Markus Andrews

Around 1.2 million people in the UK fear they will have to skip meals if Boris Johnson’s government goes ahead with the £20-a-week universal credit cut next month.Some 20 per cent of those on universal credit told YouGov they may miss meals and go hungry if ministers push ahead with the cut – set to leave claimants £1,040 a year worse off.Around 1.3 million people (21 per cent of claimants) fear they may not be able to heat their homes properly once payments are reduced, according to the survey for the Trussell Trust network of food banks.Claimants told MPs on the Work and Pensions Committee on Wednesday that the £20-a-week uplift brought in at the start of the Covid crisis has proved to be “lifeline” in their struggle to pay bills.Anthony Lynam, a single parent with two children, said: “Before the uplift was introduced we were already on a knife-edge of food versus fuel. The uplift was some relief and for that to be removed it will leave us with that big question again: do I go hungry? Do my kids go hungry?”Amina Nagawa, a single parent with one son, told MPs: “If the government removes the [uplift] money we will suffer more – I already have next to nothing to spend on food and other basics. I often go without food, and my son cannot always eat some nutritious.”Gemma Widdowfield, a fellow single parent, said the £86 a month from the uplift has helped keep her family out of debt.“Without that extra £86 a month I’ll be going back to using my credit cards and spiral into debt,” she told the committee. “Benefits haven’t risen in many years, but the cost of living does. That extra £86 is so needed.”Despite mounting pressure from MPs in all parties to maintain the temporary universal credit uplift on a permanent basis, the government has vowed to cut payments from October.Emma Revie, chief executive at the Trussell Trust, said cutting the uplift would be “a devastating blow for millions of households already struggling to make ends meet”.The food bank chief added: “These are families already caught in impossible situations who worry every day about switching on the heating and feeding their children.”The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has said the universal credit cut will push 500,000 people into poverty, while Citizens Advice has warned that a third of people in receipt of the benefit will be pushed into debt when the uplift is removed.Chancellor Rishi Sunak said on Tuesday he does not accept the change will force people into poverty – suggesting the sudden cut would push people to look for work.He told parliament: “I don’t accept that people will be forced into poverty, because we know, and all the evidence and history tells us, the best way to take people out of poverty is to find them high-quality work.”The remarks came as the government pulled Labour’s plans to hold an imminent vote on the controversial cut to the uplift payments.Sir Keir Starmer’s party had been scheduled to hold an opposition day debate on the issue on Wednesday, calling on the government “to cancel its planned cut to universal credit”.Instead, the government announced it was earmarking time on Wednesday for a vote on its health social care funding plan. While any motion tabled by Labour would not be binding on the government, it would force Tory MPs angry over the issue to rebel in a Commons vote. More

The government is “confident” that a Covid vaccine booster programme will get the green light in the next few days, the health secretary has said.Speaking on Wednesday Sajid Javid suggested his vaccine advisory committee would spell out the terms of the programme this week, saying the work on the scheme was “almost done”.”I’m very confident there will be a booster programme but in terms of who actually gets it and when, we’re waiting for final advice, which could come across certainly in the next few days from the JCVI. We need to see that advice,” Mr Javid told Sky News.”That work is almost done and based on the timeline they’ve given us, I’m confident we could start the booster programme this month.”The government’s vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi yesterday said the booster shots were “probably the most important piece of the jigsaw yet to fall into place” for ending the pandemic.He added that the NHS was effectively “ready to go” to “to operationalise a massive booster programme”. The NHS is reportedly planning to combine a Covid vaccination booster drive with the annual flu jab programme, which could see third jabs going into arms as soon as this month.But there remains much uncertainty about how a booster vaccination scheme would work. Last week, a person close to the JCVI told The Independent the experts were resisting intense political pressure to approve vaccines for 12-15-year-olds in order to preserve Britain’s vaccine supplies for booster jabs.Although no formal parameters have yet been set, most scientists expect the JCVI to recommend a booster programme focusing first on those most vulnerable to Covid, largely those aged over 50 and others who are vulnerable because of other underlying health conditions.However, the deputy chairman of the JCVI, Anthony Harnden, said last week his committee did not want to rush its decision and would instead wait for results from the Cov-Boost study, to see what immune responses are prompted by third jabs and whether different Covid vaccines can be mixed and matched.Asked about the prospect of other measures on Wednesday morning, health secretary Mr Javid said he had not examined whether it would be useful introduce a so-called “firebreak” lockdown in October.”I don’t think that’s something we need to consider,” he said. “I haven’t even thought about that as an option at this point.The Health Secretary added: “Vaccines are working. Yes, there are still infections, of course there still are. That’s true around the world. But the number of people going into hospital, and certainly those dying, is mercifully low, and that’s because of the vaccines.” More

