Comments from Philip Alston on misogyny of Universal Credit

[ContessaHallelujahSparklehorse]

"Welfare changes have disproportionately affected women, especially single parents, he said. "If you got a group of misogynists in a room, and said guys, how can we make this system work for men and not for women, they wouldn't have come up with too many other ideas than what's already in place."

Thank you for speaking out about this, Professor Alston.

Full article gives the background here: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-46236642

Hear hear!!!

Unfortunately it does sound like the Govt is going LA LA LA very hard on this one.

It's all fine, Amber Rudd is just the woman to ensure fairness for all.

It's all fine, Amber Rudd is just the woman to ensure fairness for all.

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

I don't think they are going la la la, because that would suggest they'd made a terrible mistake but were ignoring it. I think it is all working exactly as they intended:

"Ministers with whom I met told me that things are going well that they don't see any big problems and they are happy with the way their policies are playing out," Prof Alston said.

In other words, they used the financial crisis as an excuse to resume their policies from the '80s and '90s of punishing poor, single mothers for the 'crime' of being poor, single and a mother.

As the saying goes, its not a bug, its a feature.

Jackie Long did an excellent interview with the chap on C4

www.channel4.com/news/un-expert-says-austerity-has-condemned-millions-to-poverty

The interview is only 5mins long

“Punitive, mean-spirited, and callous” – that’s how the United Nations special rapporteur on poverty has described the Government’s austerity policies, and he describes the rise in child poverty as a “social calamity and economic disaster”.

Thanks Socrates, will check that out!

Just read this powerful piece on Medium (via Twitter). I thought the analogy about people in job centre's acting like a Stanley Milligram experiment particularly apt.

medium.com/@JohnWight1/un-poverty-report-the-tories-have-declared-war-on-society-society-must-now-declare-war-on-them-40ff999d4bae

The full UN statement.

www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=23881&LangID=E

That is a thorough report. Shameful state of affairs that is just going to keep getting worse. Brexit has been a great case of smoke and mirrors to mask the theft of public resources by UK Gov plc

BBC and others todat have items about UC forcing women into prostitution.

The availability of women to fuck in return for paltry amounts of cash has always been important to men, who still of course have most of the power in the UK.

Rough sleepign has exploded on our local high street.

When I started working in central london before "austerity" there were hardly any people sleeping rough / begging over the years it crept up now it is lots

And has bled though to the high streets on the outskirts

Anyone who doesn't think there's an issue hasn't been outide lately? I mean it's obvious something has goen badly wrong

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-46235842

The Universal Credit benefits system is forcing some women to turn to sex work, charities say.

The BBC has spoken to five charities and organisations in England who say there are increasing numbers of women on the credit (UC) in this position.

Frank Field, MP for Birkenhead, also told MPs in October "some women have taken to the red-light district for the first time" as a result of UC.

The government said: "No-one has to face hardship on Universal Credit."

"Julie", from Merseyside, never thought she would have to turn to sex work.

But an eight-week wait for the single mum's first payment after transferring from her previous benefits left her "desperate", so when she was offered £30 for sex she took it.

"I'm ashamed to admit, I have slept with a guy for money", said Julie, who asked for her real name not to be used.

"It's something I never ever thought I would be ever capable of doing. I just didn't think it was in me as a person.

"So I'm, like, very disappointed in myself and ashamed of myself.

"I had to use food banks. I've never been in that situation in my life. I've really struggled."

When Mr Field made his comments in the Commons, then Work and Pensions Secretary Esther McVey said work needed to be done to help them.

"Perhaps [Mr Field] could tell these ladies and the work coaches that now we have got record job vacancies - 830,000 job vacancies - and perhaps there are other jobs on offer," she said.

But Mr Field told the BBC he had received no contact from the government since raising the issue in parliament, following UC's introduction in his constituency in November 2017.

"[Women turning to sex work is] an absolute indictment of welfare reform… it seems that you couldn't get a worse result," he said. "