Going hungry this christmas

This christmas many in this country will go hungry disgracefully. To be poor is not a crime – yet in Britain, the poor have been criminalized and demonized by a propaganda campaign that gives new meaning to the word 'vicious.' In the UK, with Christmas approaching, hunger stalks the land. An ever-increasing number of lives have been reduced to misery and despair, yet for those at the top, 'austerity' remains nothing more than a word in the dictionary. It is proof that British society has now officially departed the 21st century and is heading at high-speed towards the Victorian era of the late 19th century. This is the only conclusion to be drawn from a week in which it has been revealed that food poverty – or hunger, to use the proper word – is a fact of life for millions of UK citizens. A recently published report by an All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry into Hunger and Food Poverty in Britain leaves no doubt that the UK in 2014 is governed by a gang of rich, privately educated sociopaths whose contempt for the poor is such that they are content to let them starve. That four million people in Britain are in danger of going hungry, that 500,000 children live in families that can’t afford to feed them, and that 325,000 adults do not get enough to eat, with close to a million forced to rely on food banks (charities set up to feed people unable to feed themselves), this is a despicable state of affairs. Moreover, the fact that it is happening in a country that presumes to lecture others on human rights and justice, this comes as yet more evidence of the rank hypocrisy and double-standards which lie at the heart of the British establishment. Compounding matters are the sentiments of Tory Baroness Anne Jenkin, which she expressed during the launch of the report. Calling to mind the infamous words of Marie Antoinette who, when informed of the desperate plight of the poor in Paris prior to the French Revolution, said, “Let them eat cake,” Baroness Jenkin postulated that one of the reasons was to claim that the poor do not know how to cook and should eat porrige . Tories breathtaking hate of the poor knows no boundaries. A recent excellent post by Johnny Void over at the void the report to food banks and their use has been published last week not surprisingly the real causes for food bank use's being on the increase were not spelt out. I'll allow Johnny to do this for us "The growth in foodbanks dates back to before the current Government weren’t elected as Labour’s decimation of the social security started to take its toll. The rise in benefit sanctions also began in the dying years of Labour’s administration as did the introduction of the despised Atos run Work Capability Assessment, designed to strip sickness and disability benefits from one million people. Alongside this Labour’s normalisation of workfare led to unprecedented numbers of people forced to work without pay. And then, as if things weren’t bad enough, along came Iain Duncan Smith. With him came the bedroom tax, council tax benefit cuts, the benefit cap, housing benefit cuts, freezes of almost all in and out of work benefits, more Atos tests for disability benefits, the scrapping of Crisis Loans and countless other measures all precision targeted at cutting the incomes of the poorest. Yet to read today’s report into foodbanks, you would think that none of this had ever happened. Instead it insists that the growth in people going hungry has been caused by market forces and modern economic conditions – beyond the control of us mere mortals and simply something that is here to stay no matter what we do. It is true that alongside the slow dismantling of the welfare state, the minimum wage stagnated whilst the cost of living for the very poorest soared. The erosion of social housing meant the greedy private rental sector became out of control as competition for low cost housing became ever more intense. As supermarket dominance grew, small local shops closed and with them out of the way food prices began to rise. A privatised energy market did exactly what you would expect from profit hungry vultures and fleeced their most voiceless customers, often elderly or disabled people who have no choice but to try and keep the heating on. Payday lenders and pawn shops started to appear on every high street. In some areas wherever you look you will see companies owned by the rich dressed up in pauper’s clothing as they attempt to wring every last penny of profit they can from the poor. All of these things are a direct result of government policies supported by all the major parties to allow the parasites of capital – landlords, supermarkets, energy companies and legal loan sharks – to run rampant in the name of the free market. But you won’t read that in today’s report either. Instead it proposes tinkering with the rules on prepay gas and electricity metres, vague and unspecific policies to slightly edge up the minimum wage and yet more patronising fucking garbage about cooking lessons and budgeting skills. Meanwhile calls for benefit payments to be made quicker are redundant when the government is planning a waiting period of up to six weeks for Universal Credit. This is not even mentioned in the report. They are not just willfully ignoring the cuts to social security that have already happened, but also the ones that are still set to come. The huge rise in the number of people who face benefits being stopped or sanctioned has mirrored almost exactly the growth of foodbanks. An ever more complex and draconian system now forces unemployed, sick and disabled claimants into pointless and irksome ‘work related activity’ for days, weeks and even months on end. Any breach of the rules means benefits are stopped. The report endorses this increased “responsibility to look for work”, calling it a “welcome move”. Instead it merely makes the same calls for improvements in communications with claimants and access to hardship payments that we have heard before. These bastards really think it is okay to leave someone in desperate poverty for missing a meeting with the Jobcentre as long as you write them a nice letter explaining why. This comes with a proposal for a condescending ‘yellow card’ warning system, which was first suggested by the Tory think tank the Policy Exchange. You can see their thinking on this one. Poor people like football after all, so it will be easy for our little minds to understand. Even this comes with conditions attached. Whilst they recommend claimants be given a warning with the chance to explain “their offence” before a sanction is applied, it suggests that this could come with an “additional requirement” to be met. This might as well be to go outside and hop on one leg for half an hour whilst quacking like a duck for all the good most Jobcentre requirements do to help people find work. Punishing people for their poverty is behind this idea, not helping them find jobs. Those behind the report are adamant that nothing can be done to halt the rise in the use of foodbanks. But abolishing benefit sanctions completely would slash the number of people going hungry in the UK overnight. As would scrapping the bedroom tax, council tax reform and halting George Osborne’s benefit freeze. In time honoured tradition however, politicians are clubbing together to say a functioning welfare state is over, time to move on and bring food parcels into the social security system. this. The growth of hunger in the UK did not happen by accident, it has been socially engineered. And the people who did that are the same vermin politicians who write reports telling us how terrible and inevitable it is." You can read the report at: http://foodpovertyinquiry.org/ with thanks to johnny void and his excellent blog over at http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2014/12/08/savage-cuts-to-benefits-go-ignored-in-flagship-foodbanks-report-they-really-think-we-are-fucking-idiots/