The Department for Work and Pensions is unable to explain “shocking inequality” as unemployment among young Black people soared to 41.6 per cent during the pandemic, a damning new report has found. The DWP is also unable to properly assess or improve the impact of its own policies and spending, MPs have said. The unemployment rate among young Black people rose from 24.5 per cent to 41.6 per cent from October-December 2019 to the same period in 2020, while among white people it rose from 10.1 to 12.4 per cent over the same time period. Though the government increased its spending on employment support programmes, from £300m in 2020-21 to £2.5bn in 2021-22, and hired 13,500 new work coaches, the Public Affairs Committee (PAC) warned that its focus was misplaced. Ongoing problems surrounding work coaches, from understaffing and backlogs of work, and DWP’s “focus on getting people into any form of employment” undermines its “ambitions” to support disabled people to work and people on low pay to progress, the report said. The increase in unemployment as the furlough scheme winds down has “not been as sharp as feared”, but the Committee says any second surge in new benefit claims and unemployment as the scheme ends at the close of September could “disrupt DWP’s ability to provide employment support”.Dame Meg Hillier MP, Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, said: “In response to the pandemic, DWP has increased spending on employment programmes a staggering eight-fold in the space of a year. But there is a lack of curiosity about the impact of the policies it’s implementing.“When we are talking about the long-term prospects of a generation of our young people, and the extraordinary differential in job losses among young Black people this needs serious attention now or a whole generation will be scarred. This needs to be a real focus now to avoid embedding inequality of opportunity over decades.”Moreover, the PAC report found that the DWP has “relatively few” programmes aimed at people from minority ethnic communities and also uncovered shortcomings in the department’s data on diversity and disadvantage among Universal Credit claimants which, it says, poses potential issues in properly evaluating the effectiveness of its schemes for different groups.This comes after economic thinktank the Resolution Foundation warned that young Black people have been the hardest hit by the rise in unemployment during the pandemic, having borne the brunt of the job losses because they disproportionately worked in worst-hit sectors such as hospitality and leisure.Separate research from the Trades Union Congress (TUC) published in January found that Black and minority workers have been 26 times worse hit by the employment crisis sparked by Covid-19 in the last year-and-a-half.This prompted the union to urge government ministers to tackle inequalities as a matter of priority, citing racism as a key reason for this disparity in the labour market.“The time for excuses and delays is over,” TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said. “Ministers must challenge the systemic racism and inequality that holds back BME people at work.”A DWP spokesperson said: “Before the pandemic we lifted the employment rate to a record high for ethnic minorities and we are now focused on helping people from all backgrounds back into employment through our Plan for Jobs. “Our £150 million Flexible Support Fund also invests in local initiatives, benefiting communities, such as mentoring for people from ethnic minority backgrounds.“We understand disabled people may need different kinds of assistance which is why we offer specialist programmes paired with personal support and we remain committed to seeing 1 million more disabled people in work by 2027.” More

Boris Johnson’s government has pulled Labour’s plans to hold an imminent vote on the controversial cut to universal credit payments — just weeks before the £20-per-week uplift ends.Instead, the government announced it was earmarking time on Wednesday for a separate vote on the newly announced health and social care levy, which flouts a key Conservative election manifesto pledge.Labour had been scheduled to hold an opposition day debate on the issue tomorrow, calling on the government “to cancel its planned cut to universal credit” from the end of September 2021.It was not immediately clear whether the vote would be rescheduled before the universal credit payments are reduced, but the Commons leader Jacob Rees-Mogg is expected to update MPs on Thursday.While any motion tabled by Labour would not be binding on the government, it would force Conservative MPs who have increasingly raised the alarm about the cut to divide on the issue in a Commons vote.Despite repeated warnings from anti-poverty campaigners to re-think the decision to end the uplift — worth over £1,000 per year for claimants — the government has stood by its decision not to extend the support, which was first introduced at the onset of the Covid pandemic in March 2020.Jonathan Reynolds, the shadow work and pensions secretary, said: “The [government] have pulled Labour’s vote on the cut to universal credit that would have been tomorrow to vote on NI [national insurance] increase instead.