The Tories: 2010-Present

	Disability - Welfare Denial of Rights Personal Independence Payment (PIP) was introduced in the 2012 Welfare Act PIP was brought in to replace Disability Living Allowance (support with care needs) and Employment and Support Allowance (support claimants in work) PIP is available from the age to 16 to 64. Those over 64 are not eligible to claim the allowance, although if already on the allowance at 65 the claimant will remain eligible PIP has turned out to be a disaster for those moved onto it The whole ethos of the DWP has been to deny a claim and then reward a claim later down the line under appeal For many claimants this hostile attitude can leave them destitute, without mobility and often suicidal The new ethos of hostile treatment of claims was extended to DLA and ESA as well The coalition government identified PIP as a cost cutting exercise, rather than a method to make the system fairer The government announced plans to tighten eligibility for a key disability benefit, to remove entitlement from at least 360, 000 disabled people with lower support needs Research carried out at by Disability Alliance identified that upto 50% of DLA claimants would have to cut their work hours or even give up work under the new PIP scheme The Disability Rights Partnership (DRP) said the changes would have “a hugely detrimental effect” on a “significant number of disabled people and their families” The DRP were deeply critical of the reforms, which they said were “underpinned” by the government’s plans to cut DLA spending on working-age people by a fifth – saving £2.17 billion by the end of 2015/16 The SSAC the coalitions own advisory committee said the reforms appeared to be driven by the coalition’s wish to cut the number of working-age disabled people claiming DLA by 20 per cent The SSAC also said that the government’s much-criticised plans to remove the mobility component of DLA from most disabled people in residential care should not go ahead As has been the way with all consultations and reports on Disability Rights, the coalition government ignored the findings and went ahead as originally planned The coalition government misled parliament and the public about the scale of opposition to its reform of DLA Responsible Reform found “overwhelming” opposition to replacing DLA with a new personal independence payment (PIP) for working-age claimants, with only seven per cent fully in favour The Responsible Reform report also showed that the government had consistently used inaccurate figures to exaggerate the rise in the number of DLA claimants The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) claimed that the number of DLA claimants was increasing, but neglected to point out that working-age recipients have actually been falling Privatisation of the Service DWP initially gave the assessment and delivery of PIP over to two private companies, ATOS Healthcare and Capita Atos came under scrutiny early on after it was discovered it had made misleading statements to the DWP in order to win regional contracts of £540 million In October 2013 it became clear that Atos was at crisis point due to not having enough doctors to carry out assessment of claimants In November this led to Atos to pull out of the provision and led to non-medical qualified civil servants carrying out the assessments Atos stated that the reason for pulling out of the “fitness for work” contract was because of assaults on its staff by disabled benefit claimants, although continuing with two lucrative contacts to assess claimants for PIP Atos failed to provide any evidence and didn't make a single report of a criminal offence for assault Atos won the PIP contract by boasting in a tender document of its “extensive” network of 16 NHS trusts, two private hospital chains, and four physiotherapy providers, all of which it said would provide sites where the PIP tests would take place In the months after Atos winning the contract, all but four of the NHS trusts and both of the private hospital chains dropped out Atos stated in the £184 million disability assessment contract tender that it had a network of 740 assessment sites across London and the south of England Atos only managed to secure 96 assessment centres meaning thousands of disabled people faced longer delays in being assessed, and longer and more complicated journeys to reach their assessments The public accounts committee said an absence of competition for companies such as Atos and Capita had led to the growth of "privately-owned public monopolies which have become too big to fail" In 2014 the National Audit Office confirmed that lengthy backlogs had built up in the first few months of Atos and Capita taking on the PIP assessment contracts The Chief Executive of DABD said her organisation was being “bombarded” with appeals for help because of delays with PIP claims DABD CE also said “The whole timescale of waiting is ridiculous. And when we have challenged the DWP and Atos they are blaming each other for the delays.” Citizens Advice, said their organisation had “seen far too many examples” of claimants who had arranged home visits from Capita but no-one had turned up, with some claimants experiencing this three times Claimants have arrived at Atos assessment centres to be told there was no-one there to see them Capita responsible for assessing disability benefit eligibility failed to make its own workplace accessible for a disabled employee for more than three years, and then sacked her when she became too ill to work Atos was mired in further controversy when it was found in 2015 that it was lying on its claimant assessments Costs of delivering the service soared yet all three (Atos, Capita, Maximus)service providers failed to provide an adequate service The National Audit Office found spending on assessments was set to double in just two years while the three providers were failing to meet the required standards The NAO said the DWP had failed to achieve value for money from the health and disability assessments it had contracted out to Atos, Maximus and Capita The Commons public accounts committee said disabled benefit claimants do not receive an acceptable service from contractors The Commons public accounts committee had particular concerns about the way claimants with fluctuating and mental health conditions are assessed In 2018 the DWP extended the contracts of two discredited companies Atos and Capita to carry out disability benefit assessments despite their continued failures In July 2019 more than a third of disability assessment reports completed by Capita were found to be significantly flawed Atos was found to be even worse with proportion of disability assessment reports found to be significantly flawed soaring by more than 40 per cent in the last two years Misery for Claimants The government always saw the move over from DLA to PIP as a massive cost cutting exercise, looking to reduce the overall costs by 28% regardless of need The government sought to create the impression of scroungers committed to a life of welfare at the tax-payers expense Both Esther McVey and Ian Duncan Smith tried to create the untrue impression that there had been a massive surge in the number of applicants for DLA In 2014 the DWP carried out 60 secret reviews into benefit-related deaths in less than three years Gary Moyse was harassed and bullied by the DWP over a number of years The biopsychosocial model of health (BPS) used by the DWP to assess claimants has been found not fit for purpose BPS assumes “it is the negative attitudes of many ESA recipients that prevent them from working, rather than their impairment or health condition”, BPS has been used to “underpin increasingly harsh and at times punitive measures targeted at disabled people” as the state tries to cut the number of people receiving ESA The DWP has repeatedly been found to be bullying claimants
