What will happen if food poverty and homelessness keep growing in the UK?

[AbsentmindedWoman]

I think it's generally accepted that food prices are rising, and will rise a fair bit more next year. I'm hoping that costs aren't completely insane, though. Does anyone know how much they are predicted to rise?

If they go up by much, surely food poverty and food bank usage is just going to keep going up?

What will happen to homeless people also? There is honestly a shocking amount of people on the street in central London. Many argue that a lot are beggars, and actually go home at night - but that's still not great? That people are cobbling together a living from begging on the streets?

I feel it's so easy to fall into horrific destitution these days - obviously, times over the course of human history were far more brutal and it's still vastly better for us living here in the UK today. I get that. Still, though, the world feels like a kind of scary place to be in many ways right now. As a chronically ill woman with no assets such as property, I feel an undercurrent of vulnerability all of the time. Maybe I need better anxiety medication

What do you think will happen to people in poverty in the UK over the next few years? Will things improve somehow?

They need to balance the country, Northern towns are shrinking and there are a lot of empty houses, rural farming areas are having to use European labour NOT paid any less but there just isn't the British born people in the local area or that are willing to do it and the benefits system doesn't help people take short term or seasonal work.

We need more investment for jobs in Northern and rural areas and a better system for seasonal work.

Food costs will go up when they lose that easy labour and crops will rot in the fields.

Brexit will make all of this so much worse for many reasons. Everyone will be so caught up with it there is no time for anything else. We will more than likely see worker's rights stripped and food prices will soar further. I think the future is pretty bleak, to be honest. I can see riots becoming pretty common. The veneer of civilisation is very thin.

Also, if we are out of the Single Market/Customs Union, jobs will go, so there will be more people plunged into this terrible position.

Yes, I'm concerned about worker's rights disappearing too. Even now, it's very clear that a lot of the all the soundbites about diversity and disability are bullshit, for example.

The crash has never been properly addressed. Austerity (which was never real austerity at all but poor punishing) was a terrible decision. Brexit was poorly timed and not planned at all. AI/offshoring.

Perfect storm.

wasonthelist I was shocked by the attitudes re Grenfell but unfortunately i wasnt surprised. Ive posted a lot about the attitudes to social housing tenants on here.

This is our current situation which im struggling to get resolution over.

Dec 2007 Recieve letter from HA saying all items in communal hallways must be removed or they will remove and dispose of them including DHs mobility scooter. Phone housing officer and explain. Get granted permission letter to keep it.

Dec 2011 same thing happens again ....get granted permission letter again.

November 2017.....last Thursday our new housing officer decided to introduce himself by pinning a tort notice to the wall downstairs saying that unless the mobility scooter is gone by 21 December they will take it and sell it to cover the cost of taking it.

It is kept under the stairs completely out of the way and we have prior permission.........TWICE. I phoned the HA and spoke to someone who first asked us to send a copy of a prior permission letter to prove we have permission.

I explained that putting us through all this was in breach of section 149 of the Equality Act and he did get it after a couple of times.........this wasnt the HO i spoke to it was someone else.

He said he would send us a copy of a prior permission letter which he has done. He sent us the one from Dec 2007. We also hunted for our original letters from 2007 and 2011 We found the original 2007 one but also have the new copy he sent us. We cant find the 2011 one. But i did find an old thread of mine from 2011 talking about this on another site so was able to quote dates from when they tried this in 2011.

Now we have the stress and worry of them taking it....... at Christmas for the THIRD time completing the hat trick!

This is the third time they have done this in the run up to Christmas

And he sellotaped the "tort" notice on the wall and then went on annual leave for a week.

I phoned the HA last Friday (the 24 Nov) and they sent me a copy of a previous permission letter But then i recieved another letter on Weds dated the 27th about the hallway. Im so so sick of this.

I think there will be rioting. Something will happen and it will all kick off.

When, not If

Koloh, where you live sounds amazing - but let me guess, it's a low population area? (if such a thing still exists).

someone upthread said there was scaremongering about Jeremy Corbyn - yes, the way it was talked about him increasing corporation tax was like they'd all go out of business - he was only suggesting increasing it to what it was a few years ago!!!

Food prices could rise substantially when the U.K. leaves the common market. 30% of food consumed in the U.K. is imported from the EU

@Nyx1 I live in Yorkshire, aye, in a small town in one of the dales. It's absolutely lovely and I know my luck!

Koloh I've got friends in Yorkshire, I wonder what their perception is. They grew up in London, we remember being horrified by homelessness years ago.

I got particularly ragey when Westminster council got funny about us (the public) buying them food.

Silverdaleglen
I agree so strongly with this. The government strategy has been so focused on London. other countries have several large ecomic centres. I know some UK cities have a lot going on, but they aren't in the same league as London and nothing is done centrally to encourage this.