The bedroom tax is a year old today, shame on Britain

Today see's a year pass since the hated and much talked about bedroom tax came into force. It is 12 months since the government removed its spare room subsidy, dubbed the "bedroom tax" by critics. It is designed to save money and free up under-occupied homes, so what effect has it had? The fact it still exists is a disgrace to be honest lot of hot air as per usual has come from the left from the labour party and even more to the left than them yet the tax still exists this must not continue. "Scrapping the spare room subsidy, which applies to working-age tenants in social housing who are claiming housing benefit, is supposed to ensure that people are not living in bigger homes than they need at the taxpayer's expense - at a time the government is looking for savings from the welfare budget. People deemed to be doing so have a choice: they can move to a smaller home or pay more rent. Polls show the government's welfare policies are popular with the public. The problem is that finding a smaller home in the social housing sector is not easy - there is a lack of availability - so most people affected have had to find more money. Benefit cuts In May 2013, a month after the "bedroom tax" was introduced, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) estimated that 660,000 people would face a reduction in their housing benefit because they had at least one spare room. By November, the deparrtment produced new figures showing that 498,000 were affected by the changes. This is a fall of 50,000 from the initial estimate, which the DWP attributes to people taking action, such as moving to a smaller home, finding work, increasing their earnings, and/or discontinuing their claim for housing benefit. Channel 4 News asked the DWP what had happened to all social housing tenants living in homes with excess bedrooms. Were they paying more rent? How many had moved? The DWP said it did not have any published data which could answer these questions. 'Little research' An impact assessment drawn up by the DWP in 2012, before the policy was implemented, said "there is little research that provides an indication about the possible behavioural impacts on claimants in the social rented sector following the introduction of the size criteria". But it added: "DWP estimates that the impact of claimants moving to smaller accommodation, (as opposed to remaining in their current accommodation), is likely to be broadly neutral in terms of the impact on benefit savings." This suggests that although the government could not be sure how people would react when the spare room subsidy was removed, it expected to make most of its savings from people staying put and paying more rent rather than moving to smaller, cheaper accommodation. The government's rationale is that before the reforms, a million spare bedrooms were being paid for by the taxpayer, despite the fact that there are a quarter of a million households in England living in overcrowded social housing and another 1.7 million on waiting lists. Then there is the small matter of austerity, with ministers expecting to save £1bn over the next two years. People caught out who decide to stay put, or cannot find a smaller home, face a 14 per cent reduction in their housing benefit if they have a spare room, or 25 per cent if they have two or more spare rooms. So what has happened since April 2013? The National Housing Federation (NHF), which represents two thirds of housing association homes in England, published a survey in February which showed that two thirds of households hit by the changes were in rent arrears, with one in seven at risk of eviction. The Ipsos MORI survey of 183 housing associations found that more than a third of those in arrears were in this position because they could not afford to pay the "bedroom tax". 'Misery and hardship' According to David Orr, chief executive of the NHF, removal of the spare room subsidy is "heaping misery and hardship on already struggling families". Although the government argues that people affected can move, "we know there aren't enough smaller homes in England for these families to move into". The DWP is aware of these shortages. Its 2012 impact assessment said there was a surplus of three-bedroom homes and a lack of one-bedroom properties, which "could mean that there are insufficient properties to enable tenants to move to accommodation of an appropriate size even if tenants wished to move and landlords were able to facilitate this movement". The Local Government Association (LGA), which represents councils in England and Wales, says the "limited opportunities" for tenants to downsize is driving up local authorities' costs. The government is helping people affected by its welfare reforms with its discretionary housing payments fund, which allocates money to councils, and the LGA says the end of the spare room subsidy is "the biggest cause of financial hardship among those applying for help". It also argues that demand for help "is significantly outstripping the money the government has made available to councils to mitigate the changes in some areas". In August, a study commissioned by the LGA estimated that benefit cuts, combined with a shortage of jobs and affordable homes, would mean that "four out of every five of those households are likely to need some form of assistance from their council to help them cope with the reduction in welfare". with extracts from Channel 4.com http://www.channel4.com/news/bedroom-tax-year-spare-room-subsidy-social-housing

This week: take action to stop workfare and sanctions

The Week of Action Against Workfare and Sanctions begins tomorrow (Monday December 2nd) with a noise protest outside the annual welfare-to-work conference. There will be online actions everyday, announced on the Boycott Workfare website (and probably here a bit later). Tomorrow will see online action aimed at the ERSA conference where delegates will be tweeting using the hashtag #ERSA2013 – more details are to come on how to challenge the poverty profiteering conference online. Please help spread the word and share, tweet and blog details of all events both on and offline! Here’s the list of what’s taking place so far via Boycott Workfare: Things are very wrong: each month 70,000 people face hunger and hardship due to benefit stoppages – ‘sanctions’. Millions of hours of work which should be paid are being replaced by workfare. But we’re taking action and having an impact. This week, from 2-8 December, join thousands of others across the UK to push back against sanctions and workfare – with action online and on your high street. Here’s the latest list of actions planned across the UK. Let us know if you’re planning something too and check back here Monday-Friday to take online action every day. Edinburgh: flyering all week and a demo on Saturday 7th Cardiff: Wednesday 4 December at 6:30pm, Marks and Spencer – 72/76 Queen Street, Cardiff London: • Noise Demo at workfare industry conference at the University of London, 12.30pm 2nd Decemeber • Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group demo at Hammersmith Job Centre against the introduction of Universal Credit. Meet 11am on Wednesday 4th December at Hammersmith Job Centre, Glenn House, 22 Glenthorne Road, W6 0PP • M&S picket, Islington – Sunday 8th December 1pm outside Holloway Road M&S • M&S picket, Wood Green – Sunday 8th December 2pm outside Wood Green High Road M&S (Nearest tube: Turnpike Lane) Reading: Saturday 7th 4pm at Reading town centre. Planning meeting for the action on Tuesday at 7pm. Please sign/share/tweet the petition calling for all benefit sanctions to be scrapped without exceptions: http://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/benefit-sanctions-must-be-stopped-without-exceptions-in-uk?bucket&time=1385073159

East Herts see claims for help with rents shoot up

In a fairly decent area of the country where poverty and crime is low relatively compared to other regions east Hertfordshire has seen claims for people struggling to pay rent increase. This is no doubt due to the governments vicious benefit cuts and our local councils unwillingness to fight the cuts. We have a Tory council around here so I wouldn’t expect them to be on the side of the poor but this article below quotes a local Tory councillor who clearly has no idea of the scale of the hardness on ordinary people out there struggling already. SWINGEING benefit cuts have seen almost six times the amount of people asking for help paying their rent than a year ago. Across the board, East Herts Council are being bombarded with calls and enquires from “confused and frustrated” people struggling to make ends meet as Government welfare changes come into force. In April and May this year 146 people in East Herts made requests for discretionary housing payments, up from 25 in the same period last year. A section of the report for the East Herts and Stevenage Council’s joint revenue and benefits committee, which meets tonight (July 1), said: “Customers have been generally confused and frustrated by the welfare reforms and are keen to express this dissatisfaction to officers. “The volume of contacts with customers is very high and often repeated.” The sweeping changes have lead to an increase of 15 per cent in the level of work done by East Herts Council and Stevenage Borough Council’s joint benefits service compared to last year. There has also been 503 more council tax payment reminders sent from May 2012 compared to May 2013, up 17.4 per cent to 3,388 from 2,885. The average value of the reminder is £87.55. Since April, 2,569 people in East Herts who used to get a 100 per cent discount in their council tax are now paying 8.5 per cent. This is after Government reduced spending on council tax support by 10 per cent. East Herts council passed this reduction on; something executive member for finance Cllr Mike Tindale (Con, Little Hadham) called “one of the council’s most difficult decisions” back in February when the budget was set. Speaking on Monday before the meeting (July 1), he said: “It was a very difficult decision about people who were already feeling the squeeze and were asked to pay more. “We were mindful of that and we wanted to spread the burden as wide as possible. “In retrospect, we feel what we did was right but there’s no easy way of making cuts.” Some of these people, which mainly consist of disabled people, the unemployed and those on low income, are paying council tax for the first time. “These customers are resource intensive and are demonstrating patterns of repeat callers,” the report continued. “There appears little understanding of council tax liability and payment requirements.” The report also mentions the benefits cap will hit 42 families in East Herts when it is rolled at intervals nationwide from Monday July 15. With article sourced from http://www.hertfordshiremercury.co.uk/Hertfordshire/Welfare-cuts-see-rent-help-requests-to-East-Herts-Council-up-584-per-cent-20130701131937.htm So more crocodile tears “difficult decisions” etc etc how about these Tory councillors find out what it is like to live on a limited income always worrying how they will next pay the bills and feed themselves. These Tory councillors don’t know poverty and will never know it from their ivy towers. Whilst East herts on the whole is not fairing too bad from the cuts there are still pockets of poverty hidden away from public more often than not but it is still there. It’s those people who are struggling by I stood for when I stood for TUSC this year in the county council elections. Gaining 59 votes in a hugely true blue Tory area with no previous experience of standing was a decent effort. Shows even in leafy East herts three are people looking for an alternative to cuts and misery even if just a few at this stage. We all know cuts will carry on and we must hold firm our time will come as socialists even in areas we’ve never seen much action in in the past. We live in unprecedented times where anything is possible it would seem.

