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For further comment or to arrange an interview please get in touch with Max Anderson: max@brightblue.org.uk or 07850 684474.

Commenting on the Spring Budget 2023, Ryan Shorthouse, Chief Executive of Bright Blue, said:

“This was steady stuff from the Chancellor, designed to reassure the markets and the public of Conservative economic competence after the turmoil of 2022. 

“We’re now forecast to avoid a technical recession this year, but economic growth and living standards remain dampened for the foreseeable future. Tax and public debt levels are expected to stay historically high throughout the decade. This is no roaring twenties.

“But some brightness is beginning to show. Inflation will fall rapidly by the end of the year. The Energy Price Guarantee will be extended until the Summer, after which bills will drop considerably.

“This country really does need to go for growth. Improving productivity and expanding labour market participation have been rightly identified as two of the most essential ingredients for garnering growth. The Budget today makes solid steps towards both, adopting several Bright Blue policies.

“Full expensing of capital investment against Corporation Tax, as a successor to the Super Deduction, should catalyse productivity. Increasing childcare subsidies and conditionality in the benefits regime might have a modest impact on employment rates. 

“The new childcare policies were surprisingly and positively bold. Current or prospective parents up and down the country will be relieved. But the phased extension of the free entitlement to children under the age of 3 could have been accelerated. 

“You get an expanded workforce from three main sources: parental, older age and migrant employment. The Government is doing too little to keep over 50s economically active. Increasing the annual allowance for tax-free pensions contributions, and abolishing the tax-free pensions lifetime allowance, are deeply regressive and wasteful policies, and could well accelerate retirement for affluent earners who can reach savings goals quicker. Better to raise the age at which people can first access both their state and private pension.”

The 2023 Spring Budget adopted 5 Bright Blue policies:

• Upfront payment of the childcare element of Universal Credit.
• Uprated maximum amounts claimable under childcare element of Universal Credit.
• Extended Early Years Free Entitlement to children under the age of three.
• Relaxed staff-to-child ratios in formal childcare settings.
• Full expensing of capital investment in new plants, machinery and industrial buildings against Corporation Tax.

Childcare

• Upfront and uprated payment of the childcare element of Universal Credit.
• Extended Early Years Free Entitlement to children under the age of three.
• Relaxed staff-to-child ratios in formal childcare settings.
• A sign-up bonus for new childminders of at least £600.
• Increased funding for schools and local authorities for wraparound care so all school-age parents can drop their children off between 8am and 6pm.
• Increased funding paid to nurseries providing the existing Early Years Free Entitlement.

Eve Redmond, Research Assistant at Bright Blue, commented:

“The exorbitant costs of childcare have contributed to Britain’s waning workforce. The Chancellor’s extension of free childcare hours is therefore a very welcome one.

“The decision to pay the childcare element of UC upfront and at an increased rate, as well as extending the Early Years Free Entitlement, will allow parents – particularly single parents – to bridge the gap between being a parent and a worker. 

“Yet, more still needs to be done to not only attract new people to the childcare profession, but to ensure they are retained and suitably rewarded.”

Taxation

• Raised the headline rate of Corporation tax to 25%. 
• Created 12 new Investment Zones.
• Full expensing of capital investment in new plants, machinery and industrial buildings against Corporation Tax.
• Extended tax credits for SME companies investing over 40% into R&D.

Sam Robinson, Senior Research Fellow at Bright Blue, commented:

“Sunak has balanced fiscal responsibility – by raising the rate of Corporation Tax – with a radical pro-growth boost in the form of full expensing, which, for the next three years, will allow businesses to pursue growth without being punitively taxed on their investments. 

“After a decade of ineffectual yo-yoing on Corporation Tax rates, full expensing is a big improvement to the fundamental design of the UK’s business taxes. But to give businesses certainty for the long term and avoid another tax cliff-edge, full expensing should be made permanent.

“The Chancellor’s prime focus should be on small businesses, where support should be prioritised. The best way of helping small businesses is by cutting Employers’ National Insurance, which would reduce their main overhead – staffing costs.”

Employment 

• Expanded and improved the Midlife MOT Strategy.
• Introduced Returneeships scheme.
• Increased the pensions Annual Allowance from £40,000 to £60,000.
• Abolished pensions Lifetime Allowance Charge.
• Introduced a DWP White Paper on disability benefits reform.
• Introduced a pilot for the WorkWell Partnerships Programme.
• Increased funding for Work Coaches to help those who are long-term sick and disabled into work.
• Extended Help To Save scheme by 18 months.

