English local areas are getting more powers from central government. Under the Government’s plans for a “devolution revolution”, local leaders are to be given “radical new powers to take responsibility for driving local growth”. Much of the rationale for devolution has been framed around control and local economic growth. In contrast, there has been little specific discussion about what increasing devolution means for policies to tackle poverty. The Social Market Foundation’s new paper, Devolution and Poverty, examines whether and how we can tackle poverty locally, building on two roundtables with local leaders and policymakers.
There are a number of reasons why giving local areas more control could help tackle poverty. Unlike central government, local government is likely to have much more detailed knowledge and understanding of the causes and consequences of poverty in their areas. That means that they are often better placed to know where money should be best spent, and how to co-ordinate local services – such as skills, employment and childcare support – to help those in need. Localising power provides huge opportunities to try out new ways of delivering services to people. And finally, there could well be a political advantage too, in that building a political narrative around the case for tackling poverty may be easier at local, rather than national level.
However, whilst there are advantages to taking a local approach to tackling poverty, this does not mean that it is always easier or more effective to do so at local rather than national level. Some local areas simply do not have the same capacity to generate prosperity as others – at least in the short to medium term. Some areas have an existing stock of high quality infrastructure, jobs and skills, whereas others will not. Often these trends are highly entrenched and take a long time to shift. That also means that some types of devolution – such as allowing local areas to keep more of the tax revenues they generate – can leave poorer areas worse off, unless measures are in place to limit those losses.
Further, much of the devolution of powers so far has been focused on encouraging local leaders to take measures to boost local economic growth. But even if they are capable of doing so, a focus on growth will not automatically result in policies that effectively tackle poverty. Previous studies have found that it is not uncommon for poverty rates to either increase or stay static even in cities that are seeing economic growth, with London a prime example. A key worry in our roundtables was that often local residents did not have the skills and experience to make the most of new jobs that were being created.
Finally, if local policy is to be driven by local needs, strong local democracy and accountability is vital. Local policymakers at our roundtables worried that there was insufficient awareness of and involvement in the negotiation of devolution deals among local people.
In our paper, we argue that Government should think carefully about the pros and cons of devolution, and whether localisation of powers is always the best way to achieve particular goals. Government needs to explicitly set out where responsibilities for tackling poverty lie when it devolves powers: we examined nine devolution deals and found no explicit references to tackling poverty in them. It should focus on devolving powers for types of policy where local knowledge can be especially helpful – in the commissioning of employment services, for example. But it should be careful in how it devolves powers over tax and welfare, where the dangers of some areas falling further behind are strongest.
Nida Broughton is Chief Economist at the Social Market Foundation
The work of community organisations has always been underpinned by three key values. The first, and most obvious, is self-help: providing services when the state can’t or won’t, or when self-help is actually more effective or appropriate. Second is self-organisation. Community groups are often at their best when they’re movements for change in society, transforming attitudes about everything from homosexuality to disability to mental health. And finally, there’s independence: working strategically with local and national government to make life better by closing gaps in services and loopholes in the law.
That’s the history: what about today? In the current climate, community groups are facing unprecedented budgetary pressures. Making the Cut asked what impact is this having on frontline services and the people using them?
To get a better idea brap has been regularly speaking to community organisations in Birmingham for over a year. These organisations work with some of the most vulnerable in the city and cover a range of sectors, including housing, domestic violence, and youth employment.
What we’ve found is that cuts to spending and changes to public service design are forcing individuals to go to community organisations for the support they need. Whether it’s welfare changes, the closure of local housing advice offices, reductions in youth services, or countless other things, people are increasingly turning to local voluntary sector organisations for help and advice. Between November 2014 and July 2015, for example, 77% of community groups said they had faced a ‘significant’ increase in demand for their service.
