Breadline Britain

theists economies but for many it doesn't feel that way as the economic slump takes its toll the gap between rich and poor is widening many families are struggling to stay afloat living hand-to-mouth and excluded from a modern life living here is like being behind bars because you're only allowed to go out in certain times I'm not living and surviving I'm surviving on it's like rationing on food ration and an electric and gas it's not life at all scary thing about it all really is I just it's hard to see a future it's hard to see anything beyond what see now but what is the true scale of poverty in Britain today and what exactly do we mean by being poor a study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council has set out to answer those questions in what they say is the largest survey ever conducted into living standards in the UK tonight has had exclusive access to that survey this survey doesn't just look at the incomes people have and what they spend their money on like government surveys do it also looks at the way they live their actual living conditions what they can afford and what they cannot afford it's the latest in a series of reports looking at living standards and spanning 30 years the first in 1983 was the subject of an ITV documentary in the 1980s virtually no one dies of starvation in Britain but there are those for whom poverty remains a matter of life and death so has the nature of poverty changed in the last 30 years and if so how to find out researchers asked 1,500 people from a cross-section of society what they considered necessities not surprisingly more people now say owning a computer with internet access and a mobile phone is essential but a warm damp free home and enough food for your family remain the basics almost everyone agrees no one should have to go without what we're talking about is not people going without luxuries or without the basic necessities the ability to feed themselves and their children going without adequate clothing a warm coat in winter or shoes that fit their children's fees researchers drew up a list of items that most people in their one and a half thousand sample considered necessities using this list as the benchmark the study then looked at the living standards of more than 12,000 people anyone who couldn't afford three necessities was deemed to be living in poverty the report's authors say their findings are shocking and that more people are living in poverty today than they were thirty years ago they conclude that the unemployed the sick and disabled and the elderly make up a substantial proportion of the poor but the working poor families with children and in low paid jobs were among the hardest hit the impact on children is a particular focus of the report in the poorest families they've got 12 pounds a day per person to live on that's to pay for the he tank that's to pay for travel that's to pay for food that's to pay for something like electricity gas and for the television never mind there's nothing to do with trips or a social life 12 pounds a day that's the reality of child poverty in Britain the living standard what finds that four million children are living in deprivation children like Tyrone well not want every muffin hair we can adult it will be a person hope the stay of the house it suggests one point four million children in Britain live in homes that aren't adequately heated six hundred thousand live in overcrowded conditions and turned a half million live in homes that are damp Tyrone shares a small damp council flat with his mum Renee two sisters Charisse and Anisha brothers Siobhan and grammar Edith but damp in this room is right in the right in the corner of the room and then this step at the sets and other window sills the council has now treated the damp in two of the bedrooms but the third bedroom Tyrone's remains in poor condition water runs in hair lockers is not sold properly and dump and dump builds up on the sides and the corners and this worse are in that corner the damp has penetrated beds furniture and clothing rendering it useless two of the bedrooms are now out of use I had to throw out all the furniture and so at the moment there's no business lat there's no wardrobes in their children's room this is my mom's bed well if a more detail you can sleep on it anywhere any look any more having too few beds leaves the three generations living in just two rooms their belongings are piled in every corner of the lounge Rene sleeps on the sofa her daughter's on the floor and the boys share a room and a bed with their grandma as we look for Eddie had about where bus leaves most of the tab is cold because the radio doesn't work more sometimes that is creepin Israel around the room from that corner Rene is a single mother and receives no maintenance for any of her four children she works full-time as a mental health support worker if she works overtime she can earn up to 1600 pounds a month but a thousand of that goes on rent and child care costs and what's left is topped up by working tax credit and child related benefits it's quite hard because you're working all the time and you'll see less of your children but it has to be done you need to get income to keep a roof over your head as well if I don't do that I've had to rent officer calling me many times I've been heaven 3 victory letters already the living standard survey finds that more than 1 in 20 children in the UK have nowhere safe to play outside 3.1 million are missing out on leisure and social activities and half a million don't have a quiet place to study or access to the Internet at home so many children can't have a normal childhood things that other children take for granted so you can't have sleepovers you can't join the clubs of the brownies or go swimming or take part