	Disability - EHRC Report Summary of EHRC Findings The Equality and Human Rights Commission produced a report in 2019 looking at state of Human Rights in the UK in 2018 The report was highly damning of the government's record on Human Rights, particularly in respect of disabled people The EHRC said "Changes to the welfare system since 2010 have made life harder for those in poverty, and this disproportionately affects a large number of disabled people..." The commission noted that access to justice has been severely curtailed due to cuts to legal aid and the disastrous impact of employment tribunal fees EHRC found poverty is particularly prevalent among disabled people UK-wide reforms to welfare and tax since 2010 continue to have a disproportionate impact on the poorest in society, particularly disabled people Homelessness is also on the rise, putting more people in a precarious position and particularly affecting people from ethnic minorities, disabled people and other at-risk groups Disabled people are not experiencing the progress experienced by other groups The disability pay gap persists, with disabled people earning less per hour on average than non-disabled people The likelihood of people with disabilities being in low paid occupations has increased Disabled people are also more likely to be in poverty Those who can’t work rely on an increasingly restricted welfare regime that is projected to lower their living standards even further People with disabilities also face poorer health and lack of access to suitable housing The overall finding of the EHRC report was that Disabled people falling further behind in all areas such as work, education, housing and poverty levels Education EHRC reported that the UN expressed objections to the UK’s growing reliance on special schools There are also concerns about the legal framework surrounding disabled children’s rights to redress in the education system Tribunals do not currently have the power to award financial compensation when they make a finding of disability discrimination in schools 25.0% of pupils with Special Education Needs (SEN) attained reasonable grades in Maths and Englsih compared with 70.4% for those without SEN Work Since 2010 there has been an increase in the proportion of disabled people in low-pay occupations 3.3 million disabled people aged 16–64 are economically inactive. 44.2% of disabled people of working age were neither in work, nor looking for work, compared with only 15.9% of non-disabled people In March 2018, less than a quarter of people with learning difficulties, a speech impediment or mental health conditions were in employment Living Standards The EHRC report found disabled people, women, and many ethnic minorities are more likely to live in poverty or to experience severe material deprivation UK-wide reforms to social security and taxes since 2010 are having a disproportionately negative impact on the poorest in society and are particularly affecting women, disabled people, ethnic minorities and lone parents Benefit sanctions are applied inconsistently and disproportionately impact disabled people Bedroom Tax introduced under the Tory / Lib Dem coaltion had a disproportinate impact on the disabled as the spare room was often needed to contain specialist equipment EHRC found that disabled people across Britain are demoralised and frustrated by the housing system, reporting a severe shortage of accessible houses across all tenures Disabled people can experience serious deterioration in their mental wellbeing due to living in unsuitable accommodation Disabled people are also not getting the support that they need to live independently Welfare EHRC analysis of changes to taxes, benefits, tax credits and Universal Credit since 2010 found that the changes will have a disproportionately negative impact on several protected groups Negative impacts are particularly large for households with more disabled members, and more severely disabled individuals For households with at least one disabled adult and a disabled child, average annual cash losses are just over £6,500 The sanctioning rate for self-declared disabled Job Seeker’s Allowance (JSA) claimants was 26%–28% higher than for non-disabled claimants Research showed as more disabled people were sanctioned, there was a corresponding increase in the number of disabled people not in work The UK Government’s policy to intensify the use of sanctions and introduce harsher penalties has been largely ineffective at moving people from JSA into sustainable employment Benefit sanctions had no tangible positive effects in moving disabled people closer to paid work and worsened many disabled people’s illnesses and impairments, particularly mental health conditions In 2015/16 disabled adults (25.5%) were more likely than non-disabled adults (17.9%) to be living in poverty Those with mental health conditions (35.6%) and social and behavioural (37.6%) impairments were around twice as likely to be living in poverty as non-disabled adults Of households with a disabled person 49% were likely to use food banks Access to Transport Transport presents one of the greatest challenges to disabled people; not only those with mobility impairments, but those with vision and hearing impairments, and mental health conditions Access to transport services is in danger of becoming more restricted for some users, due to reduced bus services and inconsistency in government efforts to ensure access to transport for disabled users
	Disability - UN Report Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities In 2007 the UK signed up to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) The UK holds the dubious accolade of being the first country to be investigated for contravening the convention The UN investigation centred around the Welfare Act 2012 and the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016 and the impact these acts had on the welfare of people with disabilities It was concluded both acts were enacted for reasons of austerity Findings: UK Systematic violations of the Convention The UN concluded that there is reliable evidence that the threshold of grave or systematic violations of the rights of persons with disabilities has been met by the coalition government The government has implemented a policy aimed at reforming its welfare system and the reforms have been justified in the context of austerity measures to achieve fiscal and budgetary policy consolidation The impact assessments conducted by the coalition expressly foresaw an adverse impact on persons with disabilities Several measures have disproportionally and adversely affected the rights of persons with disabilities Measures resulted in reduction of support provided to meet the extra cost of disability Denial of reasonable accommodation in assessment procedures and realization of the right to employment have had a discriminatory effect on persons with disabilities Persons with disabilities affected by policy changes have had their freedom of choice and control over their daily activities restricted The extra cost of disability has been set aside and income protection has been curtailed as a result of benefit cuts The expected policy goal of achieving decent and stable employment is far from being attained 41,792 Employment and Support Allowance work related activity group sanctions were handed out up to March 2014 Evidence gathered nationally by the Parliament, the independent monitoring framework, universities and research institutes and centres and independent experts, has documented adverse and disproportionate effects of measures on persons with disabilities The government has not conducted a comprehensive human rights-based cumulative impact assessment The Government continues its policy of reducing social benefits of persons with disabilities as reflected in the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016 UN Committee Recommendations Government should conduct a cumulative impact assessment of the measures adopted since 2010 The Government should ensure that such assessment is rights-based and meaningfully involves persons with disabilities and their representative organizations Ensure that any intended measure of the welfare reform is rights-based, upholds the human rights model of disability Ensure that any intended measure does not disproportionately and/or adversely affect the rights of persons with disabilities to independent living, an adequate standard of living and employment The government should carry out human rights-based cumulative impact assessments of the whole range of intended measures that would have an impact on the rights of persons with disabilities Ensure that any intended legislation and/or policy measure respects the core elements of the rights analysed in the UNCRPD report Ensure persons with disabilities retain their autonomy, choice and control over their place of residence and with whom they live Ensure persons with disabilities receive appropriate and individualized support, including through personal assistance, and have access to community-based services on an equal basis with others Ensure persons with disabilities have access to security social schemes that ensure income protection, including in relation to the extra cost of disability Ensure persons with