But that’s not all: over the same period, 88% of project participants had to make changes to their work because of cuts to funding. For most this meant changes to admin and management support. A lot of organisations have also said there is less funding for overheads and the ‘softer’ activities that help create a fuller, more holistic support service. At the same time funding has become more short-term, making it harder for organisations to invest in their sustainability and to plan long-term interventions. A youth service, for example, might find itself in the unhelpful position of spending a few weeks working with a troubled young person only to have them referred back to the organisation some months later. Having more time with the individual in the first place might have allowed the agency to really get to grips with the problems they faced, giving the young person the confidence and resilience to solve their problems independently.
What is more, community groups are finding it harder to lobby local and national government about the concerns they have. This is partly because with fewer resources and increased demand, most voluntary organisations just don’t have the time to challenge this cycle of diminishing returns. For most the time available to analyse policy, engage with decision-makers, and draw out the strategic implications of new policy, practice, or legislation on their day-to-day work has been massively reduced.
Additionally, the constraints on speaking out are also partly because contractual relationships can make it harder for community groups to say what they need to. Increasingly, commissioning contracts – not just locally but nationally too – are stipulating that organisations can’t speak out about the impact of funding cuts. And many organisations don’t want to risk the relationship they’ve built up with their commissioner because funding is so tight. The customer is always right.
Since the report was published a number of local councillors and council officials have expressed concern about its findings. As communities see the impact of funding cuts really start to hit vulnerable people, most decision makers have said they are keen to deepen their links with the voluntary sector (and, in fact, some community organisations have recently told us they’ve noticed a move toward greater partnership working). Some respondents have since promised to press for formal mechanisms with which the sector can talk to and engage new governing bodies (such as the West Midlands Combined Authority). Others have offered to explore how the contents of contracts between the council and community groups are communicated, as, they claim, the intention has never been to stifle the voice of the sector.
This is a crucial exercise. For we ignore the work, expertise, local intelligence, and advice of voluntary organisations at our peril. Many have a unique insight into the cumulative impact of welfare reforms and public service changes. There is a role for public authorities now, more than ever, to engage community organisations in discussion about how to ensure vulnerable and excluded groups aren’t being left behind. And there’s a role for us, too, as a society to think carefully about what kind of voluntary sector we want to see. Because at the moment there’s a danger we’ll lose the side of it that campaigns, and agitates, and demands. We can’t just be content for community groups to fulfil the first of the values we outlined at the start. Historically, community groups have built hospices, sheltered refugees, and made public transport accessible for the disabled. If we forget this role, we are forgetting its potential. We are forgetting its vitally important role of holding up a mirror to society and speaking truth to power.
Our new work supported by Barrow Cadbury Trust will feed into the ‘Making the Cut’ project by creating a series of voluntary sector “conversations” around social cohesion and inclusion in Birmingham. Watch this space.
For more information about the Making the Cut project go to www.brap.org.uk/projects/making-the-cut
Rent-to-own stores feature on many high streets, with windows that sparkle with giant TVs, PlayStations, and leather corner suites. The glamorous lifestyle beckons, at seemingly affordable rates.
But serious issues were thrown up when the all-party parliamentary group on debt and personal finance led an enquiry into the rent-to-own sector in February 2015.
It found that APRs of up to 94.7% and charges for compulsory cover, offering nothing more than statutory protection, often doubled the cost of essential household goods. Many customers – 50% according to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) – get into difficulties on their rent-to-own commitments. And 22% of these customers in arrears have had goods accepted back or repossessed.
Add to this the lack of transparency in terminology, and heavy-handed tactics both in up-selling and repossessions, and you get a sector that did not appear to be delivering in the customer’s interest. And as the goods are rental, it may be several years and sometimes thousands of pounds before they belong to you – a fact that is not made prominent.
Fair for You
In mid-2014 Angela Clements, the chief executive of a thriving credit union in central Birmingham, was tired of meeting desperate, struggling people on a daily basis, seeking loans and often finding themselves in the clutches of right-to-own and payday operators.
