Archbishop of Westminster critical of Iain Duncan Smith

Tuesday, July 26th, 2011

Iain Duncan Smith, British Prime Minister’s Work and Pensions Secretary, is in New Zealand to give a lecture for the Maxim Institute.

His reforms are a trial run for what a local welfare working group chaired by economist Paula Rebstock has recommended here.

Rebstock had a rather narrower assignment – to “reduce long-term benefit dependency”. She took what she called “an actuarial approach”, recommending “investing” in unemployed people early so they could contribute to the economy. Yet this different approach led her to almost exactly the same proposals as her British counterpart.

Lincoln University economist Paul Dalziel, in a recent critique, says Rebstock fails to address the policy shift 25 years ago away from full employment and other policies such as low-interest home loans that helped low-income working families.

“If we follow the welfare working group’s example in failing to address the historical forces that have given rise to the current situation, but only put more pressure on beneficiaries through lower income support and more draconian job-search requirements, the result will be an intensification of poverty,” he says.

In Britain, the Archbishop of Westminster has written to Iain Duncan Smith expressing his concern over the potential impact of new and planned government welfare policies on the most vulnerable members of society.

In a strongly worded letter, Archbishop Vincent Nichols refers to the department’s own figures which show 50,000 families losing £93 a week as a result of the welfare reforms. He also referred to reports from the Caritas Social Action Network regarding growing concerns over the repercussions of the changes and the effect they are having on making social problems worse.

The Archbishop quotes the De Paul Trust, a member of CSAN, reporting homelessness increasing for the first time in 10 years and youth homelessness rising by 15 per cent in the last 12 months.

Sources