disabilities have access and are supported in gaining employment in the open labour market on an equal basis with others Ensure that public budgets take into account the rights of persons with disabilities and that sufficient budget allocations are made available to cover extra costs associated with living with a disability Ensure that appropriate mitigation measures, with appropriate budget allocations, are in place for persons with disabilities affected by austerity measures Government Response to UN Findings The government rejected the findings as they have done with all reports into the negative impact of disability rights reforms Work and Pensions Secretary Damian Green rejected the report's findings and said the document demonstrated "an outdated view of disability which is patronising and offensive" Damian Green also said"The UN measures success as the amount of money poured into the system, rather than the work and health outcomes for disabled people" Green also said "Our work and health Green Paper marks a turning point in our action to confront the attitudes, prejudices and misunderstandings within the minds of employers and across wider society." What Labour said The previous Labour government signed the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD). The next Labour government will sign the UNCRPD into UK law
	Education - Schools Education Spending Education Spending dropped by 20 billion in real terms between 2010-2017 20 billion represents a 20% drop in spending The percentage of national income spent on education has dropped from 5.7% in 2010 to 4.4% in 2018 Between 2009 and 2016, the school system took in an additional 470,000 pupils It estimated that between 2009 and 2025 there will be an increase in pupils from about 7.4 million pupils to about 8.1 million Total school spending per pupil fell by about 8% or about £500 per pupil between 2009–10 and 2017–18 Spending per pupil is not always a good indicator as takes the education budget and divides by number of pupils Many free schools and acadamies have not focused the money on pupils but rather on executive wages Many free schools & acadamies have consumed vast set up costs only to close soon afterwards Academies Only England has introduced Academies. Wales has kept schools under local authority control to ensure better outcomes 27% of primary schools and 72% of secondary schools are acadamies (as of 2018) The government intention is to convert all schools to academies Converting maintained schools to academies has cost the Department an estimated £745 million between 2010-2018 1,000 academy trusts paid a six-figure salary to at least one staff member last year 988 trusts had at least one person on £100,000 or more in 2017-18 Trusts paying £150,000-plus salaries has risen by 20% in a year, with a 7.6% rise among those with at least one person above £100,000. The rise came despite an increase in the number of academy trusts in deficit, from 5.9 to 6.4% One of the trusts to pay out a £150,000-plus salary and gave up its schools after it collapsed amid reported financial problems and concerns from Ofsted about low standards Academies are not subject to nationally set pay structures are at liberty not to pass on to teachers the recently awarded 2% payrise Two in three academy chains are “failing” pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds according to a 2018 study by the Sutton Trust Of the 38 underperforming chains, eight had scores which were well below the national average for disadvantaged pupils. These chains have 61 schools There is no evidence, despite the additional resources applied, that Academies have improved education outcomes Many academies have failed, often leaving their pupils in limbo Many academies have been investigated and criticised for financial irregularities Free Schools Free schools are new schools, not exisiting schools 55 free schools have closed since 2011 5% of free schools have closed since 2011 (some reports state 9%) More than 40 approved free schools didn't open Free schools are often near to present schools pressurisig their funding Failed free schools cause serious disruption to children, parents and the local authority There is no evidence that free schools have better education outcomes despite the vast resources they consume Sure Start In 2010 there were 3600 Sure Start Centres Cameron promised to protect their budget Sure Start budgets were cut by 763 million (50%) between 2010-2017 At least 30% of Sure Start centres have been closed or well over a 1000 Some areas saw a 70% drop in centres Reduced service and opening hours have been reported by 55% of centres Merging budgets due to money constraints has meant that local authorities have changed the purpose of Sure Start Sure Start centres are no longer inspected by Ofsted Teachers and Teaching The number of teachers saw a growth from 2011 until 2016 due to a big push to meet serious shortages Since 2016 teacher numbers have levelled off with record numbers leaving the profession The retention rate for teachers has dropped to 67.7% after 5 years teaching Approx 1.3 billion is spent on teacher training, very little on retention
	Education - Colleges Funding for 16- to 18-year-olds and for general further education has been cut much more sharply than funding for schools, pre-school or higher education Since 2010–11, funding per student aged 16–18 in further education (college based) has fallen by 8% in real terms and is now at about the same level as during the late 2000s Funding per student in school sixth forms has fallen by 21% since its peak in 2010–11, and remains lower than at any point since at least 2002–03 Funding for adult education (anybody 19 or over) has been cut by 45% since 2009–10 The overall number of 19+ learners has “fallen substantially”, from 4.7 million in 2004 to 2.2 million in 2016 Spending on further education and skills fell by £3.3bn in real terms between 2010-11 and 2017-18 In 2017 £57m of emergency funding was provided to help colleges in England Executive pay in colleges can be as much as 10 times that of a tutor The CEO of Gateshead College earned £344,000 salary in 2018 12 colleges pay their CEOs salaries of more than £200,000 salary Between 2010 and 2017 more than 23,000 posts have been lost in FE colleges in England, amounting to a third of the teaching staff overall
	Education - Universities Student Fees Until 1998 the majority of University funding came from central government. In 1998 the then Labour government introduced tuition fees at a maximum of £1000 per year In England, in 2006, the maximum fee rose to £3000 per year and in 2009/10 the maximum fee was raised to £3250 In the 2010 General Election the Lib Dems stood on a platform of ending tuition fees, which massively boosted their vote In 2010 the Conservative / Lib Dem coalition nearly tripled the maximum tuition fee in England that a university could charge to £9000 per year In 2017, the limit on fees was set to £9,250 for students in England and Wales, however Welsh students can apply for grant to offset the cost The majority of universities are charging the maximum fee allowed, regardless of the course In 1999–2000, maintenance grants for living expenses were replaced with loans and paid back at a rate of 9% of a graduate's income above £10,000 In 2006 the maintenance grant was re-instated at the same time as maximum tuition fees were increased to £3000 per year Student Debt On average a student will leave university with debt of £50,000 The debt will grow at between approximately 3.3% to 6.3% per annum depending on the graduates salary Interest starts accumulating on the debt as soon as the loan is taken, so students debt is increasing while still at university and students are not in a position to pay off the increasing debt University Funding Student fees have left universities in a much less stable position Rather than being funded centrally to allow them to plan they are subject to government policy impacting on student numbers Because the government is looking at cutting the maximum tuition fee, but is not backing this up with a return to central funding, there is a serious risk of many universities going under There has been a tendency for some universities to lose large numbers of students over the last few years, particularly where the cost of living is higher
