Labour’s Augustinian Approach to Welfare Reform

Sometimes you wonder why government ministers ever speak to journalists. Exhibit A: the fool who told Ben Brogan that the coalition’s changes to Housing Benefit amount to a modern version of “the Highland Clearances*”. Sure enough, Jon Cruddas picks up on this in the New Statesman this week. Reading Cruddas you’d think that capping rent allowances and subsidies will bring about the End of Britain As We Know And Love It. For reals:

This brutal social engineering will have profound effects on families across the country. As many as one million people could be affected by the changes to housing benefit: children will be uprooted from schools and friends; extended patterns of family support and care will be broken; the jobs of the working poor will be threatened by longer journeys and rising travel costs. The communities receiving these migrants – those with the lowest housing costs – will be put under intense pressure just as council budgets are hacked back, job losses stack up and new housebuilding is curtailed.