She began on the long and lonely path of setting up a new organisation looking to change the financial landscape for the lower-paid. It seemed criminal to her that those with the least were being forced to pay the most. Why should someone whose washing machine broke down be trapped into paying inflated prices, simply because they worked irregular hours, or cared for a disabled family member, and couldn’t access regular store credit?
In November 2015, after almost 18 months of funding rounds, setbacks and focus groups with exactly the kind of people Clements was looking to help, the business received its full FCA lending licence, and Fair for You was launched.
Established as a social enterprise, wholly owned by a charity, the small team began trading quietly at first while stress-testing the systems and concept.
Unlike the right-to-own sector, Fair for You’s customers are provided with credit to enable them to buy goods on the virtual high street. Crucially, this means that the customers own the items outright from day one.
Initially brand new white goods were available from the Whirlpool group (including Hotpoint and Indesit) at real-time high street prices – often lower than many on- and off-line retailers – and beds, cots and baby items are added in early April.
All items come with no compulsory insurances. Free delivery within three days is included (since the team recognised the convenience in specifying delivery slots), and removal of the old item is also available, free for kitchen appliances and at low cost if it’s a mattress – great if you don’t have access to a car.
Once items are chosen, a telephone discussion with lending managers establishes customers’ eligibility for loans, based more on affordability and propensity to repay. Those refused loans are signposted to organisations such as Turn2Us, to ensure applicants are receiving all financial help available.
In March 2016, the first independent social impact report was commissioned from the Centre for Responsible Credit. At stage one, the reporting is mainly around financial wellbeing – the money kept in a household to use on other things – and the self-respect given back to people by being treated with dignity.
At the next stage, this reporting is likely to include longer-term benefits to households in accessing better, more efficient food storage, clean clothes, and better sleep, and the knock-on effects this has on cohesive, healthier family lifestyles and ability to pay essential bills and rent.
The report justifies the need for ethical, not-for-profit operators in this space, looking to improve the outlook for Britain’s lower-paid families. It also contextualises the APR necessary to keep the business running, which some would see as high at 42.6%, as comparable to many credit union loans and artificially skewed due to the shorter, less restrictive loan term lengths.
But it recognises getting there has been a struggle. Fair for You will need assistance in reaching those who can benefit, to keep the loans flowing without the multi-million marketing budget of those it seeks to challenge.
The launch of the report in April will be followed by quarterly updates, which will give a longer-term picture of better lending to lower-paid households.
As Tom Levitt, former Labour MP for High Peak and chair of the charity, says, “We’re here to help – and we’re already making a difference.”
The original blog was paid for and provided by Lloyds Banking Group, one of the sponsor s of the Public Leaders Network.
Barrow Cadbury Trust supports Fair for You through a social investment.
The Women on the Move Awards, a joint venture between Migrants Organise and UNHCR UK, were presented by broadcaster Samira Ahmed at the Royal Festival Hall during the Women of the World Festival to mark International Women’s Day 2016. More than 500 people came to celebrate and recognise migrant and refugee women who often do incredibly important, and yet largely invisible, work in their communities.
Our winners, Mariam Yusuf and Seada Fekadu, made the 2016 Awards a true celebration of resilience and dignity. Seada came to the UK from Eritrea as a minor, on her own, on the back of a truck via Calais. She is about to pass her exams with distinction and is off to university to become a doctor. Seada is mentoring young refugees at Young Roots and speaking up for their rights. Livia Firth presented the Young Woman award to Seada, a living example of what can be achieved when we give young refugees a helping hand, and when our protection system and public services work well.
Journalist Lindsey Hilsum presented the main Award to Mariam, who escaped Somalia and despite struggling with our adversarial system since 2008, has given her time and energy to other women in need at Women Asylum Seekers Together and many other organisations in Manchester.