“I will do all I can to ensure a vote still takes place,” he stressed. “The biggest cut in the history of the welfare state must be debated in Parliament.”His remarks come as a Labour analysis suggested at least 200,000 children are at risk of homelessness if the decision to remove the support goes ahead at the end of the month. In a speech on Wednesday, shadow housing minister Lucy Powell will describe the decision of ministers to remove the £20-per-week top-up as “social vandalism” and “economically illiterate”.Using government data on households in receipt of local housing allowance and the monthly median gaps with rents, the party estimated that there are 204,706 children who live in families where the £20 uplift makes the difference between whether rent payments are made.“Ending the £1,040 uplift is not just social vandalism that will weaken communities, but economically illiterate damaging local economies,” Ms Powell will say.“Homes are the bedrock of a successful lives, stable families and strong societies. They give us a stake in our community.“During Covid, the country came together to make sure everybody had a safe, secure home to shelter in. The government are abandoning any progress of a better future by returning to a failed past where unaffordable, insecure housing is a gaping hole in our social safety net.”According to a separate analysis by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation the decision to hike national insurance contributions to fund an overhaul in social care would also impact around two million families on low incomes who receive universal credit or working tax credit, with the claimants paying on average around an extra £100 per year.Deputy director of evidence and impact at the organisation, Peter Matejic, said: “This extra cost adds insult to injury for these families who are facing a historic £1,040 cut to their annual incomes when universal credit and working tax credit are reduced in less than a month on 6 October.“If it presses ahead, this government will be responsible for the single biggest overnight cut to social security ever.”He added: “Any MP who is concerned about families on low incomes must urge the prime minister and chancellor to reverse this damaging cut, which will have an immediate and devastating impact on their constituents’ living standards in just a few weeks’ time.” Earlier this week, the Manchester United footballer, Marcus Rashford, a prominent campaigner on child food poverty, urged the government to keep the universal credit top-up to prevent thousands of children from going hungry.“What is it going to take for these children to be prioritised? Instead of removing support through social security, we should be focusing efforts on developing a sustainable long-term roadmap out of this child hunger pandemic,” he said. More

Boris Johnson has announced the biggest tax rise for a generation to pay for two things: one, clearing the NHS backlog caused by the coronavirus pandemic, and two, helping with the costs for people who need social care.The Conservative rebellion has so far failed to materialise, and the prime minister is rushing his MPs to vote for the changes on Wednesday to minimise the opposition. The Labour Party will vote against, but leader Sir Keir Starmer has not been specific on what he would do instead. He said he agreed with spending more on the NHS, but he didn’t agree with raising national insurance because people with income from stocks, shares and property weren’t being taxed heavily enough. The prime minister had partly pre-empted this by raising the tax on dividends, and by charging the extra national insurance on people above the state pension age, catching a lot of well-paid older people.A snap poll by Savanta ComRes found that 46 per cent say “breaking manifesto pledge to fund social care reform” is “acceptable”, 42 per cent say “unacceptable”.Paul Johnson, the director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, has meanwhile delivered his interim verdict: “It is disappointing that the government did not find a better package of tax measures to fund these spending increases. A simple increase in income tax would have been preferable. But overall much needed reforms to social care are being introduced and unavoidable pressures on the NHS are being funded through a broad based and broadly progressive tax increase. That is better than doing nothing.”Others, such as Andy Burnham, Labour mayor of Manchester, have suggested that a wealth tax would be a better way of paying for it.These are important issues that will dominate the political landscape until the next election.Do you have questions about social care, the NHS and how they should be funded? I will be on hand on Wednesday afternoon to answer as many as I can about the implications for the parties and the people.If you have a question, submit it now, or when I join you live at 4pm on Wednesday 8 September for an “Ask Me Anything” event.To get involved all you have to do is register to submit your question in the comments below.If you’re not already a member, click “sign up” in the comments box to leave your question. Don’t worry if you can’t see your question – they may be hidden until I join the conversation to answer them. Then join us live on this page at 4pm as I tackle as many questions as I can. More