Axe the Bedroom tax know your rights

As people find themselves in greater and greater debts due to rising cost of living and the new cruel bedroom tax which was brought in in April. It is called the bedroom tax and not what the Tories prefer a spare room subsidy. Technically that is what it is but it very much is a bedroom tax and much like the poll tax campaign we must call things by their proper names the poll tax was not the community charge and thus so people know what they are up against. So far in meetings and campaigns we are seeing a trickle in England anyway of people wishing to join the fight back against this vicious tax. Whilst in Scotland the campaign against this tax is taking off with an anti bedroom tax federation set up with local steering committees in most areas now. The socialist party is taking the bedroom tax very seriously whilst recognising this is not the poll tax as not everyone is affected and also that we can’t say to people don’t pay it’s not as simple s that and is a dangerous strategy to pose as they will only find other ways of getting the money off you and could eventually lead to evictions. Below I republish the supplement in the socialist this week a guide to your rights and what you can do right here right now to fight this cold cruel tax. The bedroom tax has sparked fury. Thousands have protested against people being forced out of their homes or robbed of 14% or 25% of their housing benefit by millionaire Con-Dem ministers, many of whom have spare houses, never mind spare bedrooms. But we can stop this attack! Twenty years ago a mass campaign defeated Thatcher's hated poll tax. Led by the Socialist Party's predecessor, Militant, a mass campaign of non-payment made the poll tax unviable. While the bedroom tax is different in many ways, one thing is clear - if we get organised we can defeat it. ________________________________________ ________________________________________ Can't pay - will stay! No evictions! "I've cut back on every little thing I have. I'm eating one meal a day and not putting the heating on, all so I can pay this tax. £12 a week is everything when you can only afford £30 a fortnight on shopping before paying the bedroom tax." The bedroom tax's impact on people's lives has been devastating. The case of Stephanie Botrill, who killed herself after losing £20 a week from her housing benefit, illustrated the human cost of the bedroom tax. Stephanie wrote to her son before committing suicide: "Don't blame yourself for me ending my life. The only people to blame are the government." The bedroom tax affects 660,000 of the poorest households in Britain, many of them already suffering as a result of other Con-Dem cuts. £500 million is being stolen from housing benefit, with the tenant responsible for making up the shortfall. How is it possible for people already living in dire poverty to pay? It is not and the figures prove it. Anti-eviction army Housing Associations revealed in May that thousands of their tenants had immediately fallen into rent arrears as a result of the bedroom tax. In Liverpool the Riverside Group said 50% of their 6,000 affected tenants have not paid anything in bedroom tax. Only a quarter paid the full amount in the first month. Wakefield in Yorkshire said 42% had underpaid their rent. In Glasgow 66% of Housing Association tenants have under paid. What these figures clearly show is that the bedroom tax cannot be afforded. Moreover, many tenants who have tried to pay will not be able to sustain payment. We need to build an anti-eviction army which will oppose tooth and nail any attempts to evict tenants as a result of bedroom tax arrears. Just as the 'bailiff busters' successfully prevented thousands of attempts by bailiffs to take poll tax non-payers' goods, we can build a mass campaign to prevent evictions. Build mass campaigns But threats of eviction by councils and Housing Associations for bedroom tax arrears are still at an early stage. There are many things tenants can do to defeat the tax now. All tenants should know their rights and how they can disrupt the process of their own housing benefit being cut, but this must be supplemented by building mass campaigns to scrap the bedroom tax for all. This guide briefly explains your rights as a tenant and gives suggestions on how to build an anti-bedroom tax campaign in your area. We demand: • Scrap the bedroom tax and write-off all the debt • Defend all those who cannot or will not pay • No evictions for rent arrears due to the tax or austerity cuts. Build an anti-eviction army. • End all cuts - tax the bankers and the billionaires not bedrooms • For a programme of new council house building to meet social need • Build a mass movement against austerity starting with a 24-hour general strike organised by the trade unions ________________________________________ Q&A: Bedroom Tax How do I set up a campaign? Book a room in a community centre, school or local pub for a public meeting. Print some leaflets and go door-to-door in areas where there are lots of council or housing association homes. Put up posters in the local shops. Contact us if you would like a speaker or help with leaflets. At many local meetings people have come along ready to help organise. If this is the case ask for volunteers for a steering committee to organise the campaign. Contact us for details of other local groups in your area. You can then come together to organise town-wide work - including organising mass lobbies of your council. See contact details below. What happens now? Everyone affected by the bedroom tax has been sent a letter by the council telling them by how much their housing benefit will be cut. Tenants can ask the council to look again at the decision. You need to do this in writing within one month of receiving the 'benefit decision notice' which says that your benefit is being cut. If you are still not happy after the council has looked again, you can appeal the decision. Again, this should be done in writing within one month of receiving the council's response to your request for them to look again. This is free and you have a legal right to do it. Model appeal letters are available from us or from your local anti-bedroom tax campaign. Longer than a month since you received your benefit decision? It is still worth writing a letter of appeal, explaining why you have not done so earlier (you have been ill, away, in distress, you didn't realise you could appeal...). While no guarantee for success, some common reasons for appeal include: • The bedroom is less than 70 square feet. This means that, according to the 1985 Housing Act, it is a box-room and not suitable to use as a bedroom. • Due to you or your partner/dependent's documented medical condition the other bedroom is used for therapeutic activities/medical equipment. • You use the other bedroom for fostering purposes. • Your children/dependents use the bedroom as part of the custody agreement. • The use of the other bedroom is for regularly visiting family/guests. • You have a very small kitchen, and the landlord has mistakenly designated your dining room as a bedroom. • You use your other bedroom for storage of your possessions. Should I apply for the "discretionary housing fund" for help? Yes. This is a small pot of money that councils have to help tenants. You should apply regardless of whether you think you will get it. An application for a payment can be used as evidence that you have tried to gain access to money to help with the bedroom tax - this can also help delay eviction proceedings. • 338% increase in applications for discretionary housing payments since the bedroom tax was introduced Should I move to the private sector? In general, no. This is even more expensive than most council or Housing Association properties, tenancies are usually short-term and insecure, and housing is often of poor quality. If you genuinely want to move to a smaller council or Housing Association home ask your landlord to put you on a list. However, councils and HAs simply don't have the smaller properties available to house people affected by the bedroom tax. For the vast majority it's a case of Can't Pay - Will Stay. Should I take out a Direct Debit to the council or social landlord? No. A Direct Debit allows the council to increase the money it takes from your account to cover your bedroom tax and you will have less money for food, bills, etc. • 19% increase in debt of tenants reported by one Housing Association What can my landlord do to pressurise me to pay bedroom tax? Initially, councils and Housing Associations are phoning, writing to and visiting tenants who cannot pay all their rent as a result of the deductions from their housing benefit. If your landlord arranges a visit to your home, ask other anti-bedroom tax campaigners to come round and support you. Landlords are hoping to apply pressure on tenants to make a payment arrangement to prevent a big loss in rental income. Social landlords need to understand that people cannot pay the bedroom tax - and we are not the enemy. They should stand by their tenants and demand the scrapping of the bedroom tax. It is worthwhile explaining to your landlord why you cannot pay the bedroom tax, that your income and expenditure leaves no room for the bedroom tax to be paid. It may be worthwhile putting this in writing to your landlord (make sure to keep a copy of the letter). This explanation can help later on if the landlord attempts to push for an eviction. What happens if I can't or won't pay the bedroom tax? Letters will be sent telling you that you are in rent arrears. Don't ignore these letters - contact the council and your local Welfare Rights team and Citizens Advice Bureau, community legal teams, etc. Even if you can't access legal advice, don't ignore the letters, write to your landlord and tell them you can't pay and the reasons why. If you can't get an appointment, or they give you bad advice (ie telling you that you just 'have to pay') make sure you get in touch with your local anti-bedroom tax campaign. Keep all letters you are sent, and copies of any replies you send to your landlord. These can be very important if you have to argue your case in court. Councils and Housing Associations can also try for a deduction of benefit for rent arrears. There is a standard practice of a deduction for rent arrears of around £3.65 a week from benefit. We demand all bedroom tax debt be written off and that the Con-Dem government bails out councils who refuse to implement it, including refusing to chase arrears that arise from austerity cuts. Will I be evicted? Court proceedings: At a certain point court proceedings can be used for debt recovery. However, councils and Housing Associations almost always have to do a number of things before they can take you to court. They have to: • Contact you and try to reach an agreement with you to repay the debt gradually. There is a rent arrears protocol which they are expected to follow. • Help you with housing benefit problems if you are under 18 or 'vulnerable' • Agree not to start court proceedings if you keep to an agreement to repay the debt gradually • If they do decide to take you to court they have to give you written notice of their intention to do so prior to any court hearing • Once the period of the notice has expired the court then has to decide if the landlord has 'grounds for possession' • Only then can they take you to court to try and obtain a 'possession order' • If it is granted you are sent a written copy of a 'defence form' which you have 14 days to fill out. • The case then goes to court. It is important that you attend the court and put your side of the case. Remember to take evidence with you to help your case, the letters you have written to the landlord, the steps you have taken to cover the reduction in your housing benefit, etc. Whatever