MPs have called for reassurances over the future of the UK's free-to-use cash machines.

2.7 million people, or 5% of UK adults, were still almost entirely reliant on cash transactions but the use of Internet transactions, cards and contactless payments is reducing the need for physical cash.

LINK said its proposals earlier this month came because of the sharp fall in consumers' demand for cash.

It said there would still be an extensive network of free cash machines and that any reduction would likely be in areas where there are currently many them close together.

LINK also said that the number of cashpoints was at near-record levels, with more than 70,000 across the country, of which 55,000 are free to use.

The public are concerned that in rural areas vulnerable people reliant on cash would either will have to pay to use ATM’s, or could find ATM machines removed. 

Released 27 November 2017

The DWP has published a list of the proposed benefit rates and pension rates for 2018-19.

The publication lists the proposed benefit rates and pension rates for 2018-19 as set out in the written ministerial statement made by the Minister for Family Support, Housing and Child Maintenance, Caroline Dinenage, in the House of Commons on Monday 27 November 2017.

PLEASE download the rates below: 

All calls to universal credit helplines are now free, the government has said. 

There had been a row over the use of 0345 numbers which, while included in many free call packages, could cost up to 55p a minute.

The Prime Minister is being urged to ensure a phone line is open over all the festive period to assist benefit claimants. The Department of Work and Pensions pointed out a helpline in Scotland would also be open for use for claimants across the UK on 27 December, while also stressing the closures were usual practice for Bank Holidays.

Rescue package for Universal Credit  

The Budget included "the beginnings of a rescue package for Universal Credit" as the Chair put it, and the first questions to our experts will centre on whether Government has done enough to fix what the Committee has described as "fundamental flaws" with the policy, and huge problems in its implementation. 
 
The Committee's first report on Universal Credit had the single recommendation of cutting the initial wait from the standard six weeks to one month: in response, in the Budget the Government cut the first 7 days from the wait and proposed a package of other measures. 

Further areas of investigation

The Committee will also turn to its next areas for work on UC, which might include:

• the Committee's concern that the way UC is calculated penalises the self-employment
• how claiming UC affects children's access to free school meals
• how UC incentivises work, the stated central aim of the massive policy reform, through the work allowance and "taper rate" - the amount of benefit you lose for every pound you earn  

Witnesses

Wednesday 29 November, Wilson Room, Portcullis House
 
At 9:30am

• David Finch, Senior Economic Analyst, Resolution Foundation
• Andrew Hood, Senior Research Economist, Institute for Fiscal Studies
• Victoria Todd, Senior Technical Manager, Low Incomes Tax Reform Group
• Deven Ghelani, Director, Policy in Practice

The cost of the cheapest Christmas dinner will be nearly 20 percent higher this year due to Brexit-fueled inflation, points out a survey in Good Housekeeping magazine.

Lidl and Aldi are the only two supermarkets where the whole basket costs less than £26, with Aldi’s coming in second place with a total basket cost of £25.68. Iceland is in 3rd place with a total of £28.12.

Waitrose is the most expensive supermarket, costing £41.47.

How the top 10 supermarket baskets compare:

Image: Christmas is costing more this year due to BREXIT inflation.  

Work & Pensions Committee

Immediate:  Tuesday 28 November 2017

Committee Member presents Bill to catch ‘deadbeat’ parents ducking child maintenance 

In May of this year the Committee published a short report into child maintenance, concluding that the "tentative” Child Maintenance Service must up its game in child support collection. The issue of unscrupulous parents disguising their incomes to avoid paying their fair share of child support - through self-employment loopholes, creative accounting or fraudulent tax returns, among others - was a common theme throughout. The Committee recommended that DWP reinstate the mechanisms for parents to challenge child maintenance awards where the non-resident parent has assets or a lifestyle apparently inconsistent with their declared income. 

At the time of a “disappointing” response by Government to the report, Heidi Allen MP, the Committee Member who led on the child maintenance inquiry, said: "Much of what we found highlighted the challenges associated with new ways of working: the growth of self-employment and the potential it creates to hide true earnings. As child maintenance evasion often goes hand in hand with tax evasion, it seems inefficient and ineffective not to combine forces with HMRC. I am afraid I am not reassured by the four investigations so far conducted by the crack Financial Investigations Unit, with just two resulting in any action. This is not a difficult concept to grasp. A parent can see with their own eyes when their ex is living beyond their declared income or assets. Yet the Government, through the CMS, seems unprepared to act on that.”

Now Ms Allen has tabled a 10 Minute Rule Bill for first reading in the Commons today, Tuesday 28 November 2017. The Bill aims to “equalise the assessment and enforcement of child maintenance arrangements of children of self-employed parents with that of children of other employed parents”, to get around at some one of the loopholes that allow self-employed parents to disguise the means they have available to financially support their non-resident children

Heidi Allen MP said: “When parents split up, the child maintenance service can help parents work out a fair payment schedule for the child. When the split is amicable and sensible, this system works well. But if the paying parent wants to avoid paying, they can do so all too easily and all too often, by hiding behind self-employed status. 

