Latest Updates: social exclusion RSS

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  Why pay less?

  victoria 6:09 pm on 8 February, 2010 | 0 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: social exclusion, unemployment (7)

  I am a sucker for catalogues and the one that dropped through my letter box today took my breath away. If I buy a new washing machine from Buy-as-You-View, whose catalogue it was, I can pay a total of £1,081.08 for a Hotpoint washing machine with service cover (the WMF740K if you really want to know) when the same machine – with 3 years service cover – costs a mere £462.49 from online retailer Laskys, with similar prices at Dixons, Currys etc.  That’s more than double – £618.59 to be exact – for the privilege of paying weekly.  Oh yes, and delivery is extra for BAYV’s machine.

  Buy-As-You-View likes to stress its respectable credentials, sponsoring the Inspire Wales awards, promoting ‘green’ working and most astonishing of all talking up its ‘corporate social responsibility’.  There is another spin, of course – blatant profiteering from low income households.  Inspire Wales? More like rip off Wales.

   

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• 

  The lessons of history

  victoria 3:16 pm on 1 February, 2010 | 1 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Heads of the Valleys (5), social exclusion

  Allowing local councils to set benefit rates is the latest idea to reform public services. Speaking at the New Local Government Network conference, Philip Hammond MP is reported to want to allow authorities to set and distribute benefits such as JobSeekers Allowance, so they can match benefit rates with local labour market conditions. This will result in ‘huge potential savings’. 

  Setting aside the questions of the lack of jobs full stop, the fact that there is NO evidence that unemployment benefits deter people from working, the increase in bureaucracy (because 1,000s of councils are paying tax rather than one big government department), all the unforeseen side-effects (as unemployed people ‘border hop’ from low benefit to high benefit areas) there is the little matter of history….  In the 1930s, unemployment in Merthyr Tydfil was so high that the authorities were no longer able to afford to provide ‘public assistance’ and the town was near bankrupt.

  Sixty one years ago today – 1st Feb 1939 – S.O. Davies MP said in the House of Commones that ‘areas which have suffered widespread and longstanding unemployment ought not to be left to bear entirely the financial and social consequences of such a burden’.

  Sixty one years on, that same principle holds true.

   
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  Spending squeeze hits homeless

  victoria 10:45 pm on 21 January, 2010 | 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: social exclusion

  The first signs that the squeeze on public spending will hit the most vulnerable hardest are emerging.  A local authority (doesn’t matter which one) has cut its £24,000 a year grant to Shelter Cymru.  £24,000 is not a lot of money to a local authority – even a small one – but it is a lot to a charity, and has a huge impact on people who don’t even have a roof over the heads.  It would be good to add up how much funding the public sector current provides to charities (and for what), and to see if it is a soft target for cuts.  I can think of a lot of local authority spending to cut before grants for homelessness.

   
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  Paying the price of being poor

  victoria 9:53 am on 17 November, 2009 | 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Bevan Foundation (2), social exclusion

  How to reduce the ‘premium’ paid by low income households for fuel, financial services and education is the subject of the Bevan Foundation’s latest report, launched today.  

  It argues that although the Assembly Government cannot influence household’s income, there is a great deal it can do to make low incomes go further and, in particular, stop low income families being penalised.  

  Making better use of grants is a key theme. Dishing out relatively small amounts of cash that then subsidise overpriced goods and services is inefficient and achieves little: instead, steps should be taken to link grants with cutting costs, e.g. winter fuel payments and home insulation.  

  Another key issue is payments: over and again low income households are penalised because they pay cash, often in in small amounts rather than lump sums.  Making better use of the post office network, putting cash on the same footing as direct debit payments and fair enforcement of debts are all explored.  

  And last, the public and community sector – as an important provider of services – needs to lead e.g. by maintaining payments in cash, fair debt collection, negotiating discounts for bulk purchases such as school uniforms, electricity for social housing or insurance, and complying with guidance on poverty.

  The project was a partnership with Consumer Focus Wales, National Energy Action Cymru and Save the Children Cymru and was funded by the Welsh Assembly Government’s New Ideas Fund.

   
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  It's not just houses that people can't afford to fuel

  Lee 4:38 pm on 20 October, 2009 | 3 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: social exclusion, sustainable development (6), transport (7)

  The Charter aimed at ridding Wales of fuel poverty by 2018 launched today outlined how one in four Welsh households suffered from fuel poverty, meaning they have to spend 10% or more of their income on heating.