Sam Robinson, Senior Research Fellow at Bright Blue, commented:

“Scrapping the pensions lifetime allowance may help NHS retention, but it is a regressive giveaway for a small number of the wealthiest earners in society. This is money that could have had more impact elsewhere. 

“There are other ways pension policy can boost the labour market participation of older workers. Raising the age at which you can access your private and state pensions would incentivise a much broader group of people to stay in work and come with a smaller price tag.

“While the extension of the Help To Save scheme is welcome, there was comparatively little on offer in this Budget to help those on low incomes and those in self-employment save adequately for retirement. This should be a more urgent priority, as low saving among these groups is a ticking social and economic time bomb that needs to be addressed sooner rather than later.”

Energy

• Extended the £2,500 Energy Price Guarantee until June 2023.
• Extended the Climate Change Agreement scheme for two years to allow eligible businesses £600 million of tax relief on energy efficiency measures.
• Reclassified nuclear energy to be included in the green taxonomy, subject to consultation.
• Launched the Great British Nuclear programme.

Bartek Staniszewski, Researcher at Bright Blue, commented: 

“Continuing to support households with energy bills is sound, as households continue to face elevated bills. But subsidising energy demand in the short term also casts light on whether the Government is doing enough to increase energy efficiency in the longer term. While this extension to the Energy Price Guarantee means that almost £30 billion will be spent now, only £13 billion is being spent on improving energy efficiency over the next two parliaments, even with the extra tax relief on energy efficiency measures announced today.”

Thomas Nurcombe, Research Assistant at Bright Blue, commented:

“Achieving net zero will not be cheap; it requires significant public and private investment. Moreover, we need sources of energy that are not at the mercy of geopolitical and geoeconomic insecurity. Redefining nuclear energy as ‘environmentally sustainable’ in the green taxonomy will provide the investment incentives to drive capital in the direction of British nuclear power.

“But promises on nuclear energy have been floated before. It is imperative that the Chancellor sticks to his word.”

Housing

• Introduce a Veteran Capital Housing Fund to provide £20 millions’ worth of extra housing for veterans.
• Funding to support clearer routes for housing developers to deliver ‘nutrient neutral’ sites to meet planning obligations.

Bartek Staniszewski, Researcher at Bright Blue, commented:

“The Budget’s relative silence on housing is sorely disappointing. Despite the housing crisis being one of this country’s most pressing challenges, housing scarcely features in the Budget: the Veteran Capital Housing Fund can at most provide a few hundred homes, while funding for nutrient mitigation schemes to facilitate planning is welcome, but will be of limited impact. 

“Although fiscal restraint is understandable, greater action on housing need not take the form of lavish expenditure. Even small spending commitments can have a major impact; for example, giving more money to planning departments for the development of a greater number of local and neighbourhood development orders.”

[Image: Gov.uk]

Bright Blue, the independent think tank for liberal conservatism, has today published a new report, Greater and greener homes: more homes, ready for net zero, offering new policy recommendations to both build more homes and deliver net zero.

The report outlines and examines the key changes in government policy since 2010 to build more homes and reduce carbon emissions from new homes.

The report concludes that our complex, discretionary planning system makes it harder to create dense, sustainable settlements, leading to new homes and urban sprawl that are land-hungry, car-dependent and politically unpopular. Meanwhile, the UK continues to build new homes that are emissions-intensive and that will require costly retrofitting in the future.

The report argues that housing policy reform should be guided by five key principles:

1. Environmental regulations should not prevent homes being built affordably or more quickly and efficiently.
2. New development should be consistent with net zero and biodiversity governmental targets.
3. The lifestyles that people lead in new homes are as important for net zero as the fabric of the home.
4. Planning policy and building standards should incentivise communities to accept new homes in their neighbourhoods.
5. Planning reform should ensure that communities can shape development in their area to facilitate local democracy.

The recommendations are grouped into two core policy objectives. First, to speed up the delivery of new homes where development is most sustainable, such as near workplaces, shops, and sustainable transport links. Second, to ensure new homes are compliant with reaching net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

James Cullimore, author of the report, commented:

“Home ownership has fallen to its lowest level in four decades and the homes we do build are not compliant with our climate change targets. Creating and funding a programme of urban Neighbourhood Development Orders would secure local consent for new homes close to offices, shops and public transport in our towns and suburbs. Higher environmental standards in future building regulations are also needed to ensure all new homes are warm, cheap to run and able to consume more secure, homegrown renewable electricity. 

