Why only Labour hate poverty enough to really do anything about it

By Roy Hattersley

On Saturday, I gave a speech on poverty to the Fabians’ Centenary Conference. In it, I defined ‘the poor’ as families living on sixty per cent, or less, of the national average income. I did not choose that definition simply because it is conventional and convenient, though it is both of those things. I wanted to emphasise that poverty is not just about paying gas and grocery bills. It is also about a family’s place in society, because the problem is not the absence of continental holidays and expensive trainers – it is the lack of the self-confidence that enables them to compete successfully for the resources of the state.

We know, as a matter of statistical fact, that it is the families at the bottom of the social heap that the health service and education systems are most likely to fail. That is why I have profound concerns about what is called “the choice agenda”. And that is why the alleviation of poverty and the promotion of equality cannot be separated.

As I argued in my speech, a significant reduction in poverty requires a substantial redistribution of income and wealth. And, if we pretend otherwise, we betray the poor. The easy answers are mostly inventions intended to salve the conscience of the middle classes. The “trickle down effect” is a pure fiction. But it is still trotted out as the justification for the rich getting richer and advanced as a warning that, if we take specific action against poverty, we will endanger overall prosperity.

During the lifetime of the present government, the percentage of families living in poverty has increased in some years and decreased in others. The statistics of poverty are inevitably a couple of years out of date, but we can assume a modest reduction in poverty over the last decade.

That is the result of the modesty with which the problem has been tackled – the consequence of reluctance to redistribute income on the scale which is required.

That is why, four years ago, we missed the reduction in child poverty target by 300,000 and why we will miss it again in 2010 unless we provide the £4.2 billion the IFS and the IESR estimate is necessary to get us back on track. And since keeping up the pace proved impossible, who can believe in the possibility of catching up?

We have made some progress. But we remain reluctant, indeed afraid, to admit even the degree of redistibution which we have achieved. We will never end poverty by stealth – if those of us who regard a reduction in poverty as the obligation of a civilised society are afraid to advocate boldly the means to bring it about, the national mood with never support us in that endeavour.

The overwhelming majority of the poor are the victims of the way in which society is organised. Most of the unemployed – and unemployment is still the major cause of poverty – suffer, as is now cruelly apparent, from either downturns in the economic cycle or the contraction of out-dated industries.

Some are old and, because of the conditions of their working lives, were unable to make adequate provision for their old age. A few decide to be unemployed as a rational decision because they are better off out of work than in work. That, I need hardly say to LabourList readers, is an argument for increasing the minimum wage, not for reducing benefits.

But, relying on my constituency experience, I know that there are some young men who choose not to work because they have no experience of the work ethic. Their fathers looked for work and could not find it. For them, welfare is a way of life. They too are victims of society. But for them (and them alone) I support the coercive initiatives which grow increasingly fashionable. Getting them into work is clearly in their own best interests.

But to threaten the generality of unemployed men and women with punishments would be as stupid as it would be cruel. I still read with incredulity that a Labour minister actually suggested that the families of the workshy should be evicted from their council houses.

The criteria for help should be need, and need alone. We cannot distinguish between the deserving and undeserving poor. But the taxpayers, who finance the help, need to be left in no doubt that the vast majority are deserving. To treat the poor as culprits rather than victims would do irrevocable damage to the campaign against poverty.

So politicians will have to argue the case with greater courage and conviction – though we also need politicians with what is best called ‘practical idealism’.

But first we have to believe. In the past, we have done too little because, although we have hated poverty, we have not hated it enough.