What makes the achievements and contributions of these incredible women even more remarkable is the fact that neither of them spoke any English when they first arrived, and they are both now role models and leaders, turning their traumatic experiences into kindness and respect toward others. Mariam, who is still destitute and is still stuck in immigration limbo, said after the Awards Ceremony: “I was most honored and felt that I really mattered in society.”
This year we named the media award the Sue Lloyd-Roberts Media Award after a pioneering journalist, herself one of our award winners in 2014, whose legacy of professionalism and whose passion for fair and true reporting will continue to inspire courageous, thoughtful journalism. This year’s winners are Jackie Long and Lee Sorrell for their Channel 4 news piece Inside Yarl’s Wood, which provided undercover evidence of the UK’s dehumanising detention system and helped shift public debate towards more safeguards in detention, including time limits and alternatives to the detention of women.
The Awards also recognise a champion of refugees and migrants in mainstream society. This year, the winner of the Champion Award was Citizens UK, whose grass roots community organising went above and beyond any other civil society organisation, as they responded to the refugee crisis by organising a powerful Refugees Welcome movement around the country, introducing private sponsorship visas as a way for citizens to help provide protection and save lives, and for winning a groundbreaking legal victory to open up safe and legal routes for family reunion rights for refugee children in Calais.
The Women on the Move Awards are growing and opening up spaces for refugee and migrant women to tell their stories of survival contributing to the Southbank Centre’s WOW Festival’s wider audiences and on a bigger stage at the Festival Hall. For that we are very grateful to Jude Kelly, Southbank’s Artistic Director and the founder of the WOW Festival, whose support has been crucial in the growth and development of the Awards. Jude and WOW helped turn our good idea into reality. We are also grateful to the Barrow Cadbury Trust for recognising the importance of changing the narrative by telling the stories of survival and contribution that refugee and migrant women make, and letting them speak for themselves, for justice and dignity, inspiring us all in the process.
Recent research in the UK also found that stories work the other way too. Ministers may think they are basing decisions on data or numerical evidence, but the real evidence suggests they are swayed at critical moments by hearing a moving, human story.
Stories are a kind of currency that politicians use, not just in speeches, but in conversations and pep talks. A good story can win them an argument at a critical moment. The recent film Lincoln showed the great president telling folksy stories at nervous junctures to shift the mood.
So when you are trying to persuade politicians and policy-makers that a new way of regenerating local economies is beginning to emerge, you may want to use the data – but, if there are no success stories, then they probably won’t take it in.
So where are the human stories about the new age of local enterprise, where people decide to take their own local economies by the scruff of their necks? Answer: they seem to have stayed local.
When I was working on these issues in Whitehall in recent years, it struck me – not just how little policy-makers thought about very local economic activity, but how few stories were in general circulation about it.
I wasn’t sure I could point to the most exciting examples in the UK myself. So with the help of Barrow Cadbury, we set about telling the most exciting stories of local renewal we could find in England: the result is a book of stories, more novelisation than thinktank report – though it is actually both – to try and get these tales of imagination, energy and dusting-yourself-down-and-trying-again into the political conversation.
The book ‘Prosperity Parade’ is published by New Weather on 24 March. The stories amount to a take on the emerging revolution in ‘ultra-local’ economics for places left high-and-dry by downturn and the global economy. Because, without them, this shift is often going unmeasured and unacknowledged. Whitehall can’t see it, policy-makers don’t track it or support it, and the high street banks have no interest in providing for their needs.
They include:
- How a small group of growers are turning Manchester’s food system inside out.
- How they wired-up Bath to earn money from its own energy.
- The story behind the success of the Bristol Pound, the Digbeth Social Enterprise Quarter, and the Wessex Reinvestment Trust.
- How two towns analysed where local money was flowing to and made it flow better – by tracking entrepreneurs (Totnes) or by investing local pension money (Preston).
But the real message is to the emerging enterprise revolution: don’t be shy – tell your stories.
