Report: UK Poverty 2020/21

This is the 2020/21 edition of Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s annual report on the nature and scale of poverty across the UK, and how it affects people struggling to stay afloat.

This report highlights early indications of how poverty has changed in our society since the start of the coronavirus outbreak, as well as the situation revealed by the latest poverty data, collected before the outbreak. It examines overall changes to poverty, with sections looking at the impact of work, the social security system and housing.

Key recommendations

• We need as many people as possible to be in good jobs. Unemployment is expected to rise in the coming months, and we need to see further bold action to retrain workers and create good quality new jobs.
• We need to improve earnings for low-income working families and ensure more people are in secure, good quality work. Government must support people in the lowest-paid jobs, or people working part-time, to move into higher pay and access sufficient and secure working hours, including bringing forward the Employment Bill.
• We need to strengthen the benefits system. At a minimum, we need the temporary £20 per week increase to Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit to be made permanent, extending this same lifeline to people on legacy benefits such as Jobseeker’s Allowance and Employment and Support Allowance.
• We need to increase the amount of low-cost housing available for families on low incomes and increase support for households who have high housing costs.