the governments who allowed that flood of lending to push up prices and rents, and housing benefit, in a housing market in short supply. There has been, and there remains, no coherent housing policy to keep rents and prices under control to provide all tenures with affordable housing.
To The Minister for Welfare Reform.
Listening to the debate on the benefit caps yesterday, and their obvious responsibility for increasing the unaffordability of housing for many of the poorest citizens in the UK, it became ever clearer that tenants are being asked to carry the pain of deficit reduction for the landlords and landowners; who are untouched by the ferocity of measures in the bill creating debts, eviction and misery. That injustice is spelt out in the following letter which was put together with my colleagues in the Pro-Housing Alliance.
There is a fundamental injustice at the heart of deficit reduction in the UK . Landlords have annually taken billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money in housing benefit by raising their rents to keep up with a housing market in short supply, but awash with the reckless lending of many financiers in the City of London since deregulation was allowed by Parliament in the 1980s. It rose to £21 billion in 2010. Around £3.5 billion was paid to sustain the unhealthy tenancies of neglectful landlords that give rise to significant but avoidable costs for the NHS in 2009, when 4.7 million (21%) of England’s 22 million homes were unhealthy, unsafe and poorly maintained.
The coalition’s response to the inevitable crisis has been to take a total of £18 billion from welfare claimants and nothing effective from landlords. It would be squeezing an already dry lemon to expect claimants to take any more cuts. Parliament should look for alternatives which require landlords and landowners to pay their share. It is essential to create a coherent national housing and land policy, the first in living memory, to cover every aspect of housing for all, rich and poor, that puts decent housing at the heart of national health and wellbeing.
Parliament should also explore how a land value tax could replace council tax, business rates, and abolish the other inefficient taxation measures such as stamp duty, capital gains exemptions, and second home council tax discounts that have helped create the current inequalities of health and wealth in our society.
Stephen Battersby, President, Chartered Institute of Environmental Health.
Peter Ambrose, Visiting Professor in Housing and Health, University of Brighton.
Peter Archer, Chair, Care and Repair, England.
Stephen Hill, Director- C2O futureplanners.
Rev Paul Nicolson, Chair, Zacchaeus 2000 Trust.