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Gordon Brown calls for overhaul of benefits system as study reveals ‘crisis’
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 21 Jan 2024
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
Gordon Brown has urged Jeremy Hunt to act on startling new research into Britain’s threadbare benefits system that showed the poorest families must spend an average of 63p in each pound to meet basic food and energy needs.
The former prime minister said the paper was a “wake-up call” to the chancellor that “reveals the arithmetic of poverty”, and forces the UK to “face up to the fact that it is in the throes of a crisis”.
Brown said the chancellor should use his budget on 6 March to “implement a root and branch reform of the benefits system” in order to stymie further impoverishment of Britain’s poorest children.
The unpublished briefing paper by Prof Donald Hirsch, titled the UK’s Inadequate and Unfair Safety Net, concludes Britain’s benefit system no longer provides the basic amount needed “to function day-to-day and have healthy lives”.
He added that the need to balance competing basic costs – such as clothes, toiletries and transport – meant spending on food and energy by the poorest households was likely to be inadequate, leading to serious health consequences for families.
Donald Hirsch’s important and path-breaking research reveals the arithmetic of poverty, showing just why so many families on benefits can no longer make ends meet.
The original article contains 1,012 words, the summary contains 208 words. Saved 79%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!