Former health secretary Matt Hancock was laughed at as he spoke in the House of Commons for the first time since resigning.Mr Hancock – who quit after revelations of his affair with close aide Gina Coladangelo – congratulated the prime minister in a debate on social care.The disgraced former Cabinet member was praised by both Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak, with the chancellor thanking him for the “fastest rollout of a vaccine anywhere in the world”.But his colleagues were less forgiving, and on both occasions he rose to speak he was met with a chorus of boos, laughing and general heckling.Following Mr Johnson’s statement on social care, Mr Hancock said: “The reform of social care has been ducked for decades because successive governments have put it in the ‘too difficult’ box. So, can I congratulate the prime minister for delivering on our commitments and his commitment.“Can I ask him to ensure that as well as the money, we integrate properly the NHS with social care so that people can get the dignity that they deserve?”The prime minster thanked Mr Hancock for playing “a major part in the gestation of these policies”.Mr Johnson said: “What we will be doing is bringing forward a White Paper on the integration.“Of course, this is going to be difficult but it has got to be done, and we must have a system whereby people can work across both the health sector and the care sector in an integrated way.“We have got to have single budget holders and we have got to make sure that, for instance, you have single electronic records in both health and social care.”Mr Johnson in Tuesday admitted to breaking an election manifesto promise after he announced the £12bn tax raid to tackle a crisis in health and social care.The prime minister told MPs in the House of Commons that the new health and social care levy, based on a 1.25 per cent increase in National Insurance contributions, was “the reasonable and the fair approach”.Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer disagreed with the increase and said a tax on wealth aimed at “those with the broadest shoulders” should be used to pay for an improved social care system. More

Social care leaders are warning that Boris Johnson’s £12bn-a-year tax raid will fail to end the crisis that has left 1.6 million elderly and disabled people without help, after most of the cash was diverted to the NHS.Even as the prime minister’s manifesto-busting plan appeared to win over Tory MPs – who are expected to back it in a rushed vote on Wednesday – it was met with an angry backlash from councils and charities.They warned local authorities would continue to be starved of the billions needed to provide adequate care for people in their own homes, a verdict backed by the respected Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS).“It is clear that the extra funding will not be sufficient to reverse the cuts in the numbers receiving care seen during the 2010s,” the think-tank said.The package includes £500m over three years to boost recruitment and training of care workers – but the GMB union warned of a shortage of 170,000 staff by the end of the year alone.The warnings came as the scale of Mr Johnson’s gamble was laid bare, the IFS warning that – with £25bn of tax hikes already in the pipeline – the overall rise to come is the “highest in peacetime”.Strikingly, at a Downing Street news conference, the prime minister refused to rule out further tax rises before the next election, warning the impact of Covid meant “the fiscal position has changed radically”.Nevertheless, a No 10 source said it is “confident” the Commons will back the new “health and social care levy” – effectively a national insurance (NI) hike of 1.25 percentage points, from next April – on Wednesday.A threatened Tory revolt appeared to have fizzled out as the vast majority of Conservative MPs spoke out in favour of what Jeremy Hunt, the former health secretary, called “biting the bullet” on social care.Public opinion is split, a snap poll by YouGov suggested, with 44 per cent of people in favour of the tax rise and 43 per cent against.In what was widely seen as an historic moment – after a decade of Tory inaction on social care – Mr Johnson announced a package similar to that put forward by Sir Andrew Dilnot a decade ago, and then shelved.Lifetime care payments will be capped at £86,000 from October 2023, to allow homeowners facing “catastrophic” care costs, for conditions such as dementia, to pass on their properties to their children.No one with assets below £20,000 will pay any social care costs – but, although there is a “floor” of £100,000, people with assets between £20,000 and that amount will contribute on a sliding scale.To counter the charge that