  Though the concept of fuel poverty is familiar to us  the figures are stark and shocking.  Perhaps less well known is the fact that Wales is also riddled with transport poverty.

  One in four households don’t have access to a car – in communities like Blaenau Gwent and Merthyr Tydfil as many as 35% of families are car-less.  But because jobs and services are often difficult to access by public transport many on low-incomes feel forced to ‘invest’ in a car.

  Research shows that buying and running a car is a major cause of people getting into trouble with debts.  Those on low-wages who do have cars spend nearly a quarter of their income on the cost of motoring.   And the cost is set to rise.  The price of oil has already more than doubled since early this year and is predicted to keep on going up.  

  Transport poverty in Wales will increase further if our society continues to be shaped by the idea that running a car is the same kind of ‘basic need’ as heating our homes.  Wales needs to rethink its transport priorities so that sustainable transport  options are seen as realistic and convenient for people and owning a car is no longer seen as a necessity but a lifestyle choice.

   
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  The Tories on...poverty

  Lee 1:57 pm on 7 October, 2009 | 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Conservative Party (8), Economy (19), social exclusion

  As part of his own medium-term strategy for positioning himself for the leadership Conservative AM Jonathan Morgan has set out his party’s claim on the Social Justice agenda.

  He is right that tackling poverty cannot be the property of any one party.  But he gets carried away with the symbolism of the Conservatives setting out to capture this agenda, without tackling the difficult detail of this intractable problem.

  He wants to see a greater emphasis on business and enterprise in the Communities First programme.   He echoes the criticism of the community lead initative and suggests the answer lies in a clearer focus and a greater “understanding toward the economic issues which are the most pressing”.

  He wants a greater role for central Government and a strong set of targets and benchmarks.  That will be help acheieve “a positive synergy to bring about affirmative empowerment”, apparently.

  I believe that we should restructure the programme to ensure the delivery of specific economic outcomes. Communities First was designed to tackle poverty, therefore the focus should be on those economic factors and shouldn’t be a panacea to cure every problem.

  Much of his critique is widely accepted.  But his solutions are vague.  Yes, Communities First is very broad, but so are the causes of poverty.  Also it allows each community to decide the priority for their area.  The Conservatices rhetoric of localism is in danger of giving way at the first sign of difficulty to the target culture they have done so much to criticise.

  His engagement with the issue is to be sincerely welcomed, but I can’t help feel that when it comes to solutions it is easier said than done.

   
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  What to do about workless families

  victoria 4:59 pm on 26 August, 2009 | 3 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: social exclusion, unemployment (7), worklessness

  Just done a Radio Wales interview on the latest statistics which show that almost one in five households of working age have no-one in them who is working.  Thankfully, the interview did not focus on ‘benefit cheats’, ‘dependency cultures’ and all those other phrases that are often trotted out when talking about lack of work. Instead, it looked at what should be done to help people back to work. As ever, the answers are obvious:

  1. more jobs

  2. more flexibility in jobs for people who need to accommodate certain health conditions

  3. better child care so parents can work

  4. better public transport so people can get to / from work without needing a car

  5. skills people need to get and keep a job.

  It ought not to be beyond our ability collectively to put these in place. What is more difficult is generating a ‘culture of hope’ rather than the despair that permeates many households and communities.

   
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  Faster or fairer broadband

  victoria 12:25 pm on 30 July, 2009 | 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: broadband (2), social exclusion

  Once again, the problems facing rural communities in Wales wishing to access broadband have been highlighted, based on a report by Ofcom.  Tomos Livingstone, writing in the Western Mail, says:

  “The findings are the latest in a series of investigations suggesting a growing digital divide between urban and rural areas as more and more services are offered online.”

  But work the Bevan Foundation has just published paints a different picture. Yes, broadband speeds might not be what they could be, but there is a bigger problem – the 40% or so who do not have broadband at all.  Typically people without broadband are older, on low incomes and have fewer educational qualifications than those with broadband - people in managerial and professional jobs are more than twice as likely to have broadband than people in routine and manual occupations. Not having broadband is more than just not being able to blog or check out all the newspapers in the morning – it excludes people from cheap fuel deals, from the latest information about swine flu, from applying for a job and from the day-to-day social ‘glue’ this is increasingly digital – Facebook, Bebo, iTunes and all.

  Arguments for more and more investment in faster and faster links are all very well, but if a large chunk of the population have no broadband at all – for whatever reason – then the already deep social and economic divisions in society will only get worse. 

  It seems that this is choice time – faster speeds for the few or more access for all.  Which is it to be?