	Environment Green Policies Cut Subsidies were ended for On-Shore Wind Farms in 2015 On-Shore wind can be the most cost-efficient way of producing low carbon energy Commercial solar installations of less than five megawatts – enough to power 2,500 homes had their subsidies ended in 2016 Subsidies for fossil fuelled-power stations conversion to wood or another biomass fuel were ended in 2016 In 2015, the Tories killed off the green deal, aimed at helping homeowners bring down their energy bills through installing insulation, and fitting new boilers and draught-proofing. There is now no energy efficiency policy for homes, which account for around a third of UK carbon emissions The Green Investment Bank (GIB) was launched in 2012. In 2017 the GIB was sold off The incentive to buy a greener car was undermined in 2017 when the government changed the excise duty was levelled off to a single figure for all cars regardless of pollution impact A decade-long plan to force all new homes to be ‘zero carbon’ from 2016 was binned by the Treasury in 2015 In July 2015 the Tories allowed fracking in thousands of sites of special scientific interest (SSSIs) A target set during the 2010-15 government to keep increasing the proportion of revenue from environmental taxes was dropped in Osborne’s 2015 emergency budget Tidal Lagoon Swansea Bay rejected In the case of nuclear power the government seem mesmerised by atomic power and are willing to provide extremely generous financial support and other help to kickstart a renaissance Nuclear power faces all sorts of other hurdles such as uncertain equity investors, legal challenges and ever-increasing costs and delays Offshore wind, much more expensive than onshore farms, has so far escaped the axe Green Investment Bank The Green Investment Bank (GIB) was established to help green projects with an initial injection of £3.8bn of public money In reality it was never a bank but rather an investment vehicle. It could not lend or borrow and was reliant on seed money from the government to make investments It was first put forward by the Labour government in 2008 and was included in the 2010 manifesto of all main parties In 2017 GIB was sold to Macquarie The Tories funded the GIB to the tune of £3.8bn, with the GIB seeing a 10% return on investment (only 16% of their funds had been invested at the time of sale - £610,000 The GIB was sold for £2.3 billion if loss to the taxpayer of more than £1.5 billion and with Macquarie gaining over £3 billion of seed money meaning they were paid to buy the GIB Macquarie intends GIB to become its platform for investments in green infrastructure projects in the UK and internationally, rather than been a UK investment vehicle Macquarie has made a series of public, but non-binding, commitments regarding the future of GIB and its role in the green economy The chair of the Public Accounts Committee says the government sold off its control of green investment too cheaply, and with little acknowledgement of the benefits it could have had Tidal Energy Tidal Lagoon Swansea Bay is a proposed tidal power plant that was to be constructed in Swansea Bay The plan in its current form has been rejected by the UK Government The logic for rejecting the tidal lagoon is that it does not provide as much electricity as an offshore installation Tidal power is much more consistent in supply than wind power and Swansea would provide enough electricity for 155,000 homes As their is many areas around the UK coast that would suit the Tidal Lagoon solution, it provides a massive opportunity for the UK to become world leaders in the industry In February 2019, the Guardian reported that Swansea tidal lagoon plan has been revived – without the need for government funding Property company Land Securities, Cardiff airport and developer Berkeley Group are among those to have expressed an interest in signing a power purchase agreement (PPA) with the lagoon Liverpool tidal power plant on the Mersey is an ideal place for a barrage. Its tidal range (the difference in water level between high and low tide) can be 10 metres or more at spring tides A narrow channel at its entrance (known as “The Narrows”) means the barrage could be shorter and thus cheaper to construct Close to a large urban area, with lots of electricity demand, the barrage would provide electricity for 300,000 homes The Tories are refusing to fund the Liverpool barrage Domestic Solar Panels With the subsidies first given to home solar panel installation there was a massive uptake. The initial rate was 43p per kWh, which while this is generous had the high impact on solar panel take up Since 2010 the subsidy fell in steps to finally be scrapped altogether in 2019 Since the government ended subsidies for solar panels the industry has seen take up collapse The government has said it is working on a replacement scheme, but in the meantime solar panel providers / installers have no clue as to when Solar panel installation is down by 94% in 2019 The government said that solar panel users should give their electricity to the main providers for free until a new scheme was put in place Fracking Millions of gallons of water are used in the fracking process, which directly reduces the amount of clean water available to surrounding residents When water is not available to fracking sites locally, it may be transported from other regions, ultimately drawing down available water from lakes and rivers across the country Water contamination could also reduce the overall water supply of regional fracking areas, as the chemicals that are used in the process have the propensity to leak back into local water supplies Waste water is an issue at fracking sites. Between 20% and 40% of the water used for fracking that is returned to the ground surface consists of toxic contaminants Fracking increases the potential for oil spills, which can harm the soil and surrounding vegetation Fracking was halted at the Lancashire fracking site on 21st August 2019 due to a 1.6 magnitude tremor On 23rd August fracking at the Lancashire site was halted again after a 1.05 magnitude tremor Following suspension of fracking a tremor measuring 2.1 on the Richter scale was recorded at the Lancashire site On 26 August 2019 the Lancashire Fracking site recorded an Earthquake of 2.9 on the Richter scale, the largest earthquake recorded in the UK due to fracking One of the main chemicals released in the fracking process is methane, and it is estimated that 4% of it escapes into the atmosphere during extraction Also the use of gas in providing our energy needs has a large impact on our carbon footprint, as travelling to homes is obviously subject to leaks. This escapes into the atmosphere as methane In the first two decades after its release, methane is 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide Carbon Subsidy The UK has biggest fossil fuel subsidies in the EU It found £10.5bn a year in support for fossil fuels in the UK, significantly more than the £6.8bn spent on renewable energy The EU found the UK provides £10.5bn a year in support for fossil fuels, significantly more than the £6.8bn spent on renewable energy These figures are from 2016. Renewable subsidies have been radically cut since the figures were released
	Healthcare - Funding Funding the NHS since 2010 The NHS was widely regarded as one of the most efficient healthcare systems in the developed world The efficiency was achieved despite being one of the lowest spenders of developed nations on health services Since 2010 the NHS has seen the highest reduction in funding since the 1951 Tory government There has been £4.6 billion reduction (31%) in local authority social care budgets since 2011 ) which increases NHS workload Transfered of £3.8 billion of NHS funds to care in the community At least £4.5 billion a year is spent following the Health and Social Care Act of 2012 introduced by the Tory - Lib Dem coalition It is estimated that the NHS is spending more than £3,700 every minute to pay for privately financed hospitals The Tories cut £200 million in Local Authority public health budgets Since 2010/11 Payment by Results system have been cut by over 40% for a quarter of the treatments that hospitals provide Cuts in Payment by Results has led to the NHS now charging for some treatments (hip replacements for example) From 2016 onwards budgets fell sharply, down to just a 0.9 per cent increase in 2017 By 2018-19 there was a 0.6% fall in real spending per head Growth in funding is forecast at 0.2% for 2019-20 and at 0.9% going forward NHS Deficit In 2010/11, just 5 per cent of these providers overspent their annual budgets By 2015/16, 66% of trusts were in deficit The ‘Sustainability and Transformation Fund’ contributed to a fall in deficits, but 44 per cent of trusts still overspent their budgets in 2017/18, with acute hospitals accounting for just under 90 per cent of all providers in deficit The NHS provider sector as a whole ended 2017/18 with a deficit of £960 million NHS providers started the financial year 2017/18 with a £4bn black hole between their underlying costs and income In March 2019, the public accounts select committee said NHS finances “remain in a perilous state"