in sport and actually you can't do your homework because you don't have access to a computer and you don't have access to the internet that's a normal part of childhood nowadays I feel especially sorry for the children because they were so overcrowded there's no way for them to play you don't want to let them out you know you want to keep a constant eye on them this is like the trap they're in prison while they should have freedom it would mean if we had more money well I mean look so we could have a better place to live I'm more room for one of us to play and a little bit but if we had a card in for me and there are so many children living such a grim existence and that we don't see it and actually our attitudes to this have hardened and this is a wake-up call this report is a wake-up call and I want people to see what Bernardo sees every day which is the relentless grinding down of people by poverty the study says that attitudes to poverty have hardened over the past thirty years a Christmas and birthday present is today considered a luxury in 1983 it was a necessity and adults being able to afford a one-week holiday once a year is no longer regarded as a necessity either austerity has had an effect on the views of the population on what they should be able to afford what they should be able to have and how they should live have been impoverished they've been depressed by the recession the unemployed represent the second largest group living in poverty according to the survey out today it says 1.8 million unemployed people are living in poverty this is red car in the Northeast once a bustling seaside town with a thriving steel industry it's now blighted by unemployment for every 12 people on Jobseeker's Allowance here there is only one vacancy one in ten men is out of work and a third of those are aged under 24 I am on alcapurrias I'm living off bread crumbs at the moment I can't afford anything else I am quite I would I would put myself as at the bottom bottom end of the food chain if you know what if you know what I mean mark Conway is 21 years old he has two a-levels a BTech and a number of GCSEs but since leaving college four years ago mark hasn't found a permanent job there's absolutely nothing wrong dear the past few years been odd for looking for work well yes Mark's only income from Jobseeker's Allowance is 53 pounds a week he lives in a one-bedroom council flat which is subsidized by Housing Benefit news lay at meeting of the week's I put my money in two piles just so I don't overspend I put 53 pounds in each pile because it works out as a 160-pound a fart night or whatever it is like are just so I can get by it's a 15-pound football's fair because it comes too far in Parliament River ten-pound gas which air if you use wisely can it will last the fart night 15 pound food I thought the way they're expecting us to get money for like just just to even turn the lights on or heat the boiler so you have a bath I'll turn the car on it's ridiculous it really is it's stupid almost a million young people are now unemployed across the UK all gasp there are young people who who can't afford to get to a job interview they can't afford to print out their CV to take it to a job interview there are young people who can't afford to dress for an interview so these are all huge huge problems they're huge barriers to young people getting into work according to the living standard survey 20 percent of those who are unemployed and looking for work can't afford appropriate clothes for a job interview when Mark goes job hunting he wears the only smart clothes he owns a suit he has had since school this is me prom so that still fits me it's not special most people my age usually get new suit when they go out job hunting what a I haven't as you can see this is the only one I've got so I have to bear with it and live of it really which we look Mark's family live nearby he says they're the only support he has the only thing that's keeping me close is family because if I move away and I'm on job seekers and I'm got no money I've got no friends I wouldn't be able to cook I was going to get up and go down to me met Christian Kent just to get away because I had normally no job and I'm are you angry yeah it it people don't know how it affects you the really talk it's just people don't understand the hardship of a paper go through the living standard survey suggests 30 million people almost half the population are financially insecure this means they can't afford to save five pounds a week make pension contributions or pay an unexpected bill of five hundred pounds this is disaster for the long term because it means that people were not just looking at impoverished lives today but if they can't afford pensions and savings they're looking at poverty and old-age money comes in one end and gets paid out with the other let it be food shopping or bills there's no in-between the Cox family is one of the millions identified by the study as being perched on a financial cliff edge you're dead lucky Martin and Paula are unemployed the house is in negative equity and they have no pension or savings three of their four sons still live at home some weeks something might come up like Tim might need a pair of trainers or Tom might need a pair of trainers or something might come up we not might not be able to afford it that we will make sacrifices the week after because I was twenty P less for the gas and electricity I've now been charged 15 pound because it wasn't in the bank so I'll have to juggle that for next month when it comes out make sure that extra 15 pounds in there I'll do it their income for a family of five is just over 1,300 pounds a month once all the regular bills are paid Paula says there isn't much left for food if I would some more money to spend on food we definitely