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Universal Credit and the Digital Dilemma
The Social Publishing Project is currently touring financial inclusion forums around the UK, presenting the findings of the Quids in! Reader Survey 2014. Just before we end the talk, concluding with all the things we hope to do with partners who all are playing their part in promoting inclusion, we hone in on Access Granted, our digital literacy campaign.
Our research proved that the people who need help most are not online. Collating evidence was tricky because (a) we published the survey online and so it was difficult to judge how this skewed results and (b) someone posted on moneysavingexpert.com that anyone could access the survey and stand the chance of winning £400. So, how do we know people online are better off? Well, there was a clear picture that almost everyone who responded online (before the posting on MSE) was relatively okay compared to those who responded by post. And as for the surge of online interest we had after the MSE mention, we had to ditch the lot – 50% of all our responses – because it was blatantly not the people we write Quids in! for.
There is no doubt in our minds that the digital by default agenda, notably attached to the introduction of Universal Credit, introduces an element of exclusivity to welfare. There is part of me that recognises the benefit of forcing people to go online if they cannot be won over by the 'what's in it for me?' argument but this is no time to apply the coercion of use it (IT) or lose it (your benefits).
Despite the spin, Universal Credit is far from properly piloted. The numbers migrated to it are unfeasibly low and roll out has been woefully slow. There are some good ideas behind UC, mostly around the 'better off in work' pledge. But the mechanics behind it have been oversold – it is not a simplified system, it's just a single name for a range of entitlements and the resulting IT complexities have hampered progress behind the scenes. More importantly, though, out in communities, among real people, it still remains to be seen if they can engage with UC by PC.
Our research found that only 39% of readers who responded by post had a PC at home. Only 19% of postal and 26% of online respondents said they were prepared to access benefits online. Only a fifth of postal and a third of online respondents were willing to go online for debt advice or banking. We also have close ties with employment support agencies and they all report that the single biggest challenge to long-term unemployed people is around IT, where employers are increasingly expecting people to apply online and be able to use a computer once they start a job. Whatever the job.
SPP's Access Granted campaign, run in partnership with Clean Slate Training & Employment, highlights four issues that need to be addressed if the Government and other stakeholders want or need people in poverty and on low incomes to engage online:
Truly accessible online IT facilities in communities, not restricted by firewalls that don't even allow access to Facebook, unreasonable time restrictions for people finding their way, or security settings that prevent jobseekers uploading their CV, for example
Support on hand wherever possible to guide people who cannot navigate the internet or struggle with literacy and online information
Web content designed for, and promoted to, people who are new to IT and the web or who may struggle with literacy or English as a second language, including sites that provide accessible information and links to more detailed information when they're ready. (See our pilot website www.accessgrantedbath.org)
A clear and coherent 'what's in it for me?' message advertising the benefits of getting online – from access to benefits, grants and services to finding employment (and finding better paid employment) and shopping around or finding deals
We'd like to see the brakes applied a little among local authorities closing neighbourhood offices as access to their services transition online. Yes, in principle, these changes take services into people's homes but unfortunately not for poorer households who might need those services most. We're also calling for landlords considering online publishing of tenant newsletters to think carefully about who this might exclude. There needs to be a 'third way', not an all or nothing false assumption that the world wide web reaches a world wide community. Conventional means must continue to ensure no-one, (let alone the poorest), gets left behind as the world goes online.
Heat or Eat? We Can't Do Either
Catching up on Twitter last week, I came across a Guardian article wherein three-time advisor to the US Government Robert Reich argues against austerity as an economic strategy. Despite having been published in March, it was timely for me as we're just finishing our report on the research we carried out among Quids in! readers earlier this year.
We'll publish the report in the next few weeks but, spoiler alert, I can reveal our research shows that people already living below the poverty line have been hit hardest by austerity – ie, cuts to welfare and services. Working age people not in full-time work are likely to face a perfect storm where their health, employability and home life are not only impacted but where each issue erodes the other.
In the face of rising costs, those reliant on benefits (whether in work or not) no longer have to choose between eating and heating. Our research suggests most cannot properly do either.
Reich rejects austerity as a cure for economic disaster. He says that our problems are not national debt in itself but its relationship to GDP: If fewer people are able to work, GDP goes down and the proportion is worse:
"The issue is not the deficit per se. The issue in all our countries is the ratio of the deficit to GDP – to the entire economy. And if you embrace austerity and thereby reduce economic growth you actually end up potentially in a worse place than you started, with a higher ratio of public debt to GDP. At the same time you are generating huge amounts of human suffering unnecessarily. It takes a huge toll on individuals, on families and on communities."
This 'toll' is measured in our own research:
54% saw their benefits decrease
52% said their mental health had suffered (higher among working age readers not in full-time employment)
51% turned off their heating despite being cold (higher among working age readers not in full-time employment)
37% had had to skip meals; 46% of working age and not in full-time employment; 52% of households bringing in less than £200 a week
30% had become physically ill due to money worries (higher among... you guessed it)
53% were more isolated, missing out on occasions with families and friends
George Osborne takes credit for economic recovery but most of his headlines have been about cutting welfare to 'scroungers'. Even if fewer people claim benefit, people in work are not earning more. That's some reasoning at work if he thinks slashing benefits has created wealth. A dog has four legs; my cat has four legs; my cat is a dog.