	Healthcare - Nursing Nurse Numbers As of 2018 the NHS had 40,000 vacant nursing posts The key reason for the shortage is the number of nurses leaving the profession due to low pay and poor working conditions Between July 2017 and July 2018, 1,584 more EU nurses and health visitors left their role in the NHS than joined Projections for nurse shortages predict that following present trends there will be a 100,000 shortfall by 2030 The population is expected to increase by a further 11% to 62 million by 2041 putting further strain on the NHS and nursing per head of population, the UK has fewer than half as many nurses as Norway (8 nurses compared to 18) According to HEE, around 33,000 positions are filled temporarily by agency staff a large extra expense for local NHS trusts As at the end of 2018, NHS trusts were forecasting spending some £5.6 billion on temporary staff in 2018/19 Using temporary staff is disruptive to health services and reduces the ability to deliver continuity of care Nurse Pay From April 2010, newly qualified nurses in England were paid a starting salary of about £21,200 From 2018, new nurses start on £23,000 Taking into account inflation, new starter nurses are now earning around £1,900 less than in 2010 Newly qualified nurses have seen an 8% reduction in pay over eight years Nurses saw their wage rises capped at either 0% or 1% between 2010 and 2018 From 2010 to 2018 nurses saw a 10-14% fall in wages in real terms On average nurses are £2500-£3000 worse off per year since 2010 The wage restraint has been a false economy as NHS trusts have needed to go out to agencies to make up the shortfall in nurse numbers Rents and house prices have risen far above inflation figures Growing numbers of nursing staff are using food banks, taking on additional jobs and accruing personal debt The RCN also awarded 6,500 hardship grants to trainee nurses over three years (2015-17) Nurse Welfare Suicide rate among nurses was 23% higher than the national average Bursary Two years on from the removal of the NHS student bursary (as of 2018), applications to nursing degree courses have plummeted by a third in England. The end of bursaries mean nurses are qualifying with debts of £40,000 into a profession that is not particularly well paid Sign the petition re-instate nursing bursary and scrap tuition fees
	Homelessness Homelessness Overall Picture The charity Shelter insists the overall figure, 254,514, released to mark 50 years since its founding, is a "robust lower-end estimate". A further study in 2017 showed a large increase of homelessness to 307,000 an increase of 13,000 on the previous year. Studies prior to this were much more adhoc, but indicate a increase of approximately 15% in homelessness between 2012 and 2014 Overall there has been a 17.1% increase in homelessness in 2 years and a 29% in homelessness since 2012 Homeless Children From 2012 to 2014 child homelessness increased by 15% in the two years 2014 to the beginning of 2018 saw child homelessness increase by a further 32% The overall increase in child homelessness since the Tories came to power in 2010 is 60% from 74,610 in 2010 to 123,130 by Q1 2018 7% are living in Bed and Breakfast, 7% in hostels, 26% in nightly paid accomodation, 20% in HA stock, and 32% with private landlords Accomodation is often sub-standard, overcrowded and with a lack of even a short term permanance It is estimated that 1.6 million children live in accomodation that is overcrowded, temporary or run-down Rough Sleepers The increase in rough sleepers can be attributed to cuts in mental health services, a decline in social housing with growing waiting lists and the overall unaffordability of housing Measurements of rough sleepers tends to show the trend rather than exact figures Between 2010 and 2017 recorded rough sleeping increased from 1800 to 4800. On the trend upwards this indicates rough sleeping has trebled since the Tories (+libdems) entered government Homelessness - Vunerable Women There are only 6 women’s probation hostels providing a total of 112 beds Homeless women do not want to stay in the only (mixed-sex) accommodation offered to them, so instead choose to sleep rough They are also more vulnerable to exploitation and tend to be more hidden when homeless The government has no strategy to help vunerable homeless women
	House Prices House price inflation The average house price rise for the UK since 2010 is 27% At 61% Greater London has seen the highest house price inflation Wages have dropped for age range 21-49 by on average 10% since 2010 Somebody in their mid twenties would need to borrow 10 times their salary to purchase a house A lack of building has led to a housing shortage, ensuring house prices continue to increase Through help to buy schemes the goverment has purposely inflated house prices By cutting back on social care the government is overseeing larger homes moving into rental market and broken down into flats A number of think-tanks are targeting house value to be transferred to the private sector
	Housing - Renting Legislation 2016 In 2016 Conservative MPs voted to reject a proposed rule that would have required private landlords to make their homes “fit for human habitation” The Government said the new law would result in “unnecessary regulation 72 of the MPs who voted against the amendment are themselves landlords who derive an income from a property The law introduced in the 19th century that requires homes under a certain rent limit to be “fit for human habitation” That rent limit has not been updated since 1957 and is an annual rent of below £80 in London and £52 elsewhere The everage weekly rent in London is £362 meaning no properties fall under the legislation Cost of renting Between January 2011 and August 2018, private rental prices in Great Britain increased by 16.2% When London is excluded from these figures, private rental prices increased by 12.8% over the same period If you take an area like the West Midlands, rents from 2010 to 2018 have risen on average by £804 The rising rents are against a backdrop of falling wages The government raised billions in revenue when council houses were sold, but as this was not used to build more homes Social homes often ended up being owned by private landlords, meaning the government spent much more in housing benefit than was ever raised through the sale The government spends over 20 billion per year on housing benefit, that goes directly into the pockets of private landlords
	Housing - Shortages Hyper Gentrification Council Estates are going through re-generation Estates have become a target for private developers Following redevelopment there are much less homes for council tenants In London alone there has been a nett loss of over 4000 social homes in developments completed in the last 15 years London schemes that have planning permission will result in the loss of 7600 social homes in the next 10 years 118 estated are earmarked for or undergoing re-generation in the next 5 years, affecting 31,000 residents Over 80 estates are planned to be either fully or partially demolished Heygate estate was demolished and replaced by elephant park, a luxury apartment development. This lead to the loss of 3000 social homes of which only 82 were replaced Profitability is the benchmark on whether a scheme will go forward, not the need for social housing Student Accomodation Inflation in the housing market has also impacted students Along with student fee debts, the lack of a maintenance grant for students has lead to a growing number of students being in rent arrears The situation is worsened as universities move away from providing student halls and private investors have moved in Investors have focused on purpose built student accomodation, which is not suitable for the wider market With the profit factor added to the supply, then prices will be set to attain the highest possible profit based on market conditions More than 17,000 students living in university halls of residence fell behind with their rent payments in the year 2017, according to figures that suggest thousands more face financial hardship during their courses A small but rising number of students are also being evicted from halls or having their tenancies cancelled after falling behind with payments 97 students were evicted from halls in the last year, more than double the 40 who had their tenancies cancelled the previous year About 17,300 students living in university halls fell into rental arrears in 2017
