Liverpool Claimants Network

Universal credit is a direct attack by the government on us, ordinary working class people.The new benefit system makes it harder to apply and hides a cut on the rates. UC will affect not just unemployed but employed!

Universal credit hurts kids, the disabled, part timers, child carers the sick and elderly. The ammount of people demanding for charity food and of women resorting to prostitution has increased in those areas in which universal credit has been introduced. Also, UC can increase women vulnerability in some relationships, as money is paid to one partner.

Between 80 and 100 people attended a meeting organised by the Liverpool Claimants Network to discuss and plan local resistance to the government’s proposed Bedroom Tax. The initial presentation by a member of the network gave a good overview of what the Bedroom Tax is, the implications it has for housing association tenants, and the need to organise direct action against what is a callous attack on the working-class.

As of April 1st this year, housing association tenants who have a spare room will be faced with a reduction in their housing benefit of between £40 and £80 a month (a reduction of up to 25%) as part of the government’s welfare reform plans. In Liverpool alone, 12,000 tenants will be affected. Nationally, the figure is around 660,000. Meanwhile, the Empty Homes Agency says there are 725,000 homes lying empty across the country, enough to house 1.8 million people.