“By hiding their income, not only are they denying their child the financial support they deserve, they are also defrauding HMRC and often forcing the parent with care onto benefits. 

“This is a double hit to the tax payer. The country loses out on tax and instead pays out to support the receiving parent. The purpose of this Bill is to ensure the statutory child maintenance system works for as many families as possible, by closing this loophole.”

Britain is in a “spiral of ever-growing division” with a stark postcode lottery in social mobility, according to a damning report by the Social Mobility Commission today. The report uncovers a striking geographical divide with London and its surrounding areas pulling away from the rest of the country, while many other parts of the country are being left behind.

A stark social mobility postcode lottery exists in Britain today where the chances of someone from a disadvantaged background succeeding in life is bound to where they live, the Social Mobility Commission’s ‘State of the nation’ report, published today (Tuesday 28 November) has found.

The report uncovers a striking geographical divide with London and its surrounding areas pulling away from the rest of the country, while many other parts of the country are being left behind economically and hollowed out socially.

It warns that Britain is in the grip of a self-reinforcing spiral of ever-growing division and calls on government to increase its proportion of spending on those parts of the country that most need it. Estimates suggest that the North is £6 billion a year underfunded compared to London.

At the heart of the report is the Social Mobility Index, which ranks all 324 local authorities in England in terms of their social mobility prospects for someone from a disadvantaged background. It uses a range of 16 indicators for every major life stage, from early years through to working lives, to map the nation’s social mobility hotspots and coldspots. A similar, but not comparable, approach has been taken for Scotland and Wales.

The report debunks the assumption that a simple north-south divide exists. Instead, it suggests there is a postcode lottery with hotspots and coldspots found in almost every part of the country. London dominates the hotspots, while the East and West Midlands are the worst performing regions. The best performing local authority area is Westminster and the worst performing area is West Somerset.

The index finds that the worst performing areas for social mobility are no longer inner-city areas, but remote rural and coastal areas, and former industrial areas, especially in the Midlands. Young people from disadvantaged backgrounds living in these areas face far higher barriers than young people growing up in cities and their surrounding areas - and in their working lives, face lower rates of pay; fewer top jobs; and travelling to work times of nearly four times more than that of urban residents.

There is also no direct correlation between the affluence of an area and its ability to sustain high levels of social mobility. While richer areas tend to outperform deprived areas in the index, a number of places buck the trend. Some of the most deprived areas in England are hotspots, including most London boroughs - such as Tower Hamlets, Hackney and Newham. Conversely, some affluent areas - such as West Berkshire, Cotswold and Crawley - are amongst the worst for offering good education, employment opportunities and affordable housing to their more disadvantaged residents.

The report highlights that local policies adopted by local authorities and employers can influence outcomes for disadvantaged residents. But it also warns that there is a mind-blowing inconsistency of practice in how to improve social mobility outcomes, with little pooling of experience or evidence-based strategies.

The Rt Hon Alan Milburn, chair of the Social Mobility Commission, said:

The country seems to be in the grip of a self-reinforcing spiral of ever-growing division. That takes a spatial form, not just a social one. There is a stark social mobility lottery in Britain today.

London and its hinterland are increasingly looking like a different country from the rest of Britain. It is moving ahead as are many of our country’s great cities. But too many rural and coastal areas and the towns of Britain’s old industrial heartlands are being left behind economically and hollowed out socially.

Tinkering around the edges will not do the trick. The analysis in this report substantiates the sense of political alienation and social resentment that so many parts of Britain feel. A new level of effort is needed to tackle the phenomenon of left behind Britain. Overcoming the divisions that exist in Britain requires far more ambition and far bigger scale. A less divided Britain will require a more redistributive approach to spreading education, employment and housing prospects across our country.

Image: Social mobility

Key findings include:

• London accounts for nearly two-thirds of all social mobility hotspots
• The Midlands is the worst region of the country for social mobility for those from disadvantaged backgrounds - half of the local authority areas in the East Midlands and more than a third in the West Midlands are social mobility coldspots
• Some of the worst performing areas such as Weymouth and Portland, and Allerdale, are rural, not urban
• Coastal and older industrial towns - places such as Scarborough, Hastings, Derby and Nottingham - are becoming entrenched social mobility coldspots
• Some of the richest places in England, such as West Berkshire, Cotswold and Crawley, deliver worse outcomes for their disadvantaged children than places that are much poorer such as Sunderland and Tower Hamlets
• Apart from London, English cities are punching below their weight on social mobility outcomes. No other city makes it into the top 20%
• Early years - disadvantaged children are 14 percentage points less likely to be school ready at age 5 in coldspots than in hotspots: in 94 areas, under half of disadvantaged children reach a good level of development at age 5
• Schools - 51% of London children on free school meals achieve A* to C in English and maths GCSE compared to an average of 36% of children on free school meals in all other English regions: in the best place (Westminster), 63% get good English and maths GCSEs whereas in the worst (Isle of Wight), only 27% do
• A critical factor in the performance of top local authorities is the number and quality of teachers available. A secondary teacher in the most deprived area is 70% more likely to leave
• Schools in rural and coastal areas are isolated and lack partnerships with other schools. In Lancashire and West Yorkshire only 19% of all schools are either in a multi-academy trust or an equivalent trust compared to 35% in north east London and the East of England
• Youth – In Kensington and Chelsea, 50% of disadvantaged young people make it to university, whereas in Hastings, Barnsley and Eastbourne, the university participation rate for this group falls to just 10%
• One quarter of young people are NEET (not in education, employment or training) in the worst local authority area a year after GCSEs (South Ribble), compared to 1% in North Hertfordshire
• Working lives - In 71, largely rural areas, more than 30% of people earn below the voluntary living wage: average wages in the worst performing area, West Somerset, are £312 a week, less than half of the best performing areas of London such as Wandsworth, Richmond upon Thames and Westminster
• In Bolsover, just 17% of residents are in jobs that are professional and managerial positions, compared to 51% in Oxford
• City residents face barriers in their working lives with high housing costs and high rates of low paid work compared to commuter belt residents who benefit from higher rates of the top jobs and with more families owning their homes
• In Blaby, Rochford and Harborough, 80% of residents own their homes whereas in Tower Hamlets it is just 18%

Key recommendations:

• Every local authority should develop an integrated strategy for improving disadvantaged children’s outcomes and Pupil Premium funds should be invested in evidence-based practice
• Local authorities should support collaboration between isolated schools, subsidise transport for disadvantaged young people in isolated areas and encourage Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEP) to follow the North East LEP’s approach to improving careers support for young people
• Local authorities should all become accredited Living Wage employers and encourage others in their communities to do likewise
• Central government should launch a fund to enable schools in rural and coastal areas to partner with other schools to boost attainment
• Regional School Commissioners should be given responsibility to work with universities, schools and Teach First to ensure that there is a good supply of teachers in all parts of their regions
• The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy should match the Department for Education’s £72 million for the opportunity areas to ensure there is a collaborative effort across local education systems and labour markets
• Central government should rebalance the national transport budget to deliver a more equal share of investment per person and contribute towards a more regionally balanced economy

Image: Lack of social mobility breeds frustration especially with unemployed ethnic minorities. 

Inflation is the rate at which the cost of goods and services rises year-on-year. In order to be able to buy the same amount of goods, your salary must increase by at least the same level as inflation.

Where the inflation rate outstrips wage increases, you lose money in real terms. You need to spend a higher proportion of your wages to buy the same goods, so your living costs increase.

Where your wage grows at a higher rate than inflation, you have gained money in real terms. You can buy the same goods for a lower proportion of your wages, effectively enjoying a higher standard of living.

Benefits are falling relatively as they have been frozen for four years. Someone on JSA with rent of say £448.63 giving a total income of £765.83 a month (annual income £9189.96) would need an extra (£257.00) just to stand still.

How does your salary increase compare with the change in inflation?

Please use this ONS calculator to find out:

The Christmas Bonus will be paid to over 1.2 million social welfare recipients this week (commencing Monday 27th November), with payments totalling €219 million being made to pensioners, people with disabilities, carers, lone parents, long-term unemployed people and many other recipients.

The Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection welcomed the payment of the Bonus – paid at the rate of 85% of a person’s normal weekly payment – to over 630,000 pensioners and 580,000 other social welfare recipients. 

The majority of customers will receive the Bonus this week.

“I am very pleased that the Christmas Bonus is being paid again this year,” Minister Doherty said.  “Not only is it a welcome additional support for social welfare customers in the run-up to Christmas – in many cases, the money is spent locally and provides a real boost for local economies.”

ABC Note: Regina Doherty is an Irish Fine Gael politician who has served as Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection since June 2017.

Image: Regina Doherty, Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection. 

ABC Note: These payment boost the local economy and help local traders sustain their businesses and promote trade.  

Payment by Family Type

Watch this New Zealand cop recruitment video that’s gone viral.

In a bid to attract new and diverse officers, New Zealand Police have released an entertaining recruitment video on Facebook. And it seems to be working. Will we see the police at the Oscars? Perhaps not quite yet, but their video is attracting worldwide attention. 

Image: The New Zeaalnd Police.

You could join the New Zealand Police. You might need an acadamy award the way it's looking.