Who Gets What and Why?



Zoe Williams is one of the few Guardian writers I have much time for these days because she spoke out about equal pay when all these other 'lefty' types (including lots of Labour MSPs and MPs) kept their heads down and said nothing.

And here is Zoe again calling a spade a spade on the subject of millions of pounds being spent on free school meals which goes to help middle income earners, of course, rather than the less well off.

I think it would be a much better use of public money to target our resources on areas where they would do most good.

Which is why I still can't believe the Scottish council employers reneging on a landmark pay agreement in 1999 for low paid workers which would have cost £450 million a year - while agreeing to fund a spectacular 'McCrone' pay deal for Scotland's teachers worth £800 million a year just twelve months later in the year 2000.    

Free school meals should be for those who need them, not those who don’t


This £1bn universal benefit is a punch in the face for the million people who need food banks

By Zoe Williams - The Guardian

Nick Clegg, deputy prime minister, launches the free school meals scheme. 'To drop over £1bn on a universal benefit that excludes by child’s age rather than parent’s means is just preposterous.' Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

How much does it save, the kids getting free school meals? I know a fair amount about what it costs – £2.30 a pupil, a day, plus £150m to make changes to the school – and I know that, in schools that didn’t already have a kitchen and dining room, that’s not going to be enough. But it wasn’t until this morning, when my year one daughter and year two son actually went to school, that it occurred to me: that’s £800 a year, straight to me.

This puts me in the uncomfortable position of agreeing with the former Gove special adviser Dominic Cummings – that this is one of the most ill-considered policies to emerge from this government to date, and not for want of competition – while simultaneously agreeing strongly with the civil servant who said to Cummings: “You’re a mutant virus, I’m the immune system and it’s my job to expel you from the organism.”

I object to the policy for reasons of profligacy: when you have parents who can’t afford uniforms at the start of term, kids so sure their parents can’t afford school trips that they don’t even take the letters home, to drop over £1bn on a universal benefit that excludes by child’s age rather than parent’s means is just preposterous.

I thought the same about the Health In Pregnancy grant, where they just gave us all £190 cash, to spend on vegetables: the evidence of benefit for that was flaky. And similarly, it sprayed money pell-mell at people whether they urgently needed it or wouldn’t notice it. But that was before we had a million people using food banks, disability benefits removed, hardship funds axed, the bedroom tax, all these savings made for amounts that are petty for the government but life-changingly difficult for the people who lose them. Against this background, a new universal benefit looks like an active insult, a deliberated punch in the face: apparently the nation can afford substantial sums, for the betterment of its citizens’ lives. Just not for scumbags.

In 2010, at the first Conservative conference after the coalition’s election “victory”, I was on a panel with Alison Garnham, head of the Child Poverty Action Group, Anand Shukla, then head of the Daycare trust, andCharlotte Vere, once a Conservative candidate, then about to become the head of the Girls’ Schools Association. It stuck in my mind because nobody turned up; the title was something about child poverty, and it clashed with something about Europe, and genuinely, as God and three well-respected charity heads are my witness, not one single Conservative showed (there were a couple of people there from other charities).

Anyway, gamely, we did the debate regardless, and Vere made the argument I am making now: then, it was about the free 15 hours a week of nursery that all three-year-olds got. “I don’t need it,” she said. “Why should the government waste its money on me?”

Well, so that we can continue to raise our children together, was the broad answer: everybody gets it, so everybody uses it, so that maybe, in the long run, the advantages of wealth can be flattened out – just a tiny bit – by the boost of genuine, class-blind community. Maybe … it’s worth a try, right?

You cannot make the same argument about school meals, since rich people aren’t, thrown on their own resources, going to change their nutritional choices.

We’re just going to pay through ParentPay, as we were doing before. And yet I’m coming to realise the sad undertow of this story, which is that things have become so bad I wouldn’t make a defence for any universal benefit at the moment. The solidarity argument of universalism used to be heartwarming. But now all it does is emphasise the erosion of security at the bottom, the erosion of the social promise that nobody has to starve and everybody deserves a roof over their head – and how fast and brutal it has been.