happens attend the court hearing! • At the court hearing the judge needs to consider whether a ground for possession has been satisfied, is it 'reasonable' to grant a possession order? Is it 'proportionate' to grant a possession order? In most cases the courts will follow the procedure above. This will be the case for all 'secure tenants'. If you are a council tenant you will have a secure tenancy (except for a very few new council tenants). If your property used to be council, but has been transferred to a Housing Association, you may still have a secure tenancy. However, most Housing Association tenants have 'assured tenancies' which give you fewer rights than secure tenancies. Most assured tenants threatened with eviction will be treated like secure tenants in court. Some Housing Associations have occasionally used something called 'Ground 8' in the courts against assured tenants. This takes away the judge's discretion and makes a possession order virtually automatic if you have eight weeks or more of arrears (for 100% of the rent so that is at least 32 weeks of bedroom tax arrears). Take advice urgently if they try to evict on Ground 8. If you are a housing association tenant a first step for your campaign should be a lobby of the Housing Association board demanding that they join the eleven Housing Associations that have already pledged to rule out using Ground 8. Remember: It costs an average of £6,000 to evict someone. That is more than 200 weeks of bedroom tax rent arrears. For this reason, and also because it would be so unpopular, councils and Housing Associations are hesitating to take this road, a mass campaign can stop them from doing so. What should I do if I get a letter saying my landlord is going to take me to court? If you are threatened with a court hearing get in touch with us or the local anti-bedroom tax campaign immediately. We can give you advice but also, if you wish, organise protests against court action being taken. This is the best way to prevent evictions. During the poll tax battle mass protests at courts hearing poll tax cases helped make the court system unworkable. If councils try to take tenants to court we need to mobilise a similar movement against evictions. In other words, a request for an eviction by a landlord is not a straightforward process and can be stalled or overturned. The campaign can and will ensure that no one goes to court on their own. We will seek legal advice to give guidance and support for you as well. Above all, even if an eviction order was granted anti-bedroom tax campaigners would mobilise to physically prevent bailiffs from removing a tenant from their home as a result of being unable to pay the bedroom tax. How do we fight this? Join the anti-bedroom tax campaign today. Massive pressure must be put on councils and Housing Associations to write off all debt arising from the bedroom tax. We will continue to lobby, protest and demonstrate to demand the politicians act to stop these attacks on the poorest. This is a fight we can win. If we stick together we can defeat the bedroom tax, all the cuts and bring down this rotten government of the rich. See socialistparty.org.uk for regular reports and updates on the anti-bedroom tax campaigns ________________________________________ What can councils do? Councils can refuse to implement the bedroom tax and demand that all Housing Associations in their area do the same thing. We call on councils to: ■ Refuse to implement the bedroom tax! ■ Use their borrowing powers and any reserves to assist tenants while working with the campaign to build a mass movement to defeat the tax. ■ Make a clear pledge not to evict any tenant in arrears due to the bedroom tax or as a result of austerity. ■ Demand that Housing Associations in the area (which often have councillors on their boards) pledge never to use Ground 8 to force through evictions, and pledge not to evict tenants for bedroom tax arrears or other arrears as a result of austerity. ■ Write off bedroom tax arrears and/or 're-designate' properties as having fewer bedrooms to prevent the effects of the bedroom tax. ■ A number of councils and Housing Associations have carried out some of these measures. Nine councils - mainly in areas where bedroom tax campaigns are strong - have promised no evictions for a year and several landlords - including Leeds council - have promised to re-designate homes. These partial measures show campaigning works, but we need to keep the pressure on councils to do more. Labour claim to oppose the bedroom tax, yet Labour councils are implementing it. If they all refused to do so the tax would be unworkable. Anti-bedroom tax campaigners should stand for the council Labour claims to oppose the bedroom tax but Labour councils are implementing it, and Labour nationally have refused to pledge to repeal it if they win the general election. We need councillors who will really stand up for us. Next May the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition will be bringing together campaigners against cuts to stand as many anti-cuts candidates as possible in the local elections. Standing candidates in the local elections is an effective way of building the campaign against councillors that are implementing the bedroom tax. The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) is an electoral alliance that stands candidates against all cuts and privatisation. It involves the RMT transport workers' union, leading members of other trade unions including the PCS, NUT and POA and socialist organisations including the Socialist Party. www.tusc.org.uk ________________________________________ Join the Socialists The bedroom tax is only one attack in the blizzard of cuts bombarding working class people. Reductions in council tax benefits will force more people onto the breadline in Foodbank Britain. But while most of us tighten our belts a few households and families are gorging on a feast of riches. The combined wealth of Britain's richest 1,000 people increased by almost 5% to £414 billion in 2012! Those households and major corporations have all been given a generous tax cut - helping them to get even richer. No question - this is a government for the millionaires not the millions. But potentially we have the strength of millions to stop them! The bedroom tax makes it clearer than ever - the trade union movement must urgently set the date for a 24-hour general strike against austerity. This would be the most effective way of channelling the burning anger at the government into a movement capable of stopping the cuts. If you agree with us - join the socialists! We stand for a different way of running things - where the wealth of society is used to provide people with the things we need - decent homes, jobs, a good education and NHS. We want a society for the 99% not the 1%. That is why we stand for a socialist alternative which is based on a democratic plan of production to meet the needs of all. What the Socialist Party stands for: The Socialist Party fights for socialism - a democratic society run for the needs of all and not the profits of a few. We also oppose every cut, fighting in our day-to-day campaigning for every possible improvement for working class people. The organised working class has the potential power to stop the cuts and transform society. As capitalism dominates the globe, the struggle for genuine socialism must be international. The Socialist Party is part of the Committee for a Workers' International (CWI), a socialist international that organises in over 40 countries. Our demands include: Public services • No to ALL cuts in jobs, pay, public services and benefits. Defend our pensions. • No to privatisation and the Private Finance Initiative (PFI). Renationalise all privatised utilities and services, with compensation paid only on the basis of proven need. • Fully fund all services and run them under accountable, democratic committees that include representatives of service workers and users. • Free, publicly run, good quality education, available to all at any age. Abolish university tuition fees now and introduce a living grant. No to academies and 'Free schools'! • A socialist NHS to provide for everyone's health needs - free at the point of use and under democratic control. Kick out private contractors! • Keep council housing publicly owned. For a massive building programme of publicly owned housing, on an environmentally sustainable basis, to provide good quality homes with low rents. Work and income • Trade union struggle to increase the minimum wage to £8 an hour without exemptions as an immediate step towards £10 an hour. For an annual increase in the minimum wage linked to average earnings. • All workers, including part-timers, temps, casual and migrant workers to have trade union rates of pay, employment protection, and sickness and holiday rights from day one of employment. • An immediate 50% increase in the state retirement pension, as a step towards a living pension. • Reject 'Workfare'. For the right to decent benefits, education, training, or a job, without compulsion. • Scrap the anti-trade union laws! For fighting trade unions, democratically controlled by their members. Full-time union officials to be regularly elected and receive no more than a worker's wage. Support the National Shop Stewards Network. • A maximum 35-hour week with no loss of pay. Environment • Major research and investment into replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy and into ending the problems of early obsolescence and un-recycled waste. • Public ownership of the energy generating industries. No to nuclear power. No to Trident. • A democratically planned, low fare, publicly owned transport system, as part of an overall plan against environmental pollution. Rights • Oppose discrimination on the grounds of race, sex, disability, sexuality, age, and all other forms of prejudice. • Repeal all laws that trample over civil liberties. For the right to protest! End police harassment. • Defend abortion rights. For a woman's right to choose when and whether to have children. • For the right to asylum. No to racist immigration laws. New workers' party • For a new mass workers' party drawing together workers, young people and activists from workplace, community, environmental and anti-war campaigns, to provide a fighting, political alternative to the pro-big business parties. • Trade unions to disaffiliate from the Labour Party now and aid the building of a new workers' party! Support the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition as an important step towards this. Socialism and internationalism • No to imperialist wars and occupations. Withdraw the troops immediately from Afghanistan! • Tax the super-rich! For a socialist government to take into public ownership the top 150 companies and the banking system that dominate the British economy, and run them under democratic working class control and management. Compensation to be paid only on the basis of proven need. • A democratic socialist plan of production based on the interests of the overwhelming majority of people, and in a way that safeguards the environment. • No to the bosses' neoliberal European Union! For a socialist Europe and a socialist world! ________________________________________ The Socialist will be carrying regular articles on the bedroom tax. Subscribe via website. Send us your stories to: editors@socialistparty.org.uk Get in touch for campaign resources including leaflets and posters: info@socialistparty.org.uk 020 8988 8777 Socialist Party organisers: Eastern 07905 167 703 East Midlands 07737 978 057 London 020 8988 8786 Northern 07841 144 890 North West 07769 611 320 Southern 07833 681 910 South East 07894 716 095 South West 07759 796 478 Wales 07891 547 900 West Midlands 07929 395 884 Yorkshire 07706 710 041