	Housing - Social Funding Housing associations have taken over the role of providing Social Housing In 2010, George Osbourne cut the annual capital funding budget for housing associations from £3bn to £450m The 2010 cut in funding to Housing Associations amounted to a cut 15.3bn billion over the next 6 year period The government announced in September 2018 extra spending of £2bn for the period of upto 2029. The goverment will have deprived housing associations of 30bn by 2029 and if inflation is factored in, in the region of 35bn When the additional funding was announced, it was made clear the money would be for affordable housing. This is not the same as social housing £24bn is paid to private landlords per year in housing benefit. A large increase in the budget for social housing would remove this cost and create a social asset Private landlords receive more in one year in housing benefit than social housing will receive in 20 years Much of the private stock of housing is of poor quality. Social housing could remedy this, providing good housing and making money for the state There are more than 1.8 million households waiting for a social home of which there are 1.2 million in England alone Many of those on housing waiting lists have been on them for five or more years Stalled Building Social house building from 1980 fell off a cliff and by 1990 there was practically no social housing being built by local authorities In 1990 Housing Association building was higher than local authority building for the first time, but has never come near to filling the gap with the loss of local authority building As of March 2018 there was 63,000 sales of social homes as opposed to just 16,000 new builds In the 2017 budget Phillip Hammond announced a large fund to increase social homes building. This fund was later retracted and used to prop up a failing NHS Theresa May has said on a number of occassions that the Conservatives are building one for one (one house built for one house sold under the right to buy scheme). The true figures are 1 built for every 7 sold The number of new government-funded houses built for social rent each year has plummeted by 97 per cent since the Conservatives took office in 2010 More than 36,700 new socially rented homes were built with government money in England in 2010-11 – the year in which the Tories came to power in coalition with the Liberal Democrats. By the 2016-17, financial year that finished in April, that figure had fallen to just 1,102 From 2010-18 the total number of "affordable" homes built per year with government money more than halved – from 55,909 to 27,792 The Conservatives were forced to U-turn during the the 2017 election campaign after Theresa May announced the Tories would deliver "a constant supply of new homes for social rent”. The Government was later forced to admit that the new homes would, in fact, be the significantly more expensive “affordable” homes In 2017 the Tories handed £281,000,000 back to the Treasury that was for social housing and was not spent Housing Associations At the height of funding for housing associations they were still only building houses at half the target Housing associations, particularly those with charity status, are not answerable to government Some Housing Association chief executives are taking home six figure salaries Right to Buy Following the Right to Buy act home ownership grew from 55% of the population in 1980 to 67% by 1990 By 2015/16, home ownership had declined from a high of 70.9% in 2003 back to 62.9%, the lowest level since 1985 The Treasury received £28 billion from the right to buy scheme (note the government now pays 24bn a year to private landlords in housing benefit) More than 40% of houses sold in London under the right to buy scheme are now owned by private landlords Tens of millions of pounds are being paid by local authorities to rent former council homes in order to house growing numbers of homeless families Some councils have bought back their former homes at more than six times the amount they sold them for In a gig economy where more and more working people require housing support to provide a home private landlords extract wealth out of the local economy and restrict councils from having the funds to expand and improve social housing
	Human Rights Disability UNCRPD findings In 2007 the UK signed up to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) The UK holds the dubious accolade of being the first country to be investigated for contravening the convention The investigation centred around the Tory / Lib Dem Welfare Act 2012, as well as in the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016 The UN Committee concluded that there is reliable evidence that the threshold of grave or systematic violations of the rights of persons with disabilities has been met The impact assessments conducted by the Tories / Lib Dems prior to the implementation of its welfare reform expressly foresaw an adverse impact on persons with disabilities Several measures have disproportionally and adversely affected the rights of persons with disabilities Measures resulting in reduction of support provided to meet the extra cost of disability, denial of reasonable accommodation in assessment procedures and realization of the right to employment have had a discriminatory effect on persons with disabilities 13,900 persons with disabilities have lost their Motability schemes and therefore their adapted cars by 2016 41,792 Employment and Support Allowance work related activity group sanctions were handed out up to March 2014 Evidence gathered nationally by the Parliament, the independent monitoring framework, universities and research institutes have documented adverse and disproportionate effects of measures on persons with disabilities The Tories continued its policy of reducing social benefits of persons with disabilities as reflected in the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016 The UN findings were rejected in full by the Tories The next Labour government will sign the UNCRPD into UK law Work in progress Other study
	Pensions Pension Comparisons The UK has the lowest state pension of all OECD countries 31% of the UK population rely fully on the state pension The Tories insist this is due to increased life expectancy. Life expectancy increases very slowly and life expectancy is in decline under the Tories The NI fund is in surplus and the Tories are using it to pay down national debt The average state pension recieved per year in the UK is £7440 as compared with £26330 in Spain A UK citizen will, on average, enjoy 15.5 years of retirement, while in France they will enjoy 22.1 years of retirement (note these figures are before the government radically increased the retirement age for women) During retirement a UK pensioner will receive on average £115,000 in state pension, a Spanish pensioner £442,000 and a German pensioner £464,000 A German retiree will have a surplus (income after essentials) of £308,920. In Spain £300,880 A UK pensioner will have an average deficit of £252,740 to meet everyday esentials over their pension lifetime