We need to challenge the Government's pronouncements on how wealth creation and distribution works. George Osborne may defend liberal economics, suggesting free trade makes us all richer, but surely we all know that in a global economy this is not guaranteed, in fact it's unlikely. We know corporate companies raising huge profits in the UK dodge domestic tax, one way the nation funds services and balances its books. We also know that when employers make more money, it doesn't follow that their staff do – shareholders are the only stakeholders they really consider.
Ninety percent of the time, I remain optimistic that there is the hope of a better future for people in poverty in the UK. But then I look at the stats and read how wrong current policy is and I wonder whether the end goal is really tough love to encourage self-help at all. If people can't heat their homes or eat properly, maybe austerity will succeed – if success is a Darwinian contest where only the fittest survive. The needy will perish but at least the cost of supporting them will diminish.
UNLOCKING UNDEROCCUPANCY?
I was at a Job Centre Plus event last week with Lord Freud to look at the introduction of Universal Credit. I was among a number of employers who pretty excited about its potential. Some were from the care sector and recognised the flexibility the system will create for workers currently unable to exceed 15 hours and 59 minutes without a whole lot of paperwork for a number of the benefits they're on.
For my part, I wanted to know if UC is going to enable Housing Benefit claimants affected by Underoccupancy rules to earn their way out of hardship caused by having a spare room. If it doesn't, or if UC fails altogether, the Bedroom Tax will remain a symbol of social injustice running like a theme through all welfare reform. If people cannot work their way out of increased hardship, or kowtow to new rules, people of all political persuasions should oppose a regime that says the weakest in our society is damned if it does (have a spare room) and damned if it doesn't (or cannot) do anything about it.
Earn Your Way Around Bedroom Tax?
Clean Slate is the social enterprise I run to create and support paid work for long-term jobless people. I've been speaking to social landlords about ways to help people affected by the various benefit caps. Could we offer half a day's paid work each week to cover tenants' shortfall in rent?
Apparently, not. Offsetting the new Housing Benefit cap is not currently an option because anyone on JSA will lose all but the first £5 from their other benefits when in paid employment. On ESA, some claimants lose all but the first £20. Others may be luckier but they're not the focus of the DWP back-to-work stick. Like all benefit traps, it's self-defeating. We find just half a day's work is enough to re-activate jobseekers who learn what they have to offer and the general value of work.
Move Your Way Around Bedroom Tax?
What if householders say 'Okay, this may be our family home, and maybe our kids might want to come home one day, after college or their next tour of duty, but because we need our rent paid or subsidised, we'll move'? There's no guarantee there's a smaller place for them. Previous wisdom was that it was better to build social housing too big than too small. In parts of the North, for example, whole estates of 3-bed houses were built and smaller 'units' are few and far between.
What if properties are there but tenants can't cover the cost of removals? For someone hard-pressed enough to need to move to side-step the bedroom tax, a few hundred quid plus the hassle of moving will put paid to the idea. Surely claimants putting themselves forward for a move should be exempt from the cap, if there's simply nowhere or no means to allow them to move.
Lodgers
New rules free up claimants to be able to take in a lodger without it all counting as earned income. Under the Rent a Room Scheme, householders can charge up to £4,250 a year before paying tax but only the first £20 is overlooked by the DWP, who'll deduct the rest from benefits as they would earned income. Luckily the average impact of underoccupancy is reckoned to be £14, so most people could make this work. But…
Where is the guidance to ensure householders protect themselves against risk when taking in a lodger? Where is the advice on checking with their landlord about whether renting a room breaches the terms of their tenancy agreement? Or help on checking the sub-tenant won't rob or abuse them? Or support with the legals to make sure the lodger leaves if they fail to pay.
Rent a Room could be a massive boon to claimants and single people needing a roof over their head. It feels like a leap to think we're returning to the days of Rising Damp and the norm of using 'digs' as the best hope of independence but if that's where we're heading, let's make sure no-one's exploited in the process.
Window Tax
Every loophole is being explored by social landlords around the country to find ways to protect tenants and, of course, rent payments against bedroom tax caps. Some have claimed bedrooms aren't bedrooms at all. Frank Field even called for landlords to brick up doorways, the way homeowners did with windows in the 18th century to avoid the Window Tax, or to take down walls to make one room of two.
UC... It Might Just Work
I'm a fan of the principles behind Universal Credit. It does over-promise to simplify a complex system but I'm hopeful its promise to overcome the benefits trap will be borne out. It could give jobseekers a chance to be reactivated through small, practical steps and a whole lot of encouragement, the way we've tried at Clean Slate. UC is the only piece of the welfare reform agenda that can help claimants find the means to help themselves out of hardship – especially that created by new caps to welfare.
I'm under no illusions about Government pledges, especially when they're reliant on human and IT systems and ambitious enough to replace numerous already imperfect systems and link up a number of departments along the way. But maybe, just maybe, UC can free jobseekers and employers from what Lord Freud described as a 'tyranny' of false barriers like the 16 hour rule and help us start helping claimants affected by the negative impact of reforms to help themselves.
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Jeff Mitchell is Managing Editor for Quids in! magazine and co-founder of the Social Publishing Project. A former Managing Director of The Big Issue magazine, he also runs employment project Clean Slate Training & Employment.
Underoccupancy
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