Disability benefit cuts be aware of what’s going on

Today changes are being rolled out in disability benefits. The change from DLA to PIP enters another phase being rolled out in other parts of the country. • Concern? A new system of disability benefits has begun to take effect across England, Scotland and Wales. Personal Independence Payments (PIPs) are replacing Disability Living Allowance (DLA) as part of the government's welfare reforms. The government claims PIPs will target resources more effectively towards those who need it most. But a charity warns that almost a fifth of claimants - 600,000 people - could eventually lose their benefits. Since April, thousands of new claimants in the north of England have already applied for PIPs. Now, new claimants of working age in the rest of Britain will also have to apply for a PIP, rather than DLA. Northern Ireland will join the system later. From October, PIPs will be extended further, when the government will start to re-assess existing claimants, but only those who circumstances have changed. The vast majority of the 3.2 million people who currently claim DLA will not be re-assessed until 2015 or later. Many disabled people fear having to be put through the new in-person tests to test their eligibility. Phil Sumner, a former postman who has multiple sclerosis, told the BBC that the prospect of an interview is "quite intimidating". "It's like being judged again. Filling out forms is bad enough. Face-to-face, I don't like anyway," he said. Savings Figures from the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) suggest that 450,000 will no longer be able to claim the benefit by 2018. But the disability charity Scope said that - including those who would have been new claimants between now to 2018 - some 607,000 people will miss out in total. The government claims the new system will better target those who need help. Under DLA, most people filled in their own application forms, and did not have to re-apply, even if their health improved. "Seventy-one percent would have indefinite awards, without regular checks," the disabilities minister, Esther McVeigh, told the BBC. "So this is about targeting billions of pounds a year at the people who n So we are told. I am currently on DLA and am not being reassessed just yet I don’t expect to be for sometime but it is a worry at the back of your mind. My eyesight is unlikely to ever improve so how is my situation ever likely to change? I was awarded my DLA for life when I got it and don’t see why this has to change. I will have to see what happens but I don’t see why I should be targeted while the rich laugh all the way to the banks evading billions in tax. Quite clearly this is an attack on disabled people who as we know can’t fight back so easily so are an easy target for this vicious and cruel government. All benefit cuts must be fought as best we can. Keep a watch on my blog for further updates on benefit cuts and disability news and views.

What’s that Labour would make cuts too?

Yes as predicted the labour party have to start to come clean and admit softly that they too will make cuts if elected in 2015. This comes as no surprise to Marxists and those who have any sort of long term perspectives on the situation currently unfolding around the world. Labour as we know has wedded itself to the dictatorship of the market and thus will bow down to its mantra of austerity. So today’s news that labour will end universal welfare on winter fuel allowance comes as no surprise to me at all. As we know all labour controlled councils have also passed on huge tory cuts so this should have been a signal too. • ovary' Labour would cut winter fuel payments for the UK's richer older people if they won the next general election, Ed Balls is due to say. It would affect about 600,000 people over 61 who pay higher and top income tax rates - saving about £100m. But one pensioners' pressure group said it would undermine the principle that those who paid into the system were entitled to something in return. The shadow chancellor will also promise an "iron discipline on spending". Mr Balls is due to tell an audience at Thomson Reuters headquarters in London that Chancellor George Osborne's economic policies have "failed catastrophically" on growth, jobs and deficit reduction. 'Symbolic' He will say the policies will leave a future Labour government with "a very difficult inheritance", and will promise a "tough deficit reduction plan", coupled with more action to strengthen the economy. "The situation we will inherit will require a very different kind of Labour government to those which have gone before," he is due to say. "We will inherit a substantial deficit. We will have to govern with much less money around. We will need to show an iron discipline . Also there we have it what do those who preach to us Owen Jones and all that we need a labour government? Should we not be building an alternative instead of wasting our time trying to reclaim a party which in all fairness was never even ours? With references to the BBC http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22748914

Could you live on £53 a week?

That is the challenge for many people who are unable to find work in this recession. £53 is nothing really when you have to pay the b ills for gas, water and electricity not mentioning feeding yourself and heating your home. There is simply no way you can live on this alone. Yet Iain Duncan Smith is telling those who can’t find jobs that £53 a week is a cushty lifestyle and they should be grateful for even this. Putting it into perspective at how generous this really is JSA in the UK is 18% of average wage, compared to Germany's 35%, France's 47% & Sweden's 68% This is simply not a lifestyle you would choose if you had the choice. An incredibly fast growing petition has been set up by someone who thought they’d challenge IDS to live on £53 a week the link to this is below http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/iain-duncan-smith-iain-duncan-smith-to-live-on-53-a-week Those who are on JSA take it as a way of getting by and getting by is all it gives you an existence not a life. You cannot live the life of luxury like the Tories seem to think. But then when you’re so disengaged from reality of life in poverty and have never had to struggle in your life then no wonder you’d think benefits are generous. It is a clear out and out contempt for the poor. This is blatant class warfare where we need the labour movement to answer this in a robust fashion drawing the links and common ground between that in work and out of work. Over 60% of those on benefits are actually in work according to the DWP taking tax credits to top up crap pay. We wouldn’t need working tax credits if we all had a proper decent lovable wage not just a living wage of a tiny bit more than minimum wage. But IDS people will not take this laying down the uptake in this petition now touching quarter of a million signatures shows the strength of feeling against the Tories and their attacks on the poor. Let’s not just call for IDS to try living on £53 a week let’s get rid of him and his government of millionaires once and for all!

Bin the bedroom tax can’t pay won’t pay!