	Poverty Insecure Work Since 2012 there has been a 358% rise in zero hour contracts Zero hour contracts peaked in 2015 at 2.1 million. 2017 saw the number begin to rise again upto 1.8 million and increasing The nature of the zero hour contracts means the employer can circumvent employment rights Universal Credit Universal Credit was intended to be gradual and the rollout was expected to be completed by the end of 2017. The complexity of managing and applying the system has meant that roll out is now expected to complete by 2023. Approximately 11% of intended recipients have been moved to Universal Credit by December 2017 (0.7 million out of 5.5 million) The DWP had estimated administration costs for the roll-out of Universal Credit to be £2.2 billion. By August 2014 this estimate rose to £12.8 billion and was later increased to £15.8 billion. A single parent with two children, working full-time on or around the minimum wage, could be £2,500 a year worse off In-work poverty has increased and in areas where UC has been introduced Benefit fraud and errors have increased Poverty Overview Fourteen million people are in poverty in the UK – that is over one in five of the population (22%) Eight million working-age adults, four million children and two million pensioners are living in poverty In 2017 one-and-a-half million people lived in destitution in the UK, which means they could not afford to have what we all need to eat, stay warm and dry, and keep clean. And 365,000 of those destitute were children More than one-and-a-half million people were destitute in the UK at some point during 2017, including over a third of a million children Child Poverty In 2018 30% of children were living in relative poverty and the figure is increasing 4.1 million children were living in poverty as of 2018 3.1 million of the children living in poverty have working parents, an increase of over 50% since 2010 when the figure stood at 2.1 million Child poverty in some inner-city areas is as high as 50% When Labour entered government in 1997 child poverty stood at 27% and rising. This was compared with 13% when the Tories entered government in 1979 From 1997 under a Labour government poverty started a downward trajectory, standing at 20% in 2010 and still falling. This amounted to 900,000 children taken out of poverty over that period When Labout entered government in 1997 absolute poverty was at 26.1% and rising. By 2009/10 absolute poverty stood at 12.4% The target set by Labour was to end child poverty by 2020 (and they were pretty much on target) The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) estimates that absolute child poverty will increase by a further 4% by 2022 The Tories have scrapped the Labour targets and moved to a model of stigmatising poverty rather than ending it Pensioner Poverty The last Labour government slashed pensioner poverty Under the Tory government rates have began to rise again. New measures targeting pensioner credit will create further hardship For those in social housing, the poverty rate peaked at 54% in 1996/97 and fell to 20% during the Labour 1997-2010 government Since 2010 pensioner poverty in social housing had risen to 31% by 2016/17 and is on an upwards trajectory Government figures indicate that 40,000 pensioners will lose an average of £5500 per year due to changes in pension credit The UK has the lowest state pension of the 39 OECD countries and one of the highest retirement ages In-Work Poverty In-work poverty is higher than at any time in the last 20 years The number of workers in poverty has increased at a faster rate than the total number of people in employment The rise in in-work poverty over the last five years has been driven almost entirely by the increase in the poverty rate of working parents. A working parent is over one-and-a-half times more likely to be in poverty than a working non-parent The Poverty Premium Poverty comes at a cost +Higher costs for credit +Using pre-payment meters +Paying to access money +Paying to receive paper bills +Not switched to best fuel tariff +Not paying by cheapest billing method +Insuring specific items +Insurance premiums related to where people live +Higher tax in proportion to income The average low-income household in 2016 paid a poverty premium of £490 per year The poverty premium can be more severe for the poorest rising as high as over £2000 per year The lowest tenth of earners pay an average of 47.6 per cent of their income in the form of income tax, national insurance, VAT and council tax. This tax burden has increased by 4.4% since 2008-9 and is an upward trend as the Tories move towards direct local taxes The richest 10 per cent see around a third (33.5 per cent) of their income go to the taxman Council tax and VAT were found to hit the poorest households particularly hard. Low earners pay an average of seven per cent of their income in council tax while the wealthiest households pay just 1.5 per cent The poor pay 12.5 per cent of their income on VAT while the rich pay five per cent The Tories raised VAT by 5p in the pound, hitting the poorest the hardest. They had intended to raise VAT by a further 2.5%, but cancelled the policy due to protests from businesses Council tax is set to hit the poorest even harder as the government implements its latest rounds of cuts to local authorities
	Services - Ambulance Between 2009-10 and 2015-16, the number of ambulance calls and NHS 111 transfers increased from 7.9 million to 10.7 million, an average year-on-year increase of 5.2%. Between 2011-12 and 2015-16, income for ambulance trusts’ urgent and emergency care activity increased by 16% from £1.53 billion to £1.78 billion Over this period, activity rose by 30% Commissioners have warned that, given current financial challenges in the wider health service, future funding settlements are likely to be tighter In 2015-16, approximately 500,000 ambulance hours were lost due to turnaround at accident and emergency departments taking more than 30 minutes, which equates to 41,000 12-hour ambulance shifts In 2015-16, only 58% of hospital transfers met the 15-minute admittance expectation and only 65% of ambulance crews were then ready for another call within 15 minutes Performance against the response time targets is getting worse. In 2015-16, only one trust out of ten (West Midlands) met the their targets Most ambulance trusts are carrying a large number of vacancies Trusts are facing challenges retaining staff, with most reporting increased turnover rates. For example, North West Ambulance Service’s turnover rate increased from 4.7% to 9.6% between 2011-12 and 2015-16 Social Care cuts mean more patients require transferring to hospital Hospitals under pressure for beds are transferring recovering patients home much earlier often resulting in patient re-admittance due to medical complications Time lost when ambulances are forced to hold patients in the ambulance due to no space in hospitals for admittance Increased social issues such as homelessness and poverty leading to drug and alcohol dependancy Increased mental health issues due to poverty and lack of support services Privatisation To complete by Saturday 7 September
	Services - Fire Central government funding has been reduced by an average of 45% since 2010 Funding from council tax has so far held up fairly well, with only a slight reduction (approx 2%) Averaging out funding reduction across the two sources, funding has reduced by a third More than 40 Fire Stations have closed The quantity of fire fighting equipment has been severely reduced There are 11,000 fewer fire fighters than in 2010 Fire deaths decreased year on year until 2015-16. Since then fire deaths have been increasing. Something that the Fire Brigade Union has been warning about since the start of the cuts Response times did not not increase significantly between 2010-15, although the signs of strain were beginning to show. Since 2016 response times have begun to increase more markedly The government have announced a further 15% cut to Fire Service funding for the period 2019/20, despite incidents being up 4%
	Services - Police Police Numbers Since 2010 frontline police officers figures are 14% lower than 2010 when there were 143,734 police officers, representing a decrease of 20,564 The number of police officers in England and Wales is the lowest recorded level since 1983 In 1983 though there was 1 police officer per 469 people. Now it is a ratio of 1:563 Between March 2010 and March 2017 police support staff fell by 84,000 to 67,000 a drop in staff of 17,000 There has been some recovery in support staff with the difference between 2010 and March 2019 standing at 14,000 Police officers are covering support staff activities exacerbating officer shortages If all the areas of Police work are taken into consideration, including special constables and Police Community Support Officers then the overall loss in the force is 45,000 from 244,497 in 2010 to 199,752 Funding The Police Force has seen a 19% cut in funding since 2010 Central government cuts were 30%, with council tax taking up more of the funding share The lack of funding for forces is a vicious circle as they are less able to deal with crime, meaning repeat crimes Funding has been reduced in other areas, such as youth clubs, probation services and with the growth of serious poverty increasing crime and police workload More Officers 2020-2022? In August 2019 Boris Johnson pledged to increase Police numbers by 20,000 in 3 years This target only applies to frontline officers and does not deal with the 14,000 support staff that have been lost since 2010 The attrition rate for officers over 3 years is on average 21,0000. The additional officers promised would only mean numbers would stand still To expand the number of police officers back to the 2010 numbers the police force will need to recruit a further 40,000+ officers over the next 3 years Support staff would also have to be increased to support the additional officers. There are no plans to increas support staff The Home Office has admitted it does not know how much the scheme will cost or where the money will come from It is also unclear how 20,000 more officers will be accommodated following the closure of 600 stations since 2010