“With the Government due to update planning policies and building regulations for net zero, now is the opportunity to unlock both greater and greener housing.”

Ryan Shorthouse, Chief Executive of Bright Blue, commented:

“The UK is facing both a housing and climate crisis. We are not building enough homes. And the houses we do build are not green enough to support this country’s transition to a net-zero economy. Bolder public policy is needed to support both greater and greener homes.”

John Penrose, MP for Weston-Super-Mare, commented: 

“Creating denser, beautiful urban neighbourhoods won’t just cut our carbon footprints by using brownfield land and letting more of us bus, bike or walk to  shops and offices. It will increase the number of homes that are built and the speed of building too, so housing becomes more affordable whether people want to rent or to buy. A simple, low-risk process to get upfront planning permission will cut costs, risks and red tape, particularly for smaller local builders and developers, to unlock housing delivery.”

Jerome Mayhew MP, Member of the Environmental Audit Select Committee, commented: 

“I welcome this report on greater and greener homes. My Carbon Emissions (Buildings) Bill would regulate the embodied carbon in building materials and construction, which is a bigger driver of climate change than aviation and shipping combined. Building homes with a smaller carbon footprint is an essential part of the mix as we work towards net zero”

Cllr Jane MacBean, Buckinghamshire Councillor and Chesham Town Councillor, commented: 

“In Chesham, we know all too well the public concern that new development can bring. To build greater and greener homes, we are keen to work with the community to build consensus around the ‘gentle densification’ of our town. That’s why Chesham Town Council is working to create new Neighbourhood Development Orders, shaped and approved by residents, to deliver new homes which meet local design preferences and contribute to a vibrant community and thriving high street and local economy, whilst ensuring protection of our precious green spaces. I welcome the proposal in this report to support more civil parishes and neighbourhood forums to bring forward the new homes that their areas need.”

This report recommends ten new original policies to boost greater and greener homes:

Recommendation one: Government should create and fund a Neighborhood Development Order (NDO) Pathfinder Programme to bring forward homes in urban neighbourhoods

Densification of existing settlements is the most environmentally sustainable way of increasing housing supply. To ensure it can make a greater contribution toward meeting housing targets, we need to remove the need for house builders to submit a planning application where development can be shown to have local support. 

NDOs give parishes and neighbourhood groups a chance to bring forward the development they want to see in their areas for approval, rather than waiting for developers to come forward with their own proposals. NDOs are able to set clear rules on the type, design and density of homes, and are approved by residents in a referendum.

However, the current funding to deliver NDOs is limited, so achieving good design at a meaningful scale, such as a whole neighbourhood or area in a town, is challenging. In addition, the process for permitting infill and brownfield redevelopment through an NDO remains ambiguous. Perhaps above all, they are simply little known. 

To make NDOs an established solution to community-led intensification, the Government needs to kickstart a programme of NDO creation in towns and suburbs which already have a local design code in place. These codes specify the local design preferences and other requirements which residents want new homes to meet. This will allow the neighbourhood planning group to move swiftly to public consultation. 

Recommendation two: To ensure there are sufficient installers for the introduction of the Future Homes Standard in 2025, the Government must ensure heat pump training providers can access future waves of Skills Bootcamps, and supply appropriate governmental financial support to those undertaking them

The Government expects heat pumps to be the primary low-carbon heating solution for new homes and intends for new builds to help develop the supply chain for heat pumps. However, without a skills base, new homes could be delayed when the Future Homes Standard is introduced in 2025. Furthermore, substandard installations could undermine consumer confidence in the technology.

Training as a heat engineer takes at least three years so readying for the Future Homes Standard in 2025 will predominantly require the retraining of existing heating engineers and plumbers. To reach the 12,400 heat pump installers required by 2025 according to the Heat Pump Association, we need to train almost 10,000 more. The industry is predominantly made up of sole traders who do not have the training budgets of large companies to prepare themselves. As such, there is a need for government support to upskill the workforce ahead of the Future Homes Standard.

Currently, the Heat Decarbonisation Skills Training competition does not provide long-term funding or sufficient training opportunities to build the installer base for the Future Homes Standard, and the Skills Bootcamps have not been well-tailored for heat pump installation courses. 

