A leading charity has accused ministers of trying to play the extent to which the benefits of benefit will increase poverty, claiming that official forecasts rely on a “hand sleep” to underestimate the true impact.
One quarter of one million people, including 50,000 children, will be put into poverty as a result of welfare reforms, according to an impact assessment that the United Kingdom government published along with the Spring statement of Chancellor Rachel Reeves on Wednesday.
But the Joseph Rowntree Foundation said this was an underestimation because the general figure involved an alleged reduction in poverty due to the cancellation of reforms planned by the previous conservative government.
Impact assessment said that “not taking advanced changes from the previous government” would benefit 370,000 people with an average of 2,600 pounds per year. This was factorized in the overall assessment of a net growth of relative poverty of 250,000.
JRF argued that since these changes never moved forward, the true impact would be higher, with the main analyst of charity, Peter Matejic, assessing people’s growth in relative poverty would be at least 350,000.
The Treasury said that the evaluation of poverty was “of all the measures listed in the spring statement, which includes not moving forward with the measures of assessing the previous government’s work skills.”
“It is fair for this to be included in the general analysis of poverty. To suggest otherwise it is misleading,” the treasure added.
The Budget Liability Office had kept savings deriving from the target reforms of the Conservatives in its fiscal forecasts in October, because the government said it would bring its reforms by making at least as large savings.
The government also estimates that about 800,000 people will lose disability benefits, also known as payments of personal independence (PIP), with individuals determined to lose an average of £ 4500 per year by 2029-30.
The estimates are likely to foster further dissatisfaction among labor MPs, many of whom are already angry at the government that reduces welfare and aid budgets while increasing protection costs.
Last week, the secretary of labor and pensions Liz Kendall discovered a package of comprehensive well -being reforms that included tightening the skills for PIP and lowering the highest level of disability in half.
However, its announcement does not include assessing the government’s impact that indicates how many people will be affected by the masses.
These figures show that about 370,000 people who are in receiving disability benefits will no longer receive them when reassessed. About half a million the next contenders will no longer be right for them, she added.
Meanwhile, about 2.25MN people currently in receiving disability benefits, known as Universal Health Health, will be affected by freezing tariffs, losing an average of £ 500 per year.
Moreover, the next 750,000 benefit recipients will lose about £ 3,000 a year due to the government’s decision to reduce the right to half for new plaintiffs, he added.
About one -fifth of households with family disabilities will lose benefits as a result of reforms, on average a loss of £ 1,730 per year, according to the analysis.
Relative poverty is defined as a family whose income is below 60 percent of the average level.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer had hoped that the changes announced last week would generate about £ 5 billion in annual savings until the end of the forecast period, but the OBR refused to “mark” many of the proposed changes, claiming that the government had not provided sufficient details regarding policy proposals.
The clash caused political disorders just hours before Reeves determined her spring statement.
Kendall was forced to find additional urgent cuts, including freezing in the degree of disability benefits, leading to increased anger from MPs who had made sure that well -being reforms were not just a cost reduction machine.
“It all looks like a shamebles,” said one person informed about the preparations of the statement. “It’s been pretty chaotic.”
“The last minute clash to capture even more funding from the welfare budget has destroyed any illusion of a moral issue for cuts,” said Labor MP Neil Duncan-Jordan. “Politics will foster the social determinants of poverty who ultimately create further pressure on the services the Chancellor is trying to cut.”
Treasury Secretary Chief Darren Jones angered the disappointment of his back on Wednesday when he compared the cost of reducing the benefits of OBR to reduce his children’s pocket money as they told them to get a Saturday job.
OBR on Wednesday estimated that the total package of well-being measures would save only 3.4Bn £ 2029-30, after factoring new costs and managing the well-being system-even stressed that its estimates were very unsafe.
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Fiscal supervisor said that this figure includes a total reduction of £ 3 billion to spend on incompetence benefits – from which it has dropped 1.6bn £ that would have been rescued from previous conservative reforms that the current government has removed.
It also includes a reduction of £ 4.1 billion in expenses for disability benefits in England and Wales. Meanwhile, the most generous rate of unemployment benefit will add 1.8bn £ for expenses by 2029-30, ahead of a small additional cost because more people are expected to claim.
However, the OBR said there were not enough details to evaluate whether changes in financial incentives and work support would bring more sick and disabled people in the long run.
However, he noted that people interested “generally have limited ability to work and may have been out of the job market for some time.”
The government said its evaluations for people driven into poverty did not consider its programs to put people into work, which expects that it would ease some of the financial losses.