	Welfare - Sanctions Coalition of Cruelty From 2010 the coalition created a hostile environment for welfare claimants The coalition's 2012 Welfare Reform Act carried the hostile approach into law and saw the ramping up of the regime The Lib Dems took legal advice prior to voting for the welfare reform act and were advised it was illegal. They voted for the act anyway The 2012 Welfare Reform Act introduced the "Claimant Commitment pledge" The pledge or work plan was defined as “ regular specific tasks and training opportunities and the penalties claimants could face for failing to meet their responsibilities to get into work will be clearly spelt out” The Claimant Commitment was partly blamed for a 60% rise in jobseeker’s having their benefits sanctioned ;These sanctions could mean benefits cut or stopped completely for weeks, months or even years for failure to adhere to the jobseeker’s agreement The Citizens Advice Bureau said at the time, benefit sanctions can create barrier to employment DWP statistics showed 38,969 of decisions to sanction were later overturned following an appeal In 2014 the coalition introduced new measures that meant many more single parents with children under five faced sanctions The toughness of the rules along side overstretched job centres meant that more single parents were bound to suffer from sanctions Gingerbread described it as a tick box exercise that failed to take into account the needs of the parents or help them into work Even before the new rules were introduced 38% of single parents on appeal were found to have been wrongly sanctioned By 2014 the coalition sanctions were beginning to bite, with lone parents seeing since 2009 a 563% increase in sanctions, 65% increase for disabled and 76% increase for women The PCS union said that there was mounting evidence which suggests that Jobcentre advisers are being pressurised into sanctioning the unemployed The PCS union said that the current sanctions regime is a “pernicious and counter-productive” tool which does little to encourage unemployed people to look for work Trussell Trust said that benefit delays, including over-zealous sanctions, account for a significant percentage of people who require food aid Over the years a number of Jobcentre employees have come forward and revealed that the DWP gives sanction targets to staff and provides guidance on how to trip claimants up so that they can be sanctioned Under the coalition it was those with mental health issues that suffered most from sanctions. This was a result of MH issues making it impossible for some sufferers to meet the new hostile compliance regime The DWP showed that between January and March 2014 9,851 (60%) adverse benefit sanctions decisions were made against ESA claimants with mental or behavioural disorders. The Work and Pensions Committee had raised concerns in early 2014 about the sanctions regime, but it had been rejected by the coalition government Dame Anne Begg MP, Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee said “Recent research suggests that benefit sanctions are contributing to food poverty. Dame Anne Begg MP also said "No claimant should have their benefit payment reduced to zero where they are at risk of severe financial hardship, to the extent of not being able to feed themselves or their families, or pay their rent." In August 2015 DWP guidance on hardship payments for sanctioned Jobseekers Allowance claimants said a person will only be a member of a vulnerable group if they have an accompanying physical health problem Mind said they were "seeking clarity from the DWP as to why people with mental health problems who have had their benefits stopped aren’t considered to be vulnerable in this instance." In 2015 it was discovered that the government had significantly understated the number of Jobseekers Allowance claimants being sanctioned The government had stated that only a small minority of claimants were being sanctioned Figures showed that since the coalition had come to power sanctions had more than doubled from 7.7% in 2010 to 16.7% (1 in 6) in 2014 The increase in the number of sanctions had also come at a time when the length of any given sanction had risen to a minimum of 4 weeks and a maximum of 3 years Between December 2012 and June 2015 the DWP imposed 70,452 sanctions on sick and disabled people This represents a huge rise in sanctions against those who have been deemed unfit for work following a work capability assessment These sanctions are at odds with the coalition's own stipulation for sanctions which states... “You may get Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) if your illness or disability affects your ability to work”, including “work-related activity.” A report by the Department of Sociology of the University of Oxford found that the imposition of adverse sanctions inreased exit from unemployment. They were unable to detect an impact on employment recovery A report by Salford City Partnership (SCP) concluded The implementation of the DWP’s conditionality and sanctions regime continues to cause distress and destitution for the claimant SCP concluded an increased demand for support for the City’s public and community and voluntary sector agencies SCP concluded many vulnerable claimants are still receiving benefit sanctions which are often inappropriate and potentially unlawful SCP concluded devastating impact on the lives of people who are already struggling to make ends meet SCP concluded sanctions affect an individual’s ability to meet essential living expenses for themselves and family such as food and fuel SCP concluded sanctions can also lead to longer term problems including debt, rent and council tax arrears and in some cases destitution SCP concluded sanctions do not “incentivise people into work” SCP concluded the sanctions regime serves as a barrier, preventing people from engaging in appropriate training, volunteering and demotivating employment-related activities SCP concluded sudden loss of income by imposing punitive sanctions often damages people’s mental health, create tensions within family relationships and may cause individuals to turn to crime in order to meet their basic survival needs Continuation of Cruelty The 2010-2015 coalition had set the scene for a hostile sanctions environment. The Conservative government carried on the hostility from 2015 to present A National Audit Office (NAO) in November 2016 made it clear that there was still no evidence that sanctions worked The NAO report found that sanctions which have caused thousands of claimants to fall into hardship and depression The NAO report also found sanctions are being handed out without evidence that they actually work The DWP is failing to monitor thousands of people whose benefits are being cut or withheld while many are being pushed outside the benefits system In February 2017 A report by the public accounts committee found that some Work Programme providers and jobcentres withhold payments to twice as many people as others in the same area The committee found the use of financial penalties, which it found “have increased in severity in recent years and can have serious consequences” such as forcing claimants into homelessness The committee said "Nor can the DWP estimate the wider effects of sanctions on people and their overall cost, or benefit, to government.” By 2018 more than a million benefits sanctions had been imposed on disabled people since 2010 Unemployed disabled claimants are up to 53% more likely to be docked money than claimant who are not disabled Trials to improve the sanction system were scrapped despite their success In 2018 the Work and Pensions Select Committee expressed anger and frustration over the lack of evidence provided by the DWP to an inquiry into the effectiveness and impact of punitive benefit sanctions Data suggests that sanctions are being imposed for longer periods, and sometimes against vulnerable people the DWP accept are too ill or disabled to work In March 2019 The British Psychological Society (BPS) called on the DWP to put an end to its cruel benefit sanctions regime, which they say is known to be harmful to vulnerable people’s mental health