Therefore, to ensure there is consistent provision of free heat pump installation training for heating engineers during the remainder of this parliament, the Government should ensure future waves of Skills Bootcamps can be accessed by heat pump training providers.

To further incentivise heating engineers to upskill while the demand for heat pumps remains relatively low, the Government should consider an additional payment to compensate sole traders for their time.

Recommendation three: The new National Development Management Policies (NDMP) should include a hierarchy of options to set higher environmental standards for more ambitious local authorities

To protect local democracy in local authorities, they should be able to continue to set more ambitious planning requirements than the required national minimum on issues such as reducing carbon emissions and providing green infrastructure in developments.

To provide stronger clarification where policies included in the new National Development Management Policies (NDMPs) or building regulations conflict with local policies on the environment, central government should set a hierarchy of more ambitious standards that local authorities can choose to adopt. This would prevent a plethora of different requirements from springing up across the country while respecting the wishes of communities to insist on more sustainable development in their area. 

Recommendation four: Include targets for energy use intensity (EUI) and thermal energy demand limit (TED) for all new homes in the Future Homes Standard from 2025 onwards.

Recommendation five: Introduce through the Future Homes Standard a new testing requirement for all new homes and reform Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) so they test in-use energy performance.

Recommendation six: Ensure the energy performance targets in building regulations metrics for new homes incentivise energy storage and solar PV in the Future Homes Standard from 2025.

Recommendation seven: Include appropriate reporting requirements for whole-life carbon emissions of new homes by developers in the Future Homes Standard from 2025 onwards.

Recommendation eight: Strengthen minimum water efficiency standards in the Future Homes Standard.

Recommendation nine: Expand green infrastructure requirements in the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).

Recommendation ten: Set a requirement in the National Planning Framework (NPPF) for Local Planning Authorities (LPAs) to create Local Development Orders (LDOs) for small- and medium-sized sites to meet a proportion of their housing requirement.

Charlie Rowley, former Special Advisor to Michael Gove at Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, commented:

“I welcome the recommendations in this report to bring forward greater and greener homes. These policies would give communities a stronger role in shaping development their area, reduce planning risk for local house builders, and ensure new homes are consistent with our net zero target. These are key government objectives for the planning system.”

Will Arnold​, Head of Climate Action at The Institution of Structural Engineers, commented: 

“The UK construction industry has all the tools necessary to enable embodied carbon reporting legislation to be introduced this year. As an unregulated 50 million tonnes of yearly emissions, this is an incredible opportunity for the government to show targeted intervention towards decreasing the UK’s carbon footprint.”

Sam Hall, Director of Conservative Environment Network, commented

“This report shows that our climate and biodiversity goals do not need to conflict with housing affordability or delivery. By offering developers greater certainty over the planning process, in return for requiring them to be built to higher environmental standards, these core government priorities can be achieved together. Greener homes will also boost housing supply, by strengthening local support for development, while saving households and Treasury money in the long run.”

Stuart Colville, Director of Policy at Water UK, commented:

“Water efficient homes are greater and greener. To increase our resilience to climate change, leave more water in rivers, and save money on energy bills we should be building homes with a strong minimum water efficiency standard. It is better to build it right first time, and to build it with the future in mind.

“This report shows that with the right policy changes, we can deliver the new homes needed while also protecting the environment and saving people money. Bright Blue’s call to strengthen minimum water efficiency standards is timely and it is critical that their recommendations are taken on board.” 

Philip Box, Policy Advisor at UK Green Building Council, commented: 

“This report represents a strong set of recommendations for how we can build more homes and simultaneously meet our environmental goals. The two go hand-in-hand. Only by building more sustainably, can we truly address the housing and environmental crises we face. Business appetite for these ambitious policies – and the associated green growth – is there; and we hope the Government fully seizes on the opportunities.”

Juliet Phillips, Senior Policy Advisor at E3G and Electrify Heat, commented: 

“Getting on track for net zero homes requires serious attention to scaling up the supply chain, which has been decimated by recent boom-bust policy making on energy efficiency. This requires long-term policy and funding certainty, as well as a laser focus on training and skills. Bright Blue’s new report rightly draws attention to this important issue. We hope to see the government scale up its response to this challenge, taking an Olympics-style approach to training up an army of heat pump and insulation installers.”

