Kayte Lawton

Today’s speech on welfare reform from the new Welfare and Pensions Secretary, Ian Duncan Smith, was noteworthy for three reasons. First, it was an impassioned speech full of outrage about the extent of poverty and inequality in the UK. It lacked the usual clichés of ministerial speeches on welfare (from both Labour and the Conservatives) about getting tough on benefit cheats and cracking down on the ‘can work / won’t work’ cohort. Instead, this felt like a genuine attempt to get to grips with the scale of poverty and think seriously about how to address it.   Read more...