the NI hike will punish the young and lower-paid, working pensioners will also pay what will become a new “health and social care levy” from April 2023 – and listed separately on pay slips.And business owners and investors will also pay a new dividend tax of 1.25 per cent, after criticism that only workers and companies paying them are being hit.But, although the plan was billed as ending the social care crisis, only £5.4bn of the £36bn to be raised over three years is for care – with the NHS grabbing around £25bn and £6bn going to the devolved governments.Furthermore, the Treasury acknowledged the £5.4bn is largely for “implementing” the new caps and floors and for ensuring councils pay more to care home providers.In the Commons, the prime minister twice refused to say how much will go to councils for better care – despite a £5bn funding black hole even before Covid, leaving 1.6 million with unmet care needs.Edel Harris, chief executive of the learning disability charity Mencap, said: “Today’s announcement won’t be enough to fix the crisis that is happening right now.“People who need care are missing out, others are having their support cut and some are being asked to pay towards their care which they simply can’t afford.”Phillip Anderson, head of policy at the MS Society, supporting people with multiple sclerosis, said: “Sadly, today’s announcement has not been worth the wait.And Richard Kramer, chief executive of the disability charity Sense, said: “Once again, the social care system is treated as the ‘Cinderella’ service to the NHS.”Mike Padgham, chairman of the Independent Care Group, described the announcement as a “damp squib”, saying: “It’s not clear how the money is going to be ringfenced for adult social care so it gets to local authorities on the frontline.”And the Unison general secretary, Christina McAnea, said: “Those currently in receipt of care and the thousands more who need support but can’t get it for love nor money will feel extremely let down,”The prime minister conceded his broken tax promise, telling MPs: “I accept this breaks a manifesto commitment – which is not something I do lightly. But a global pandemic was in no one’s manifesto.”And, pointing to the dividend tax as proof of the plan’s fairness, he said: “We will be asking better off business owners and investors to make a fair contribution too.”Stephen McPartland, the Conservative MP for Stevenage, said he would not back a plan that provided “no new funding for social care for at least 3 years” – but there were few dissenting Tory voices.“No money for living costs, only personal care costs. Selling your home is just deferred. It is a tax on jobs. I need much more detail to even consider supporting it,” Mr McPartland tweeted. More

Boris Johnson announces rise in National Insurance to fund social care.mp4Boris Johnson has admitted that raising National Insurance breaks a Conservative manifesto pledge after confirming that the 1.25 percentage point tax increase aimed at funding the NHS and health and social care reform will go ahead. Announcing the hike, he told the House of Commons that “a global pandemic was in no-one’s manifesto” either, before telling a Downing Street press conference that breaking his 2019 pledge on taxation was necessary to keep his promises to be fiscally responsible and fix health and social care. Asked at the press conference whether he would rule out any future sudden tax hikes, the PM declined to do so – saying that it would be “totally wrong” for him to comment. “What I can tell you is that there are not many people in the Conservative Party who are more dedicated to cutting down on taxes than the three people standing before you today,” he added, referring to himself, Chancellor Rishi Sunak and Health Secretary Sajid Javid. Initially the levy, which is set to be introduced in April 2022, will be paid by employees and the self-employed and will work out at around £5 per person each week. From April 2023, National Insurance will return to its current rate but a ‘Health and Social Care Levy’ will appear on pay slips, including those of pensioners who don’t pay NI. Show latest update

1631040271Thank you for following The Independent’s live politics coverage today. To learn how the government’s planned National Insurance hike could affect you, click here. And to receive daily politics briefings direct to your inbox, click here. Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 19:441631040057Johnson says Scotland will receive additional £1bn amid tax hike backlash Boris Johnson has said that Scotland will receive more than £1 billion as he announced plans to raise taxes to pay for social care reform. The move has, however, drawn criticism from the SNP with Commons leader Ian Blackford, who likened the hike in National Insurance and future health and social care levy to a poll tax. “By raising this levy across the UK, the Tories are taxing Scottish workers twice – forcing them to pay the bill for social care in England as well as at home in Scotland,” he said. “This is the Prime Minister’s poll tax on Scottish workers to pay for English social care.”Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 19:401631039244Boris Johnson warned his £12bn-a-year tax raid will fail to end social care crisis, as Tory MPs back planSocial care leaders are warning that Boris Johnson’s £12bn-a-year tax raid will fail to end the crisis that has left 1.6 million elderly and disabled people without help, after most of the cash was diverted to the NHS.Even as the prime minister’s manifesto-busting plan appeared to win over Tory MPs – who are expected to back it in a rushed vote on Wednesday – it was met with an angry backlash from councils and charities.They warned local authorities would continue to be starved of the billions needed to provide adequate care for people in their own homes, a verdict backed by the respected Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS).Read more: Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 19:271631038402Starmer: NI hike will hit renters, young people and low-paid the hardest Labour leader Keir Starmer has accused the Prime Minister of hitting young people and low-paid workers hardest with his plan to increase National Insurance. Sir Keir also claimed that the hike is unfair to renters who will pay more if they are working full time jobs while their landlords will not have to pay additional tax on their properties. “11 years of Tory unfairness continues,” he wrote on Twitter. Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 19:131631037454Majority of young people believe NI hike is unfair, poll finds The majority of young people believe that raising National Insurance to pay for social care is unfair, while most over-65s support the move, YouGov polling suggests . In total, 44 per cent of people are in favour of the tax increase confirmed today by the prime minister, while 43 per cent oppose it, the pollsters say. Among 18-24 year olds, 62 per cent told YouGov that they don’t think the hike is fair, as did 54 per cent of 25-48 year olds. By contrast, two thirds of people over 60 said that they believe the move is fair.Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 18:571631036661Johnson: Tax rise is ‘right, reasonable and responsible’ Boris Johnson has said that introducing a health and social care levy is the “right, reasonable and responsible” thing to do.In a video message shared to Twitter, the PM said that the tax hike will fund a “once in a lifetime, once in a generation” to “fix” the NHS and social care. Labour leader Keir Starmer, on the other hand, characterised the tax rise as a “broken promise” and accused the PM of failing to present a plan on how he proposes to fix social care. Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 18:441631036027Government pulls plans for imminent vote on controversial universal credit cutBoris Johnson’s government has pulled Labour’s plans to hold an imminent vote on the controversial cut to universal credit payments — just weeks before the £20-per-week uplift ends.Instead, the government announced it was earmarking time on Wednesday for a separate vote on the newly announced health and social care levy, which flouts a key Conservative election manifesto pledge.Labour had been scheduled to hold an opposition day debate on the issue tomorrow, calling on the government “to cancel its planned cut to universal credit” from the end of September 2021.It was not immediately clear whether the vote would be rescheduled before the universal credit payments are reduced, but the Commons leader Jacob Rees-Mogg is expected to update MPs on Thursday.Read more from Political Correspondent Ashley Cowburn: Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 18:331631035104PM refuses to be drawn on possible Cabinet reshuffle Boris Johnson has refused to say whether or not he will reshuffle his Cabinet in coming days amid speculation that senior ministers such as Dominic Raab and Gavin Williamson could lose their current positions. The Prime Minister was asked by multiple journalists about reports that key roles could change hands at a Downing Street press conference, but failed to answer these questions. Towards the end of the session, he said that he had avoided discussing “more political matters” because his focus for the briefing was to discuss fixing NHS backlogs and reforming social care. The Sunday Times reported that a Cabinet reshuffle could take place this week. Downing Street has previously said there were “no plans for any reshuffle”.Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 18:181631034337Tory MP says he needs ‘more detail’ to support NI plan Conservative MP Stephen McPartland has indicated that he may not support ministers’ decision to raise National Insurance. Calling the move “a tax on jobs”, the Stevenage MP tweeted that he would need “much more detail” to even consider supporting the plan. MPs are set to vote on the 1.25 percentage point increase in parliament tomorrow. Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 18:051631033263Significant disruption to school year still possible, warns education ministerSignificant disruption to education could still happen this academic year, according to a government minister.Nick Gibb told the education select committee that the government is “trying to avoid” this situation.Children no longer have to isolate after coming into contact with a Covid case, unlike during the last academic year.Hundreds of thousands of students were off school as they were self-isolating as the summer holidays approached.Read more from Zoe Tidman: Joanna Taylor7 September 2021 17:47 More