Its like the whole country has to live commutable from London and then is surprised it makes housing scarce in that area.

AS for the future, I think we will see the return of the workhouse. They will probably be more in line with modern times but workhouses all the same.

I agree that we will see workhouses come back - privately run by the contractors who currently profit from prisons and workfare. Universal Credit and Brexit will result in such a steep increase in destitution that those who have lost everything will have to be contained securely in order to prevent unrest. If you can't afford to buy a survival retreat in a lightly populated area (who can?) you should think about emigrating, particularly if you have children.

Wasonthelist, completely agree, Thatcher’s ethos of every man for himself (or woman) began greed and ruthlessness as a concept to aspire to and be proud of - all hail the Yuppies of the day, and that has become so deeply ingrained in so many people’s psyches that I can’t see how the me, me, me attitude will ever be reversed, it’s bloody disgusting that a supposedly ‘civilised’ country with the wealth it has can treat its vulnerable with such disdain and neglect

This morning I watched one of the "Drugsland" documentaries, about homeless people in Brighton. At the beginning, they said that, in Brighton, one in every 69 people is homeless.

Even if if the true figure is half that, it's horrifying.

Brighton & Hove council is so short of temporary accommodation that they lease properties in neighbouring areas from private landlords and place homeless families in them. The houses are a little less than market rent, but still not affordable for families who are benefit capped, so they end up in rent arrears and homeless again. Only this time, they're intentionally homeless, so no council has a duty to house them.

A shrewd property developer bought a small office block further along the coast and converted it into studio flats, which are used as temp accommodation for homeless single people. Because each one has its own kitchen and bathroom, HB pays the same rate as for a one-bed property: £650 a month. There are at least 50 flats in the block, possibly more. That's over £30,000 a month, paid by the taxpayer, going straight into someone's pocket.

The whole housing situation is dysfunctional. I think the poster upthread who mentioned the imbalance between richer and poorer areas makes a good point. Some area have jobs
but little housing while others have affordable housing but few jobs.

Maybe there should be regional variations in the rate of employers NI, to encourage businesses to relocate to areas where the jobs are needed.

It's frightening what could happen in the country.

But I actually see things improving in the North with brexit. The falling £ will increase food prices. But food prices falling have driven many farmers to bankruptcy.

The increased value of the £ has increased the appeal to EU migrants. Nothing against any migrant from anywhere in the world coming to the.UK. but when the £ is so strong it encourages people to come to the UK and live in 'digs' and send money home. Which doesn't help the UK economy. We are in the building industry and see this all the time. The immigrants also work for shit money, live in shit shared houses and are exploited by gangmasters making a fortune from their cheap labour.

The housing crisis is a house of cards. It will collapse. It has to. It's disgusting that private rentals are replacing social housing and a complete false economy. If we increase social housing we reduce the need for private rentals. Which reduces HB and other benefit payments as people are more likely to work to pay an affordable rent.

0 hour contracts need abolishing. NMW needs to increase. Unemployment will probably increase but benefit payments will decrease as less families will be reliant on tax credits and HB if 0 hour contracts go.

And speaking personally there needs to be a massive overhaul in the construction industry. The VAT system and CIS scheme is open to massive abuse. Make the main developer liable for all VAT and CIS payments and you will massively reduce the amount of small companies going bankrupt ensuring small subcontractors are paid and don't go bust owing HMRC thousands.

Frouby, our horrible housing system won't collapse because governments will keep it going.

I totally take your point re food prices and farmers.

I also think HS2 is intended to bring more business into London, not help divert business away from it.

So, if 'we' can all see that our current system is dysfunctional, inhumane and morally corrupt - why is this country still heading in this terrible direction?

@Justified Because whilst people will tut on social media very few will get out their nice warm houses and act.
Same reason why when we see pictures of dead Syrian babies washed up on a beach we say how terrible it is but very few people do anything.
The media also does it's part to downplay these things, a friend of mine recently livestreamed the crowds from an anti austerity march in London which had at least 10,000 people but never saw a whiff of it on the BBC.

If people want things to change (and not everybody does!) then people need to take action, join community groups and make a noise that cannot be ignored.
Keeping the people terrified and subdued is what keeps these things happening.

Do you think all the TV shows and newspaper articles demonising people on benefits are an accident? Keep the working poor hating those on benefits.
Divide and rule.

I realise I'm coming off like a crazy revolutionary here but it's true.

Do you think all the TV shows and newspaper articles demonising people on benefits are an accident?

Indeed.

The government don't care, they have no morals and if people die in poverty then it's most likely the loss of a voter who wouldn't be a Tory. One of these days it'll most likely be me.

That people are cobbling together a living from begging on the streets?

How do you cobble together a living from begging in the streets?

The one with a foil sheet to keep them warm we saw recently didn't look like they were being too successful at making a living from it.