Who Gets What and Why? (6 April 2014)


I've been saying for a long time that in these tough economic times people living in rented accommodation have been getting a raw deal compared to their neighbours and friends who have a mortgage.

And that's because mortgage payers have seen their housing costs fall significantly over the past five years with interest rates being at artificially low levels - whereas the cost of rented accommodation keeps going up as this article from the BBC web site shows with a big increase of 7.63% in West Dunbartonshire Council, for example. 

Yet to add insult to injury the Scottish Government has announced extra spending on free school meals for a Primary 1-3 school pupils which is worth £114 million over two years or around £330 a year for each child - for families with children.

But not to the less well off families of course because their children already receive free school meals, so all these extra millions of pounds are going to support the better off - like Scotland's school teachers who enjoy much better than average pay.

Now Scotland's largest teaching union, the EIS, has been campaigning in support of these changes which is understandable as it is clearly in the interest of EIS members, but the bigger question is "Is such a policy fair and socially responsible?".  

I say "No" because in my view the money would be much better spent on targeting the the less well off instead of further cushioning the lives of the better paid, especially when you stop and think that the majority of teachers will have been benefiting from the mortgage situation over the past five years.

So if you ask me, the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament has got this all wrong - the lower paid are the ones who deserve a break not people in already well paid jobs.  

West Dunbartonshire Council announces housing rent rise

Rents for council house tenants in West Dunbartonshire are to rise by 7.63% from 1 April, it has been announced.

The council said the increase would add an extra £4.67 each week to the average weekly rent over the year.

Housing convener, Cllr David McBride, said the rent rise was "needed to pay for the major improvements required to our properties".

He added: "Increasing rents is never an easy decision but I believe our tenants understand why we need to do this."


P1-3 pupils in Scotland to get free school meals

The Scottish government matched a plan being introduced in England

All Scottish P1-P3 pupils will get free school meals from January 2015, First Minister Alex Salmond has announced.

He said the move, affecting 165,000 youngsters, would boost health and was worth £330 a year for each child to families.

The move matches a plan being introduced in England, in September this year.

Opposition parties accused the Scottish government of playing catch-up, and taking credit for Westminster policies.

The first minister also told the Scottish Parliament that free childcare would be expanded to every two-year-old from a workless household in Scotland by August, affecting about 8,400 youngsters.

Mr Salmond said a further extension of the policy to reach 15,400 two-year-olds by August 2015 would see Scotland delivering 80 million hours of childcare to pre-school children, which he said was the greatest amount in the UK.

The free meals announcement came after UK ministers announced plans to offer pupils in the first three years of primary school in England a free cooked lunch.

Scottish ministers followed suit, partly by using extra money going to Scotland, through the Barnett Formula, as a consequence of the English plan.

Mr Salmond said the Scottish government announcements would bring improvements, but fell short of the childcare revolution which Scotland needed.

Ahead of the independence referendum on 18 September, the Scottish government said all three and four-year-olds, and vulnerable two-year-olds, would get 1,140 hours of childcare a year by the end of the first parliament, in the event of a "Yes" vote.

But opposition parties said SNP ministers had the devolved powers to realise their childcare plans now.

Mr Salmond told MSPs: "We need to create a tax welfare and childcare system that doesn't plunge children into poverty, as the UK government is doing, that puts us on a par with the best childcare systems in the world.

"That is why the future of Scotland's children is the future of Scotland, and why Scotland's future is an independent one."

Scottish Labour leader Johann Lamont said the free school meals plan was promised by the SNP in 2007, but never delivered, adding: "Now it has been reprised, because the UK government has acted on it and provided the money."

She said of Mr Salmond's childcare vision: "What he had was an opportunity to show his new-found commitment to childcare was more than a referendum ploy and start delivering for working families and children now."

Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Conservative leader, added: "A cynic might say that the SNP, having promised the earth and failed to deliver for years, has only now re-discovered its commitment to free school meals because the coalition government is delivering it.

"Today, we have a Westminster policy delivered with Westminster money, and the SNP playing catch-up but trying to claim the credit."

From Democracy Live: Alex Salmond announced his plan in parliament

However, the free school meal and childcare expansion plan, being funded at a total cost of £114m over two years, was welcomed by Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie, a long-time campaigner on the issue.

"The best educational investment we can make is in two-year-olds, because that can change their life," he said.

"If we're going to break the inter-generational cycle of poverty we can make efforts at later stages - we can do stuff about youth unemployment, we can try and improve life chances through schools - but the best impact we can make is in doing it at the age of two."

John Dickie, head of the Child Poverty Action Group, told BBC Scotland the school meals announcement was long overdue, adding: "The pressures on families and their ability to support their children are extraordinary, so providing a free school lunch to children in primary one to primary three is a very immediate, direct and well-evidenced way of supporting families at a time of increasing pressures."

Analysis

BBC Political editor, Scotland

Alex Salmond's critics suggested his enthusiasm for free school meals was driven by external factors: the availability of cash from the Treasury as a consequence of the previous announcement of a comparable scheme for England; a desire to cosset parents - and especially mothers - with an eye to the referendum.

The first minister insisted he was persuaded by the advantages of the policy: it encouraged uptake including among those who were nominally eligible at present; it improved the health and wellbeing of youngsters and thus their educational attainment

Give to the Needy (29 December 2013)


In the run up to Christmas Scotland's largest teaching union, the EIS, burst into fairy-lights by demanding that Scotland's 'share' of the extra public spending announced recently by the Coalition Government at Westminster - should be used to provide free school meals to all children in primaries 1, 2 and 3.

Now this is serious money we're talking about - around £60 million a year, I think, because Scotland will expect to get 10% or so of the extra public spending announced by the Chancellor, George Osborne, in his autumn statement.

Which is of course a free handout of taxpayers money to people who earn above average incomes - because school meals are already free to people on low incomes and to those claiming benefits.

So, the big beneficiaries of the new policy in England and Wales are the better off - since the less well off gain absolutely nothing from extending free school meals to children whose working parents are perfectly well able to meet the cost themselves.   

In fact the policy benefits people exactly like EIS members, as I can't believe that any of Scotland's teachers currently qualify for free school meals - as things stand.

But if I had a Magic Wand, I would target this £60 million on the less well off and probably not just those with children - since that leaves out a great many people who have never had children or whose kids have grown up.

To my mind, £60 million spent on those most in need, would do far more good than spreading £60 million across the whole population - or in this case just people with children of a certain age.

Now some people say that social benefits should be 'universal' or available to everyone on the same basis - free NHS prescriptions in Scotland are a good example although they are not really free since the cost is met out of general taxation.

Yet this approach does not apply to the cost of housing and I've written before about the £20 billion windfall that mortgage payers have enjoyed in recent times which has not been shared with people who rent their homes or living on a fixed income.    

So why not use the extra money in a more meaningful and imaginative way, for example, by holding down rents in the social housing sector?

Because this particular group within the Scottish population has not benefited from the artificially low interest rates that Scotland's mortgage payers have experienced in the past 5 years - which means that since 2008 mortgage payers have effectively been receiving special treatment as far as their standard of living is concerned.  

A much better and fairer use of £60 million, if you ask me, as such a policy would put a significant amount of money in the pockets of those at the bottom of the income ladder - instead of subsidising members of the teaching profession and EIS (Educational Institute  of Scotland). 

The statistics tell their own tale - Scotland's share of the great £20 billion mortgage windfall is around £2 billion which makes £60 million look like chickenfeed.