This year many people across the country will be affected by the bedroom tax. A tax on empty rooms in a house. [Mike Daily is the Principal Solicitor of Glasgow’s Govan Law Centre and is a member of the Financial Services Authority’s Financial Services Consumer Panel. He writes in a personal capacity.] One of the worst aspects of the 2012 Welfare Reform Act is the so called ‘bedroom tax’, although it might equally be called a ‘disability tax’ because two-thirds of the 95,000 households affected in Scotland contain someone with a disability.1 The rationale for housing benefit cuts for ‘under-occupied homes’ in the social rented sector is the UK Government’s desire to reduce the overall cost of housing benefit by £1bn over two years – so the bedroom tax is another tentacle of the austerity agenda. 2 A strategy that almost all respected political economists around the world will tell you is fundamentally flawed.3 If everyone does something at the same time, like implement cuts and reduce spending, the economy will go on a downwards spiral and UK debt will actually grow. This is what has happened in the UK. This is known as a ‘fallacy of composition’.4 The Chancellor has got it wrong, GDP has gone down, and our economic growth is flat lining.5 Besides the obvious human misery and indignity of forcing people out of their homes, there are other powerful reasons why implementing a bedroom tax is wrong and not in the public interest. Two immediate problems are created: first, you create a dynamic to force people to downsize. The DWP estimate that 660,000 people across the UK will be affected by these changes. The changes apply to claimants under the age of 61.6 Some 81% of those affected are ‘under occupying’ by just one bedroom. This means most people affected will be liable to a 14% cut in their existing housing benefit from April 2013 – the equivalent of £624 per annum or £12 per week. The DWP already accept there will be many communities where there is insufficient smaller homes to downsize to. This added to cuts in other benefits and the universal credit coming in in April will have a devastating effect on local communities and some of the poorest in society. This tax must be fought as widely and as tactically as we can. This is not going to be something the trade unions are likely to get involved in although their support for direct action struggles is always welcome. This may take local tenants groups with militant mass non payment to force this tax into the dustbin of history. What is clear though is that non implementation is a option and labour councils should be using all legal powers they have to try and delay disrupt and ultimately make this tax unworkable. Disabled people will of course be hardest hit, along with those on low pay or benefits. The exemption for tenants who need an overnight career is of limited application. ITV News has given some common real life examples of where disabled tenants will be penalized by the bedroom tax.8 The example of a tenant who uses her second bedroom as sterile room to receive nutrition from a machine, made necessary after she had surgery for bowel cancer. Or a couple where the husband had a stroke and cannot share the same bedroom with his wife. Both of these tenants will lose over £48 per month from their housing benefit from April. While the cost to a social landlord in evicting a tenant is on average £6,000. Local councils will not want to be seen to be shelling out thousands in evicting lots of people this could become unworkable if many simply refuse to pay or in many people’s case cannot pay so won’t pay. It’s a disgrace while rich millionaires have spare rooms in their houses are not taxed yet those of us who need a spare room are taxed for the right to have one. It smack’s a little of a nanny state dictating what you can and cannot have now. There are sure to be many legal cases against this unfair tax on the basis of discrimination and I do hope those who are affected search out any route to fight back and are supported when they do so. Occupations must be supported if families are under threat of losing their homes and our solidarity will be needed at all times. People facing this tax are not alone and must not be made to feel so. An attack on one is an attack on us all.

Silence from the TUC demand action now!

You’d be forgiven for thinking the TUC never passed a motion at its conference last September motion 5 which committed the TUC to investigating the practicalities of a general strike. Yet we are in January now and so far the silence has been deafening from the TUC. We’ve lobbied them again with the NSSN and others in December yet the new general secretary of the TUC Francis o’grady who the media have spent time talking her up as this new female firebrand has not even mentioned the motion 5 and building for a general strike. What is their game? Well the TUC and the higher level bureaucracy in most trade unions bar a few honourable exceptions are largely drawn from a middle class petty bourgeois background where quite often they are on very lavish salaries and have done very little in the way of struggle, organising on the ground or anything that would get their hands dirty. It’s a disgrace that these are our so called leaders in the labour movement. But for me if these lot will not act and would rather wait for a labour gov which may or may not happen thousands of jobs will be lost, services will be decimated and the welfare state and NHS is being eroded under our nose. So I’d like to think if the TUC wont act and it looks increasingly likely that they wont that those unions willing to fight get together and name a day for co-ordinated strike action. All unions have issues they could ballot members on right now be that pay, privatisation, job cuts, working hours, conditions, pensions you name it could be one of many. It’s the co-ordination that is key finding an issue to co-ordinate ballots on should not be a problem it’s agreeing with other unions to go out on the same day. I think personally that day has got to be named sooner rather than later. We also need to use the general secretary election in Unite to put pressure on the union to be involved in any co-ordinated strike action taking place. Unite – Britain’s biggest trade union should not be pulling its punch’s now this shit is for real and real action and leadership is required. It is possible that the current crisis could be drawn out, similar to the depression in the 19th century from 1873 to 1896. But there is no "final crisis of capitalism". Capitalism can always find a way out, through the destruction of living standards, and ultimately by curtailing and possibly destroying the democratic rights and organisations of the working class. In this way, an unstable equilibrium can be established for a time. But as sure as night follows day, a new economic crisis will be prepared, as the history of capitalism itself has shown. So with the support of the NSSN and the socialist party trade unions and trade union members should be confident and bold in putting pressure on their unions to name the day and step up the action in the battle over austerity. We’ve only seen an estimated 20% of cuts and this feels bad enough how bad can things get? A low-wage economy alongside a mass and stagnant pool of unemployed, to be used as a weapon against those fortunate to have a low-paid job, is the future that is mapped out by the strategists of capitalism for the working class. At the same time, a reduced standard of living for the great majority of the population is all that is offered. Already, Britain has slipped down two places to sixth in the European league table of living standards. But this is just the beginning with Cameron and King promising more of the same with their predictions that 'austerity' will last for at least another decade. The TUC has been great in compiling research on the cuts and their affects this is all a little too little too late though but welcome all the same. The Trade Union Congress (TUC) has published research which shows government and media attacks on 'scroungers' are based on lies. On average members of the public think 41% of the welfare budget goes to the unemployed. This 'fact' is used to justify attacking the unemployed as scroungers. In fact the figure is 3%. And, with huge job cuts, any of the "hard-working taxpayers" of today could be denounced as the "work-shy scroungers" of tomorrow. Alongside the massive tax dodging of firms like Vodafone and Starbucks, the amount of benefit fraud is even more miniscule. The public has been led to believe it is 27% of the welfare budget. The figure is actually less than 1%. Compared to the legal and illegal expenses claims of MPs most benefit fraud is tiny. All this has not stopped the Tories of Westminster City Council from floating the idea of cutting benefit for people they deem too fat. And next week people they deem too thin or too tall no doubt. People in work are being asked to approve attacks on the unemployed because they 'get too much money'. However, one of the questions in the TUC survey was about the benefits entitlement of an unemployed couple with two children aged six and ten. The imagined figure was £147 a week, when £111 is the real figure they would be entitled to. But the amount that those surveyed thought the couple would actually need to live on be £202 a week (excluding housing costs). The old adage would seem to be true. Figures can't lie but liars can figure. The Daily Express contained headlines "a new ice age", "a cure for cancer" and "the economy is booming" in the same month. Why on earth believe it when they tell you 80% of benefit claimants are frauds? The TUC has done a good job in commissioning this research. Now what are they doing about that general strike they promised?

Labours hypocrisy on benefits

Labour today intend to vote against the benefit cap of RPI + 1% which in effect is a real terms cut. This on the face of it sounds great go on Labour the labour left cheer we have our party back, labour stands up for the poor. Slow down there this is nothing of the sort. Labour still support a benefit cap just disagrees on the way it fits that’s all. Do you really think if they were in gov they’d be acting any differently? Take these quotes from Ed Ball’s article in the Guardian this morning and you can hear their similarities with the Tories ideas. Labour has fallen or rather backed up the Tories in the scrounger vs. strivers rhetoric so common among capitalist politicians nowadays. Take some of these quotes I found in this Guardian article by Ed Balls. “Of course we need spending cuts and tax rise’s to get the deficit down” He goes on.... We also need a welfare system that works. And for Labour, that means any reform of the system must pass three tests. First, it must pay more to be in work than live on benefits, both for the individual and the Exchequer. Labour introduced a minimum wage alongside tax credits to help ensure work pays. But this government's deep cuts to tax credits already mean that thousands of working parents are now better off if they quit their jobs, while cuts to childcare support mean thousands of mums and dads are struggling to afford to take up full-time work. The implementation of the government’s flagship universal credit is already proving to be a shambles with Iain Duncan Smith’s own Cabinet colleagues warning this week that it is a “disaster waiting to happen”. Meanwhile the government's benefits cap could also end up costing more than it saves. Labour supports the principle of a benefits cap but this government's crude 'one size fits all' cap - with the same level in London as the rest of the country - will simply lead to taxpayers funding the cost of rising homelessness as families living in high cost areas are turfed out of their homes. Second we must get tough on the scourge of long-term unemployment by matching rights with responsibilities. A One Nation approach to welfare reform means government has a responsibility to help people into work and support those who cannot, but those who can work must be required to take up jobs or lose benefits as a result – no ifs or buts. Tackling long-term unemployment will be a top priority for the next Labour government because we know from the 1980s that it has a scarring effect on individuals and communities, damages our economy and society, and builds up long-term costs for the taxpayer. All this could have come straight out of IDS’s mouth but a labour front bench politician I just think it says it all. Forcing you into an unpaid position or you will lose your benefits is slave labour there is no two ways about it. You have no choice in the matter. So whether you are labour or Tory workfare or workfare plus the results will be the same. Labour does not recognise that low pay is at issue here a huge issue that most people receiving benefits are actually in work. They talk of long term unemployment but have no answer to those themselves only more workfare and Tory light ideas. How anyone can support labour still I do not know. Their policies are bankrupt and their ideas are straight from the Tories. We as socialists cannot give any support to labour and must build TUSC as an alternative. Those who say only Labour can beat the Tories is wrong I’m sure the liberals were telling the newly formed Labour party in the 20th century only we can beat the Tories yet look what happened. We must be brave must be bold and confident let’s not settle for lesser evilism or labour are not as cruel line. Let’s kick the cuts coalition out and build a working class, socialist alternative with TUSC. With quotes from this Guardian Piece http://www.politicshome.com/uk/article/69052/ed_balls_britain_needs_real_welfare_reform_that_is_tough_fair_and_that_works.html For more information on TUSC and how you can get involved check out www.tusc.org.uk

