Five million brits that are on benefits and do not work are set to get a pay rise from Rachel Reeves with taxpayers footing the bill for those on benefits street.
At the Autumn Budget it is expected that the Chancellor could increase welfare spending by a staggering £15 billion, according to analysis from the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ).
The CSJ revealed there are five million people that have no requirement to find a job and are claiming benefits. There is one million on Employment and Support Allowance and four million people claiming Universal Credit (UC).
Since before the pandemic in 2020, this has risen from 2.7 million and also includes around 1.5 million children living at home with their parents who are on benefits as they are not working.
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Conservative MP Sir Iain Duncan Smith told The Sun newspaper that it is clear under this government “welfare is now in crisis.”
Sir Duncan said that “before the pandemic, my welfare reforms brought workless households down to a record low” this “meant hundreds of thousands more children grew up seeing a parent go out to work each day, transforming life chances forever”.
The former Welfare Secretary added, “soaring sickness benefits and the relaxation of benefit rules during lockdown, never to be turned back on, are costing the taxpayer billions and worse still, wasting the potential of millions of people”.
Joe Shalam, the CSJ policy director, said, “Everyone can see the system is broken.
“With millions neither required nor helped into work and collapsing job starts among young people, we risk losing a generation.”
Reeves is looking to rake in around £20 billion against the backdrop of a slower labour market to which she created with last years Autumn Budget which saw the government raise employers’ national insurance and increase the minimum wage, which was one reason as to why SMEs started to slowdown in their hiring along with economic uncertainty.
The Department for Work and Pensions said: “The number of Universal Credit claimants has been increased as we have invited tens of thousands of people each month to move from the legacy benefits system to a modernised system.
“We’ve redeployed 1,000 Jobcentre staff to specifically support sick of disabled people into work, as well as delivered our Connect to Work programme which will support hundreds of thousands of sick or disabled people back to work.”