So the argument about universality, about everyone being treated the same way, does not stand up to serious scrutiny.  


£20 Billion Windfall (5 January 2012)




















I read something the other day - a claim by an organisation know as the 
Family and Parenting Institute (FPI) - of which I know very little.

Presumably it does what it says on the tin - seeks to speak up for families with children - because the FPI claims that average income of households with children will drop between 2011 and 2016.

By 4.2% would you believe or around £1,250 a year - depending on the exact income of the household in question.

But I say - so what - what does that have to do with the price of mince?

Because unless you factor in other things - such as how much some households have benefited from our artificially low mortgage rates - then the FPI's claim is completely meaningless.

I know some folks - some with others without children - who are saving hundreds of pounds every month necause of low interest rates - worth many thosuands of pounds a year. 

So spare me all this special pleading from special interest groups - as ever they are concerned with their own narrow agenda - and have no time for the big picture.

And the big picture means big savings - not for everyone - but for those paying mortage interest when rates dropped like a stone - and the bigger the mortage the bigger some people's  windfall.

Here's what I had to say on the issue in 2011 - no doubt the £20 billion figure now needs to be revised - in an upwards direction.

'All in this together' (September 15th 2011)

When people start urging us to take the view that 'we are all in this together' - it's time to stop and think.

Who's 'we'? - will do for a start.

The fact is that not everyone in the UK has been doing badly in these hard economic times - in fact people who are in a secure job and who have been paying a mortgage off - are doing very nicely thank you very much!

Compared to lots of other people anyway.

And just to demonstrate this point here's something I wrote back in March 2011 - arguing for a 'windfall tax' on the £20 billion that mortgage payers have saved in recent years - as a resul tof artificially low interest rates.

Now the people who are not part of this £20 billion windfall are - typically - the less well off and those on fixed incomes who rely on their savings - which produce little or no interest these days - to help pay the bills.

So why don't we hear any of this at the TUC conference - where delegates are good at telling everyone else what to do - but seldom come up with practical ideas for resolving problems.

A special windfall tax would recoup just some of the £20 billion that mortage payers have gained - simply through sheer luck - and it would seem to embrace the 'were all in this together approach'.

Which the present government and the trade unions both espouse when it suits their own argument, of course.

I imagine most union leaders are paying mortgages - because most live in private housing - and most will have benefited hugely out of the artifically low interest rates - we have witnessed in recent times.

Ironically the one union leader who would escape a special 'windfall tax' on mortgages - would be Bob Crow - who has been living in subsidised social housing in London for years.

But a windfall tax on mortgages would be redistribute income between the 'haves' and 'have nots'.

A windfall tax would be progressive because it would tax 'unearned income' - and would be likely to affect the majority of delegates this year's TUC.
In other words - a real life demonstration of solidarity - that we really are 'all in this together'.

Windfall Tax On Mortgages (March 4th 2011)

I read a remarkable statistic the other day - which made me stop and think.

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has apparently calculated that the UK's artifically low interest rates in recent years - have meant an unexpected windfall of £20 billion to the nation's mortgage payers.

Yet another example of the old saying - 'It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good'.

In this case £20 billion to the good - and the bigger the mortgage - the bigger the killing people have made - without any effort or risk.

While those who can't afford or no longer need a mortgage (e.g. low paid workers and pensioners) - have lost out big time, comparatively speaking.

So I have a suggestion for the government and our policy makers.

Bring in a special windfall tax on mortgages which claws back some of this £20 billion - and use the money to reintroduce the 10p tax rate to help the low paid.

Low paid workers will spend the money - because they don't have a lot to start with - and that will help to boost the economy.

Readers will remember that the 10p tax rate was abolished by the 'man with a moral compass' - Gordon Brown - in one of his worst decisions as Prime Minister.

But here's a chance to right a great wrong - help the lower paid - boost our flagging economy - and with money that has simply fallen into people's laps by sheer luck - nothing else.

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