The day of regressive budgets hitting ordinary people hard

So today it was budget day in the UK and over in Ireland. News and comments are still filtering through and I haven’t read them all in full and will probably depress myself if I did so but what is clear is that these budgets are austerity budgets designed to further the pain on ordinary people the working and middle class’s All this is to pay for a crisis not of our making, this is as I’ve stated many many times now is a crisis of capitalism and no wonder George Osborne has missed his deficit targets as he is increasing the deficit rather than looking to cut it. What he is cutting though is the fabric of our society, all we’ve ever fought for our welfare state, our NHS you name it it is all up for grabs under this government. Below is how the BBC saw the main points from the budget. As we can see there are increases in areas but this will be offset by bigger cuts elsewhere such as local government, NHS, welfare and major benefits. All the measures like housing fall way short of what we need and the idea of teachers pay linked to performance is a joke. FUEL The 3p-a-litre increase in fuel duty, planned for next January, is cancelled ECONOMIC GROWTH Predicted to be -0.1% in 2012, down from 0.8% predicted in the Budget Forecasts for next few years are: 1.2% in 2013, 2% in 2014, 2.3% 2015, 2.7% in 2016 and 2.8% in 2017 BENEFITS AND PENSIONS Most working-age benefits to rise by 1% for each of next three years From 2014-15 lifetime pension relief allowance to fall from £1.5m to £1.25m - annual allowance cut from £50,000 to £40,000 Basic state pension to rise by 2.5% next year to £110.15 a week Child benefit to rise by 1% for two years from April 2014 Local housing allowance rates to rise in line with existing policy next April but increases in the following two years capped at 1% Changes to welfare to save £3.7bn by 2015/16 TAXES AND ALLOWANCES Basic income tax threshold to be raised by £235 more than previously announced next year, to £9,440 Threshold for 40% rate of income tax to rise by 1% in 2014 and 2015, from £41,450 to £41,865 and then £42,285 Main rate of corporation tax to be cut by extra 1% to 21% from April 2014 Temporary doubling of small business rate relief scheme to be extended by further year to April 2014 Inheritance tax threshold to be increased by 1% next year Bank levy rate to be increased to 0.130% next year. £5bn over six years expected from treaty with Switzerland to deal with undisclosed bank accounts HM Revenue and Customs budget will not be cut ISA contribution limit to be raised to £11,520 from next April Prosecutions for tax evasions up 80% - with anti-abuse rule to come in next year No new tax on property value No net rise in taxes in Autumn Statement GOVERNMENT BORROWING Point at which debt predicted to begin falling delayed by a year to 2016/17 Deficit forecast to fall this year, as is cash borrowing Deficit to fall from 7.9% to 6.9% of GDP this year, and to continue falling to 1.6% by 2017/18 Borrowing forecast to fall from £108bn this year to £31bn in 2017/18 £33bn saving to be made on interest debt payment predicted two years ago Deficit fallen by a quarter in last two years Bradford and Bingley and Northern Rock Asset Management brought on to balance sheet, adding £70bn to national debt GOVERNMENT SPENDING Period of austerity to be extended by another year to 2017/18 Departments to reduce spending by 1% next year and 2% year after Local government budgets to be cut by 2% in 2014 Government spending as share of GDP predicted to fall from 48% in 2009/10 to 39.5% in 2017/18 Spending review to take place in first half of next year JOBS AND TRAINING Unemployment expected to peak at 8.3%, lower than the previous prediction of 8.7% Employment set to rise in each year of the parliament Since general election, 1.2 million jobs created in the private sector TRANSPORT Extra £1bn to roads, including upgrading A1, A30, and M25 £1bn loan to extend London's Northern Line to Battersea EDUCATION AND FAMILIES £1bn to improve good schools and build 100 new free schools and academies £270m for further education colleges Teachers' pay to be linked to performance INFRASTRUCTURE Ultra-fast broadband expansion in 12 cities: Brighton and Hove, Cambridge, Coventry, Derby, Oxford, Portsmouth, Salford, York, Newport, Aberdeen, Perth and Derry-Londonderry £600m for scientific research Annual infrastructure investment now £33bn £1bn extra capital for Business Bank Gas Strategy to include consultation on incentives for shale gas HOUSING Funding to assist building of up to 120,000 homes OVERSEAS AID Promise to spend 0.7% on development to be honoured next year, but not exceeded

International disabilities day but we are going back not forward

Today is international disability day, whatever that means in the capitalist form of the term. Many today have been highlighting the disgraceful treatment of disabled people at the hands of this system and the Tories who look to manage it. In many ways the disabled are the hardest hit with cuts attacking them disproportionally than others. With DLA being phased out and the introduction of the Universal credit to come in next year many people are disgusted with the attacks on the disabled. Yet the media true to form continue with their anti scroungers, anti disabled benefits lines as if nothing had changed. Even just on Saturday night I stumbled across Ian Collins on LBC a presenter I used to respect but his show on Saturday night was all about our bloated welfare system. He moaned and moaned about students getting EMA why don’t they get a Saturday job he cried despite not realising how many young people struggle to get a job today. Such ignorance in the media is toxic as this feeds a political agenda to turn the non disabled against the disabled, the working class against the working class not in a job, public vs. private and so on all to create division and resentment the age old tactic of divide and conquer which the ruling class have employed for many many years. But the media focus heavily on benefit cheats and the disabled are lumped in with this never separated in my experience yet tax evaders of the super rich big business evade 120 billion a year more than enough to cover the deficit in one go if it was properly collected. This is a political decision not an economic one. We’ve had bigger deficits in the past yet built the NHS and a huge number of council housing. No one is standing up and putting an alternative in the media. Labour who presided over 13 years crows about tax evaders now but what did they do in their 13 years of government sweet nothing I would suggest. In fact one of their high profile figures Peter Mandelson was once quoted we are relaxed about the rich getting filthy rich in this country. But as for the international day of disability it’s a huge disgrace that the closures of the last remaining remploy factories that employed disabled workers will be closing very soon. This is a national disgrace in my view. This is not just limited to Britain either in Spain over the weekend over 50 thousand disabled people and friends and families marched in Madrid demanding an end to cuts to disabled people. All over the globe disabled people are treated with contempt and disrespect under capitalism there can be no fairness for the disabled or any section of workers. It’s got to be up to us to organise and build a movement which can remove this rotten exploitative system once and for all. Only a truly democratic socialist system can provide for the needs of everyone including disabled people to meet their daily needs to fulfil their potential in life in any way they can.

