Series: CASE Studies on Poverty, Place and Policy

 

Poverty is still a real issue within Britain today and this essential series provides evidence-based insights into how communities and families are dealing with it.

Published in conjunction with the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion (CASE) at the London School of Economics, this series draws together fresh research and sheds important light on the impact of anti-poverty policy, focusing on the individual and social factors that promote regeneration, recovery and renewal.

CASE Studies on Poverty, Place and Policy

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  • Poverty and Inequality x
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This chapter looks at public attitudes to inequality, poverty, and redistribution, using quantitative and qualitative sources to ask whether public opinion has become more or less progressive since 1997 and whether New Labour’s attempts to redefine the party have influenced the way people think about these issues. There is a growing body of opinion that more radical measures will be needed to make further progress in reducing poverty and that this in turn will require much stronger public support. This chapter attempts to pull together the evidence on attitudes to social justice and the beliefs and values that underpin them.

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When New Labour came to power in 1997, there was great enthusiasm within government for tackling deprivation, particularly area concentrations of problems. There were several important reasons. First, the growth of inequality during Margaret Thatcher’s years had not been reversed. Second, social housing had become far poorer as a result of targeting access more systematically at the most deprived and vulnerable households. Third, levels of worklessness, benefit dependency, and lone parenthood had all risen steeply and became more concentrated in the poorest areas, particularly in large council estates. This chapter considers the government’s attempts to regenerate poor neighbourhoods and inner cities, drawing on extensive work carried out by CASE researchers in 12 low-income areas across much of New Labour’s period in office.

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With older people in mind, this chapter assesses New Labour’s progress towards its twin goals of tackling poverty and social exclusion among today’s pensioners and ensuring that more of tomorrow’s pensioners retire on a decent income. In 1999, New Labour set out its blueprint in Opportunity for All. This chapter discusses New Labour’s policy agenda in the area of pensions and then assesses the extent to which it has been successful in improving the living standards of the poorest pensioners, now and in the future. It starts by considering the background and inheritance faced by New Labour, including the policy legacy and demographic context that prompted and helped to shape the government’s pension reforms.

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This chapter takes a wider cross-national perspective, asking whether a decade of Labour government has improved the UK’s international standing on indicators of poverty, inequality, and child well being. Despite various efforts, in 2007, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) published a report that placed the UK bottom of a child well being league. The first half of the chapter is dedicated to the material well-being domain. The second half examines relative progress in education, risks and behaviours, peer relationships, and subjective well being. At times, discussion is restricted to European Union (EU) member states because of the data available, but, where possible, information for other OECD countries is included.

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This chapter sets the scene for the rest of the book by examining the evidence on income poverty and income inequality. The assessment includes the results of micro-simulation, which allows one to separate the effects of tax-benefit policy from the effects of demographic and labour-market changes, addressing the tricky question of the counterfactual: what would have happened in the absence of policy changes? The chapter also looks at the distributional impact of public expenditure on benefits in kind such as health and education. Inequality measures generally exclude benefits in kind, but as public spending tends to be higher on poorer households, increases in spending can make a significant difference to the state’s overall redistributive impact.

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This chapter looks at the government’s efforts to improve living standards and opportunities for the poorest children. It assesses progress towards the child-poverty targets as well as the impact of early-years policies, intended to stop a class divide in child development from being established long before children reach school. Labour’s agenda for tackling poverty and disadvantage among children was serious and wide ranging, but with the benefit of hindsight, it is clear that its policies did not match the scale of the challenge. The strategy began well and ambitiously, and by 2004 there were positive signs that it was succeeding in improving the daily reality and future prospects of poor children. However, it was noted in 2005 that this success should be considered just a start.

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Poverty, inequality and policy since 1997

When New Labour came to power in 1997, its leaders asked for it to be judged after ten years on its success in making Britain ‘a more equal society’. As it approaches the end of an unprecedented third term in office, this book asks whether Britain has indeed moved in that direction.

The highly successful earlier volume “A more equal society?” was described by Polly Toynbee as “the LSE’s mighty judgement on inequality”. Now this second volume by the same team of authors provides an independent assessment of the success or otherwise of New Labour’s policies over a longer period. It provides:

· consideration by a range of expert authors of a broad set of indicators and policy areas affecting poverty, inequality and social exclusion;

· analysis of developments up to the third term on areas including income inequality, education, employment, health inequalities, neighbourhoods, minority ethnic groups, children and older people;

· an assessment of outcomes a decade on, asking whether policies stood up to the challenges, and whether successful strategies have been sustained or have run out of steam; chapters on migration, social attitudes, the devolved administrations, the new Equality and Human Rights Commission, and future pressures.

The book is essential reading for academic and student audiences with an interest in contemporary social policy, as well as for all those seeking an objective account of Labour’s achievements in power.

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When New Labour came to power in 1997, its leaders asked for it to be judged after ten years on its success in making Britain ‘a more equal society’. This book asks whether Britain did indeed move in that direction by the time New Labour had achieved a third term in office. The earlier volume A more equal society? was described by Polly Toynbee as ‘the LSE’s mighty judgement on inequality’. This second volume by the same team of authors provides an independent assessment of the success or otherwise of New Labour’s policies over a longer period. It provides: a consideration by a range of expert authors of a broad set of indicators and policy areas affecting poverty, inequality, and social exclusion; analysis of developments up to the third term on areas including income inequality, education, employment, health inequalities, neighbourhoods, minority ethnic groups, children, and older people; an assessment of outcomes a decade on, asking whether policies stood up to the challenges, and whether successful strategies have been sustained or have run out of steam; and chapters on migration, social attitudes, the devolved administrations, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), and future pressures.

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This chapter explores the gap between what families need and how city structures support their inhabitants. It notes that in theory at least, city governments try to equalise conditions on the grounds of fairness and cohesion. It observes that low-income families in return provide many essential services to the city, as restaurant workers, drivers, school assistants, IT and childcare workers, cleaners, security assistants, and carers of every kind, all vital functions within the city. It explains that the four families in this chapter argue the overriding case for community-level involvement to shape interventions more closely to family survival. It further explains that external interventions are often insensitive to community networks and the informal supports they provide, whereas community-level activity values the normally uncounted benefits of families in city neighbourhoods.

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Bringing up children in disadvantaged neighbourhoods
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Seen through the eyes of parents, mainly mothers, “City survivors” tells the eye-opening story of what it is like to bring up children in troubled city neighbourhoods. The book provides a unique insider view on the impact of neighbourhood conditions on family life and explores the prospects for families from the point of view of equality, integration, schools, work, community, regeneration and public services.

“City Survivors” is based on yearly visits over seven years to two hundred families living in four highly disadvantaged city neighbourhoods, two in East London and two in Northern inner and outer city areas. Twenty four families, six from each area, explain over time from the inside, how neighbourhoods in and of themselves directly affect family survival. These twenty four stories convey powerful messages from parents about the problems they want tackled, and the things that would help them. The main themes explored in the book are neighbourhood, community, family, parenting, incomes and locals, the need for civic intervention.

The book offers original and in-depth, qualitative evidence in a readable and accessible form that will be invaluable to policy-makers, practitioners, university students, academics and general readers interested in the future of families in cities.

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