A policy focused on drugs and alcohol neglects the majority in poverty, writes Claudia Wood.
Today Iain Duncan Smith gave a speech calling for a more multi-dimensional measure of poverty, reflecting on the fact that the fall in child poverty this year has mainly been down to the fact that the country's median income has fallen. This, he said, demonstrated the fatal weakness in relative poverty measures – they do not assess a person's material situation, rather, their income compared to everyone else. To say someone is in poverty because they receive less than 60 per cen...
Max Wind-Cowie has a confession to make.
I have a confession to make. I have been the subject of several 'penalty notices'. In Hammersmith and Fulham, in Basildon, in Southwark. I keep the little slips of judgmental paper in a draw at home, like a scrap book of my criminality. My offence? Dropping cigarette butts on the ground. I am a victim of the vociferous litter-policing that has, according to the Daily Mail, raised local authorities, and the companies they subcontract to, millions over the last year. But I&#...
Claudia Wood argues we musn't lose sight of the potential benefits of prepaid to the financially excluded.
Today we have launched the Power of Prepaid – looking at the phenomenon of prepaid cards, which are rapidly spreading across local authorities to facilitate the payment of personal budgets. As my comment in the Guardian explains, these cards can work well in distributing direct payments in social care, due to the fact they can be monitored online, removing the huge amount of paperwork required to audit care users’ spending – a statutory duty which has hitherto involved ...
Jamie Bartlett on how we achieve integration on the internet.
On multiculturalism, both the Labour and Conservative parties are edging towards a similar position: we welcome and want people to celebrate their own cultures, background, religions, but not at the cost of weakening a common British identity. We need to integrate, together. What about the internet? We spend a lot of time there of course (on average 4 hours a day), and it is where we get a lot of our information about other religions and people. It is increasingly where movements and identit...
Max Wind-Cowie on Baroness Warsi's speech on Islamophobia.
Sayeeda Warsi is not a woman known for pulling her punches. And, in giving her a new role at DCLG – with responsibility for faith and religious communities – the Prime Minister presumably hoped that she would channel her passion into fighting for groups with whom conservatives have much in common but often little in the way of mutual trust. So did I – in fact, I wanted him to go one step further and make her the Chair of the EHRC. But today, in a speech about Islamoph...
Jonathan Birdwell asks: why are local authorities so squeamish about commissioning faith groups?
This week we launched the second report in Demos’ Inquiry into Faith and Society, called Faithful Providers, which explores the vexed question of faith-based organisations delivering public services. The findings were clear. Qualitative interviews with 20 faith groups showed they can be highly effective providers, offer value for money, and added ‘social value’ to communities. So why are Government and local authorities so squeamish about commissioning them to deliver ...
Duncan O’Leary argues that businesses increasingly realise they should be worried about more than the bottom line.
In politics you know you have won when you don’t just beat your opponents, you convert them to your cause. Mrs Thatcher apparently used to say that her biggest political achievement was the creation of New Labour – such was the scale of her dominance that even one-time opponents came to embrace not just capitalism over socialism, but also privatised utilities, flexible labour markets, permanently lower tax rates, the right to buy, competition in public services and so on. The liv...
Max Wind-Cowie argues that the Government must provide consumers with clear advice on healthy eating.
This morning consumers were told that consuming mackerel might mean jeopardising the sustainability of fish stock. This comes on the back of a campaign, two years ago, in which celebrity chefs such as Jamie Oliver encouraged those same consumers to eat more... mackerel - in part by persuading folk to put down their bacon butties and replace them instead with the healthy 'mackerel bap' option. On top of this, leading sustainability campaigners have not even agreed ...
David Goodhart on how Labour should step to the plate on immigration and integration policy.
Last week saw two notable interventions in Britain's rolling debate about immigration and integration. Both of them felt rather anachronistic, almost historical commentaries on a debate that has since moved on. First was another speech from Eric Pickles, the secretary of state for communities and local government, which had nothing new to say by way of analysis or proposals - beyond the usual plea for newcomers to learn English. This is despite the fact that he was speaking just a few wee...
Those proposing Living Wage Zones are on to a winner, says Claudia Wood.
The Observer on Sunday covered a report from the Resolution Foundation and the IPPR on the living wage, with a headline 'Living Wage Zones could become key Labour pledge'. This comes off the back of the Resolution Foundation's sterling work, with economic modelling and thorough analysis, of the costs of the living wage to business. This latest report has culminated in workable policies to incentivise (rather than impose) wage rises by sharing the gains to the Treasury of public se...