Owen Edwards, Coalition Coordinator, Better Planning Coalition, commented: 

“Getting to a net-zero housing and planning system is one of the most important policy challenges of the decade ahead.  James has developed a really innovative suite of recommendations which chart that course. This report is an important addition to the discussion and offers solutions to tackling many of the most difficult issues faced by our industry today.”

ENDS

Bright Blue, the independent think tank for liberal conservatism, has today released a new report, entitled Building up: the future of social security, which examines the adequacy, accessibility and fairness of the social security system for working-aged adults before, during and at the end of the pandemic.

The report uses both subjective and objective measures to evaluate the adequacy, accessibility and fairness of the social security system for working-aged adults, drawing on original data analysis, public polling and focus groups. It concludes with three new policies that will strengthen the social security system in the future.

It is the final report of a multi-year project which was guided by a high-profile, cross-party, cross-sector commission of leading decision makers and thought leaders, including Stephen Crabb MP, Shaun Bailey MP, Baroness Lister, James Johnson, and more.

Anvar Sarygulov, Head of Research and lead author of the report, commented: 

“With the economy in trouble in 2023, the government needs to be proactive about strengthening our social security system. Universal Credit provides a strong foundation, but more work is needed to make the UK’s social security system more adequate, more accessible and more fair, and the right reforms can achieve this without breaking the bank.”

The Rt Hon Stephen Crabb MP, former Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, commented:

“The United Kingdom is going through a period of profound economic challenges. Our social security system continues to do much of the heavy lifting when it comes to shielding families from extreme poverty. But it is clear significant gaps and weaknesses in provision remain. 

Bright Blue’s recent report shines an important spotlight into the current system and points to a pathway of reform. The proposed social security digital platform will improve accessibility to the full range of benefits and a serious discussion about a positive contributory system could open the door to a fairer system overall.”

We propose 3 policies:

Adequacy

Establish a new ‘minimum living’ income, which will be proposed by a reformed and expanded Social Security Advisory Committee, which will also recommend the levels and uprating of different social security payments to help low-income households meet the ‘minimum living’ income. 

We recommend that the Social Security Advisory Committee should have the following new remit. First, to develop and annually update the ‘minimum living’ income benchmark for different types of households, just as the Low Pay Commission recommends different rates for different age brackets. It should be developed as part of a wide-ranging evidence gathering exercise, including both quantitative and qualitative research commissioned by the Social Security Advisory Committee, gathered through a call for evidence and in-person meetings with a wide range of stakeholders, including those who have experience of the system.

Second, the Social Security Advisory Committee should annually evaluate the extent to which the social security system is allowing different types of households to meet the ‘minimum living’ income. It should then make recommendations on the minimum level of uprating needed across the social security system to meet the ‘minimum living’ income benchmark. It should also conduct periodic reviews of various thresholds and caps within the social security system and to examine whether they are affecting people’s ability to meet the cost of living, such as the benefit cap. A benchmark should also be set under which benefits cannot fall below even if a sanction was applied to their recipient. 

Ultimately, the decision on the level and uprating of social security payments for working age adults must remain a democratic one, meaning the body’s role will continue to be advisory.

Accessibility 

The DWP should create a centralised ‘Social Security Digital Platform’, for all UC claimants, which acts as a single referral, application and processing platform for all benefits and grants available to low-income working age adults and allows UC claimants to have greater control over the frequency and destination of their payments.

We recommend that following the completion of migration of all legacy benefit claimants to UC, the government utilises the baseline IT system created for UC and expands it into a one-stop Social Security Digital Platform for all UC claimants.

The Social Security Digital Platform will contain the following functions. First, it will act as a single referral, application and processing platform for all benefits and grants available to low-income working age adults at the national and local level. Second, it will notify claimants of benefits when they might be eligible for more social security support, using their Real Time Information (RTI) data. Third, it will provide a significantly greater level of control to UC claimants over their UC award, specifically the frequency and destination of it. 

Fairness

Create a new, higher-level and time-limited Contribution Element in Universal Credit, which is paid out to those who have paid a new additional, voluntary, National Insurance (Unemployment Supplement). 

We recommend that, once the managed migration of UC is complete, the Government introduces a new Contribution Element to Universal Credit. The Contribution Element will be funded through, and its receipt will be conditional on, a new category of National Insurance (Unemployment Supplement) Contributions, which will be a voluntary payment from which employees could opt-out. The Contribution Element will replace the current New Style Jobseeker’s Allowance and Employment and Support Allowance.