live on how better cuts of meat surely and you know more fresh vegetables you could afford to buy well a lot more of better folk and what we're living on there we're just scraping about I'm sure we sometimes we don't even eat three times a day we'd only three times a day it would be breakfast a little beer dinner the poverty study finds that four million adults and children aren't properly fed in Britain today and 28% of parents are going without food so their children can eat parents are making huge sacrifices to try and protect their children for example we know that almost all mothers and a lot of fathers skimp on their own food so their children may eat a dick Whitley this isn't her life this is a struggle this is a real hard long road struggle it's been a long road there's no end to that road it just keeps going on and on it's like I'm going to forever walk that road and that's scary that's scary I want to change that not I'm doing whatever I can to change that but according to the reports author's one of the most surprising statistics to emerge from their study is that 2.1 million people in work and supporting a family are living in poverty they used to be an assumption that if you were able to find a job then you'd be ok it's certainly not be in poverty you might not have the same standard of living as somebody living down the road but you'd be ok that's just not the case anymore Dave rook and Kristy Locke are a hard-working couple with a young baby they are neither the squeezed middle nor the unemployed they're the working poor it is a vicious circle yeah we we're constantly you know we work hard and when it goes out on bills so we never see in any of the money that we're actually earning and that's quite depressing in itself when you you work all that time and you get nothing back from it both work part-time in order to avoid childcare costs between them they earn 1,400 pounds a month but once they've paid their regular bills and shopped for food they're left with 66 pounds that covers everything from holidays social outings birthdays and even Christmas presents as about it so it makes me feel like a failure really because you know everybody's got the idea that father goes I'll work hard brings home the bacon but it doesn't matter however you go out and work hard or not nowadays because you you the bills that we're blessed with as I'll say and they just make things impossible these two have old-fashioned values they say they want to raise their son the right way and they have a work ethic there's been a few times I thought be better off if we don't work but we didn't want to be waiting up in a family bit just think so I just take off the government in you want them to know that it's parents off to get somewhere but they're starting to question whether they'd be better off if they split up financially it makes more sense for me and Christine not to be in a relationship need to find a a bedsit 470 pound a week and we're I'm here to claim all the benefits and with seven hundred eight hundred pound them all better off and the government did say that when you are working family you'd always be better than if you're on benefits that's simply not the case it would be better if we weren't a family unit anymore in his recent budget speech the Chancellor pledged to support those who work and try to be independent of the state according to today's survey Dave and Christie are among 11 million people across the UK who feels socially excluded poverty is about not having enough money enough resources to participate as a full citizen in UK society not to be able to do the things that most people take for granted or have the basic necessities of life and that means that millions of people are not participating they're not part of mainstream UK society to the full extent it's match day in Chester and a rare afternoon out for Dave he's been saving for three months to watch his team play the ticket is 12 pounds even so he feels guilty about his day out when money is tight Alvin and wanita to go and watch the games doesn't come around that often and it's only 12 pound for a ticket to go and watch them as well nuts it's nothing to most people but that's the difference between putting gas or electric or feed in my family the Department of Work and Pensions has criticised the methodology of the living standards survey the government says it's committed to eradicating child poverty and says the latest figures shows 600,000 people have moved out of relative poverty it's using a multi-dimensional approach to tackle root causes of poverty and adds that by next year another 2 million low earners will have been taken out of paying tax altogether since filming Christie has been made redundant but dave has got a full-time job Martin is still doing all he can to find work but he's keeping himself busy by volunteering I think it gives you selfish you know your self esteem back I mean even though I don't get paid I still like to come here and I still feel as I've done a good day's work when I leave and that's why I come here Rene and her family continue to live in their damp and overcrowded flat and marks such for a job goes on the authors of today's report into living standards say austerity measures coming into effect over the next few months will make things worse for those already living in bread line Britain the Department of Work and Pensions says it expects three million people to be better off as a result of benefit changes coming into effect next week now if you'd like more information on tonight's program please visit our website at itv.com slash tonight until next time though good evening and thanks for watching

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Length: 22min 18sec (1338 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 28 2013