The Poverty Alliance have today responded to the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s Budget statement. Peter Kelly, Director of the Poverty Alliance, said:
“The Chancellor said today that there is a ‘moral dimension to the economic challenge we face’. That moral economic challenge ought to be about how we best support those who face hardship and how economic recovery can help everyone.
The increase in National Living Wage and reduction in Universal Credit taper rate are welcome moves. But welcome though they are, they will do little to help people who are not in employment and who are struggling.
Significantly, in failing to use his Budget to reinstate the £20 Universal Credit lifeline, Rishi Sunak has failed in his moral duty to protect people from poverty. It is a shameful, unjust decision that makes the Chancellor’s rhetoric about ‘levelling up’ seem as empty as the pockets of the hundreds of thousands of people swept into poverty as a result.
There can be no economic recovery while so many people across the country are locked into poverty. This Budget will do very little to unlock them from that poverty.”
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