Here are the key findings from our polling of the UK public, focus groups with UC claimants, Labour and Conservative voters, and original data analysis of the Understanding Society COVID-19 Study:

Adequacy

• The majority of the UK public support the idea that social security should be “meeting the cost of living”. 72% of the public cited this. This includes a majority of Conservative (68%), Labour (83%) and Liberal Democrat voters (80%).

• The UK public is strongly in favour of almost all claimant groups receiving more financial support through the social security system. Notably, those with long-term health problems and their carers (77%), low-income working parents (69%) and low-income workers who start their own business (61%). 

• A high proportion of the UK public thought a typical benefit claimant received insufficient support during the pandemic for a range of everyday costs. Utility bills are the cost which is most likely to be identified as one for which the typical benefit claimant received less than sufficient support (43%), followed by food costs (38%), costs of replacing broken down appliances (35%), childcare costs (34%), housing costs (24%) and transport costs (21%). 

• A high proportion of the UK public were dissatisfied with the support government provided to particular types of claimants provided during the pandemic. This included those with long-term mental health problems (43%), those caring for someone with a long-term health problem (42%), those with long-term physical health problems (41%) and low-income families with children (37%).

• None of the UC claimants in our focus groups felt the level of benefit payments they had received was adequate. As one participant described the Government’s UC support: “It wasn’t cutting it.”

• The number of existing UC claimants finding it more difficult to manage financially is higher than the rest of the population, but this narrowed towards the end of the pandemic. In 2018-19, 34% existing UC claimants cited this compared to 7% of the rest of the population. In September 2021 – towards the end of the pandemic – 21% of UC claimants found it difficult to manage financially, as opposed to 5% of the rest of the population.

• A significant minority of existing UC claimants reported that their personal debt was increasing over the last four weeks, although this decreased towards the end of the pandemic. In July 2020, 30% of  existing UC claimants cited this, compared to only 5% of the rest of the population. However, this gap narrowed significantly in later months of the pandemic, falling to 11 percentage points in September 2021.

• A sizable minority of new and existing UC claimants report not being up to date with housing payments, although this decreased towards the end of the pandemic. In 2018-19, 27% of existing UC claimants reported this, as opposed to 7% of the rest of the population. However, there is a significant fall in the number of both existing and new UC claimants who report not being up to date with housing payments towards the end of the pandemic: only 13% in both groups report not being up to date on housing payments in September 2021, while 7% of the rest of the population reported being in this position.

Accessibility 

• A majority of the UK public believe people who are eligible for benefits are not receiving them. 57% of the UK public agree that “there is a large number of people who should receive benefits, but are not claiming them”. 

• UC claimants in our focus groups noted they struggled to access social security, blaming the complexity of the system, poor signposting and a lack of information. One participant noted: “People don’t know how to claim benefits… because they don’t know where to get the help from and it’s not made obvious.” 

• UC claimants in our focus groups noted an element of stigma in the burden of presenting proof as part of the application process different benefits. As one participant noted: “It feels like you’re committing a crime” and another stated the process could be “quite degrading.”

Fairness

• There is majority support for a positive contributory principle in the social security system among the UK public (54%). Conservative voters are more likely (66%) than Labour (49%) and Liberal Democrat (40%) voters to support a positive contributory principle – where those who contribute more to social security receive more support. Conservative voters are more likely (66%) than Labour (49%) and Liberal Democrat (40%) voters to support a positive contributory principle.

• Adequacy, albeit narrowly, matters more than fairness, through the concept of contribution, for the design of the social security system. More (37% vs 30%) of respondents choose “the benefits system should prioritise helping people who are in a difficult position, even if they did not previously pay tax contributions into the system” above “the benefits system should prioritise helping people who have paid into the system previously, even if that means providing less help for people in a difficult financial position”. 

• The UK public is divided in their view on conditionality. A narrow plurality of 37% of say that “the benefits system should prioritise helping people who are in a difficult position, even if they did not previously pay tax contributions into the system” comes closest to their view, while 30% say that “the benefits system should prioritise helping people who have paid into the system previously, even if that means providing less help for people in a difficult financial position”

• The UK public is divided on whether there should be conditionality in the social security system for those on a low income but already in work. 35% agree with there being no conditionality for low-income workers, while 33% agree with there being conditionality.

ENDS