Homelessness on the rise no answer can be found under capitalism

The number of households declared in need of emergency accommodation in England rose by about 25% over the past three years, new figures suggest. SSentif said some 50,290 families and individuals were classed as homeless in 2011/12, up from 40,020 in 2009/10. But the data company said spending on tackling homelessness had fallen from £213.7m to £199.8m over that period. Source: Shelter According to SSentif's figures, 6,120 more households were left homeless in 2011-12 compared to 2009-10. It said the highest percentage increase was in the East of England while the North East was the only region which saw a fall in the number of households declared homeless. SSentif's managing director Judy Aldred said some of the results for specific councils had been "quite shocking". "By analyzing the data at council level we were able to highlight some areas that are showing much greater increases than the national average," she said. "In Birmingham, where homelessness increased 25% from 2009-10 to 2010-11, spend dropped from £7.8m to £5.5mn (29%)." Local housing authorities are legally obliged to provide emergency housing for "priority need" groups without a home, such as households with dependent children. In the East of England where I live I have noticed the housing waiting lists steadily rising. Some will say this is due to the rise in immigration, I’d counter that by saying there simply isn’t the homes there for people and a mass council house genuinely affordable homes building programmed is needed today not sometime in the future. We have a serious housing crisis in this country which needs urgently addressing. Figures like this today shows the real impact of benefit cuts, cuts to local budgets and a huge failure of local councils Tory and labour to build enough homes for their residents. Even if you are lucky enough to still have a home the amount of disposable income individuals have to spend now at its lowest level for ten years at £273 a week says ONS. The Office for National Statistics. Just to compound the misery for many. Its time for socialist solutions to this crisis. There can be no solution under capitalism and the market it has proved it is incapable of meeting the needs of everybody.

Austerity Games get involved with Youth Fight for jobs

This summer London will play host to the costly Olympic Games. While many look forward to a 'summer of sport', in its shadow, workers and young people in London and around the country face, not just months of disruption and misery that go with the £24 billion games, but poverty and homelessness as the cuts bite.

Housing in London stands on the brink of a crisis. With more cuts to housing benefit due to come in next April, a new government-commissioned study has shown that 40% of London landlords plan to stop renting to housing benefit tenants in the next year, dwarfing the already high 33% nationally.


Tens of thousands of working and poor families face being forced out of their homes as a result of the changes. The increasing lack of affordable properties only promises to exacerbate the problem and force people onto the streets or into insecure, temporary accommodation.

The government argues that the changes will stop families from claiming hundreds of thousands of pounds for large properties in expensive areas at the expense of the taxpayer and that landlords will be forced to lower rents.

The reality is that greedy rip-off landlords, who are the real beneficiaries of housing benefit, will not lower rents. In fact, 37% of landlords in London have said they are more likely to evict tenants or not renew tenancy agreements, three times higher than the 11% that said they would consider lowering rents.

The reality is that over the last year there has been a 61% rise in the number of households with children living in bed-and-breakfast accommodation and homelessness has seen increases of 14% nationally and 36% in London, with children increasingly at risk.

We refuse to accept the government's scaremongering attacks on so-called benefit scroungers to justify the return of Dickensian poverty stricken conditions.

While the real scroungers - the tax-avoiding super-rich - splash out on the luxury services on offer around the Olympic games (for between £295 and £4,500 per person you can get a champagne reception and four course dinner with your Olympic ticket) Youth Fight for Jobs will be organising to show workers and young people that, in the seventh richest country in the world, we can, and should, be afforded the right to a decent home and a decent future.

That is why young people and trade unionists from across the country will be sending teams to Hackney Marshes to compete in the Austerity Games on Monday 23 July - the week before the Olympics. We will be launching the Youth Fight for Jobs Manifesto: A Future for the 99%, which lays out the problems faced by young people in Britain today and a strategy of how to get organised and fight for a decent future.

We will be putting competitors through their paces with ten athletics events from the Race to the Bottom to the Deficit Discus and Property High Jump to highlight the plight of workers and young people, lost underneath these expensive and corporate Olympic Games.

To get involved in Youth Fight for Jobs or the Austerity Games email youthfightforjobs@gmail.com


Post originally written by Suzanne Beishon, London Youth Fight for Jobs

Camerons tories look to further attack young people time to get organised!

With the news over the weekend of David Cameron and his Tory chums plans to scrap housing benefit for all under 25’s which is the latest in a long line of austerity measures in order to make the poorest in society pay for a crisis they did not create. If ever there was a time to fight back and get organised it is now.

Youth fight for jobs which I’m involved in condemn this cynical move by the Tories to attack the youngest in society and force them out of homes and most likely into homelessness.

When we think about it with only an estimated 10 % of the cuts so far we haven’t really seen anything yet it’s going to get a hell of a lot worse yet. This is why we must stand against all cuts to start with uniting and bringing together as many people against the cuts as we can organising in our communities, trade unions, anti cuts organisations and in our workplaces.

Youth fight for jobs has been at the fore front of opposing the cuts on young people and campaigns for a mass programme of affordable house building and we mean affordable not the sort labour and the Tories consider affordable.

This summer just before the Olympics start in London YFFJ will be holding our own version of the games called the austerity games with clever sounding events to highlight the plight of young people and the cuts. This will hopefully attract some media coverage and push YFFJ’s name forward in the movement and highlight the attacks on young people.

Last year we marched 330 miles from Jarrow to London for jobs. Unfortunately the government didn’t listen we knew they wouldn’t but it paved the way for young people to re enter struggle since the fantastic student protests of 2010.

Young people deserve a future like everyone else let’s not fall for divide and rule tactics young people must get organised and link up with other workers under attack which is why I will be supporting the Coryton oil refinery workers in their fight to keep the refinery open and to preserve 850 jobs and 100 million pounds for the local economy. Only by linking up and uniting our struggles can we win.

Say no to Cameroons Tories say no to all the cuts and let’s fight for a socialist future for young people and a society which benefits all people.

The real Olympic legacy in London borough of Newham

Today in the news Labour run Newham council has created all sorts of controversy with their plans to exile the poorest in their borough to stoke on Trent of all places. This has been met with a volley of criticism rightly so in my view.

New ham council has been accused of starting "social cleansing" in the capital by asking a Stoke-on-Trent housing association to take on up to 500 families on housing benefit.
New ham Council says it can no longer afford to house tenants on its waiting list in private accommodation.
The gap between market rents and the housing allowance is too big, it says.
But the association says such a move could mark the start of "thousands of needy people" being dumped elsewhere.
Labour MPs say the decision to seek accommodation outside London is proof that the government's policy of capping housing benefit is already "beginning to unravel".
Which is of course easy to say when their own government in power failed to build anywhere near enough affordable homes in their 13 years in go?
The simple fact that 5 million people are currently on the housing register for council property in the UK is testament to the lack of homes built in the previous period.
It is a disgrace for labour to claim the moral high ground on this when their record on housing is so so poor. I think the outrage at this story is justified with the new labour MP for stoke equally shaming his party by coming out to say
Unwanted by New ham, unwanted by Stoke. "We look forward to the Olympic flame – but not east London's exiles" - Tristram Hunt.
Talking of the Olympics this borough of London is due to host the Olympics this summer with 40 million pounds of the council’s budget going towards putting on the Olympics disgracefully.
Olympic effect

New ham Council, which is Labour-controlled, is in the east of the city and will host this summer's Olympics.
It has written to the Brighter Futures Housing Association in Stoke, offering it the "opportunity" to lease homes to it.
The letter says the local private rental sector is beginning to "overheat" because of the "onset of the Olympic Games and the buoyant young professionals market".
It says the council can no longer afford to house tenants on its waiting list in private accommodation as the gap between market rents and the local housing allowance has become too great.
The council has been "forced to look further afield for alternative supply", it adds.
'Right-wing extremism'
The Brighter Futures chief executive officer, Gill Brown, has not formally replied to new ham Council's offer.

To me this is passing the buck one council cant and won’t deal with people who can’t afford to live in an area so decide to move them elsewhere so the other council where they are proposed to be going say oh no we don’t want them either. A typically middle class attitude of not in my backyard. An absolute shambles and a disgrace from a party who claims to stand for social justice.

It is clear that we need a major affordable house building programme today but who’s going to put it forward the tories and lib dems certainly wont and on this recent form labour wont either. We need a new workers party who can put forward these demands and speak for the majority of people ordinary people who are suffering due to this crisis of capitalism that they are being made to pay for unfairly.