By Malcolm Torry
31 Mar 2021
Lack of income security is widely recognised as a major problem – and one that has been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Could a Basic Income help? And is... Read More
By Rethinking Poverty
04 Feb 2021
With a new lockdown announced on 4 January and schools closed across the country, 2021 got off to a bad start. By 25 January, Gordon Brown was warning that... Read More
By Holly Barrow
25 Nov 2020
The Covid-19 pandemic has once more highlighted that the UK’s social security system is in dire need of reform. Chancellor Rishi Sunak himself seemingly identified its shortcomings, as he... Read More
By Isky Gordon
01 Oct 2020
Universal Basic Income (UBI) is not a new idea but has recently gained some credence, with interest in possible pilot studies shown by the Scottish national government and one... Read More
By Michael Orton
30 Sep 2020
Readers of Rethinking Poverty are warmly invited to give their views on proposals for a better social security (welfare benefits) system. The proposals are from a project called the... Read More
By John Hudson, Neil Lunt and Ruth Patrick
12 Aug 2020
As the UK emerges tentatively from lockdown, and the economic and social implications of the crisis start to solidify, there is an inevitable and valid debate about what shape... Read More
By Andrew Webster
23 Jun 2020
‘Perhaps the easiest way of making a town’s acquaintance is to ascertain how the people in it work, how they love, and how they die.’ Albert Camus, The Plague This... Read More
By Neal Lawson
20 Mar 2020
Most of us have experienced nothing like this before. It is strange, forbidding and dislocating to a degree probably only experienced by those alive in the early 1940s. Events... Read More
By Barry Knight
15 Jan 2020
‘I feel in complete shock. At the end I thought my heart had stopped.’ So read a text sent by a friend of mine as she left the cinema... Read More
19 Nov 2019
The Centre for Local Economic Strategies (CLES) has launched ‘The manifesto for local economies’, setting out a vision for ‘how the next government should create local economies that serve... Read More
By Bob Rhodes
18 Sep 2019
As part of its Manifesto for Social Care Reform, the Centre Welfare Reform proposes a radical reinvention of social services and the reintegration and refocusing of social work on... Read More
By Fran Bennett
14 Aug 2019
This ‘Poverty and social security: where next?’ blog series has given valuable pointers about what a future government should do to mend social security and tackle poverty over the... Read More
By Sally Witcher
23 Jul 2019
How would you design a new social security system from scratch? Not an opportunity that comes along every day, so probably not a question many have devoted time to... Read More
By Rethinking Poverty
09 Jul 2019
This month’s Talking Points reflects on the causes of inequality and puts forward some suggestions for tackling poverty rather than just more ‘bad news’. We also look at the... Read More
By Louisa McGeehan
02 Jul 2019
If a future government wants to tackle poverty, its first priority should be child poverty. Growing up in poverty steals away children’s life chances – poorer children are likely... Read More
By Barry Knight
24 Jun 2019
What follows is the text of a speech given by Barry Knight at a conference of the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations (SFHA) on 12 June 2019. The speech... Read More
By Stephen Timms
19 Jun 2019
An incoming Labour government will be confronted with the severe problems currently facing claimants grappling with universal credit. What will the Labour party need to do to put social... Read More
13 Jun 2019
A new report, Universal credit: what needs to change to reduce child poverty and make it fit for families?, from Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG), calls for changes to... Read More
By Rethinking Poverty
05 Jun 2019
A big story this month is the launch of a new review of inequality in the UK, but will it make a difference? Discussion of the four-day (or shorter)... Read More
By John Veit-Wilson
28 May 2019
Poverty is growing in the UK, and it’s not only that more people are suffering, but the hurts and indignities they suffer are getting worse. Much of this avoidable... Read More
By Claire Ainsley
16 May 2019
For people living in poverty in the UK, the workings of the social security system are too often part of the problem, not part of the solution. People will... Read More
27 Mar 2019
Compass, with support from Friends Provident Foundation, have published a new report, Basic Income for All: From Desirability to Feasibility. Authored by Stewart Lansley and Howard Reed, it presents... Read More
By Reverend Paul Nicolson
26 Mar 2019
I am delighted to make this politically independent contribution to debate the left’s poverty and social security agenda in the 2020s. I work without allegiance to any political party,... Read More
By Mary-Ann Stephenson
14 Mar 2019
Our social security system is not working. A succession of cuts and changes over the last eight years have left a fifth of the population (more than 14 million people)... Read More
By Donald Burling
27 Feb 2019
Rethinking Poverty encourages its readers to contribute their thoughts so that we can all engage in developing the society we want. Here we publish an article by Donald Burling... Read More
By Rachel Gregory
14 Feb 2019
Universal Credit is hailed as the biggest welfare reform since the welfare state was introduced. While support exists for the principles behind its introduction – simplifying the legacy benefits... Read More
By Caroline Hartnell
29 May 2018
‘Focusing on basic services, such as housing, food, communications and transport, is, we conclude, far more effective at driving down the cost of living than spending the same money... Read More
By Chris Goulden
11 May 2018
Universal basic income (UBI), or citizens’ basic income, is one of the ideas put forward in Barry Knight’s book Rethinking Poverty: What makes a good society? as a ‘promising area for... Read More