Readers on the effects of the chancellor’s spring statement and how he could have alleviated rather than intensified inequality
Rishi Sunak’s spring statement succeeds most brutally in resurrecting and reinforcing the historical divisions between the “deserving” and “undeserving” poor (UK’s most vulnerable face crunch as Rishi Sunak helps better-off, 23 March). For the “deserving”, many on low wages who earn their poverty, the deceptive small increases are aimed to engender gratitude but will also contribute to scapegoating the “feckless” poor. For the “undeserving”, those on fixed benefits, who will see their income cut by up to 7% (taking into account predicted inflation), life will be hell, as they struggle to keep warm, feed their families or get by on their state pensions or disability allowances.
Many will blame themselves for having to depend on charitable relief for food, children’s clothes and bedding, and go without. As your editorial suggests (23 March), Sunak’s statement “is a strategy for inequality”. But notably absent in Wednesday’s parliamentary debate and follow-up interviews with the opposition was any commitment to a wider vision, to radically reduce major societal inequalities through more progressive income tax and wealth reform, or even propose the dignity afforded by a living wage.
Prof Mike Stein
University of York