David Boyle is co-director of the New Weather Institute and the author of Prosperity Parade:
http://www.newweather.org/2016/03/13/why-policy-makers-dont-see-the-next-local-economic-revolution/
The ‘refugee crisis’ of 2015 conjures tragic images and headline-grabbing figures. From the haunting pictures of Alan Kurdi, the three year old boy who drowned during the short but treacherous crossing from Turkey to Greece, to discomfiting scenes between baton-wielding border guards and desperate families seeking sanctuary. Philanthropy has been responding and will continue to do so in very constructive ways. However, its greatest opportunity may be in treating the refugee crisis not as a separate event, but as part of a wider effort to create more just and equal societies.
Over a million refugees, asylum seekers and migrants arrived on Europe’s shores during the past twelve months. Latest estimates suggest that at least three and a half thousand drowned attempting to do so. And, contrary to popular perception, just over 40 per cent were woman and children, including thousands of children separated from their families. Europe’s refugees are a mere fraction of the tens of millions displaced worldwide, but 2015 did mark the continent’s biggest population movement since the World War Two.
The challenges posed by ongoing events are undoubtedly daunting. While a large proportion of those arriving in Europe in 2015 were fleeing from the conflict in Syria, an over-emphasis on this group masks a more complex picture of displacement, simmering global inequality and changing demographics. In addition, many of the durable solutions ultimately lie in resolving seemingly intractable conflicts in the Middle East and further afield.
European foundations’ response
Given the scale of human suffering and the fact that the numbers arriving show no signs of abating, how could and should foundations respond? And what are they already doing? According to a survey of foundations conducted in the UK by Global Dialogue and the Ariadne funders network, a majority of respondents were planning to adjust their long-term strategies to adapt to new realities and some had already provided emergency grants.
In a European context, there is clearly considerable scope for foundations to fund humanitarian aid. This is particularly the case in border states such as Greece, which is bearing the brunt of the crisis while contending with its own domestic woes. As a survey on responses to the crisis by the European Foundation Centre (EFC) highlighted, many foundations recognise the immediate need to improve the living conditions for new arrivals and enable them to access legal advice and education.
However, there is also the perennial concern about philanthropy replacing the role and resources of governments and international organisations and some may not even have the mandate to countenance this type of emergency funding. On the other hand, doing nothing seems to be an increasingly untenable option for foundations concerned with peace, equality and social justice in Europe.
Tapping the upsurge of sympathy
One way to navigate some of these issues is to consider where philanthropy might be uniquely suited to intervene. In the short term, in addition to more service-orientated assistance, some foundations have been thinking about how to capitalise on the outpouring of sympathy and compassion for Europe’s newest arrivals that reached a crescendo upon the publication of the pictures of Alan Kurdi’s body.
In the UK, where the effects of the crisis are much less visible on the ground than elsewhere, refugee charities have been inundated with offers of support and requests to volunteer. Although it is as yet unclear whether these are ‘converts’ to the cause or those already sympathetic to refugees mobilising into action, a number of UK-based foundations and their civil society partners have discussed the strategic importance of the heightened focus on refugee protection.
For example, there are countless examples of civil society or citizen-led initiatives springing up in support of refugees and small scale and timely resources to embed schemes to host and welcome new arrivals could help maximise their impact. To this end, a number of UK-based foundations, including the Barrow Cadbury Trust, have established New Beginnings, a pooled fund to provide catalytic support to frontline organisations and community groups. Grants will be modest and short-term but is it hoped that they will enable groups to respond to the opportunities that the current context has presented.
The opportunity for increased advocacy
Another important consideration is that the renewed interest in refugee issues provides invaluable opportunities to ramp up advocacy. For example, linking calls for safe and legal routes to protection or for more humane family reunification policies to the current crisis could provide much-needed impetus and immediacy to existing campaigns at both national and European level.
This is particularly true in cases where non-refugee organisations and unusual allies are impelled to comment on ongoing events: here in the UK mainstream charities such as Oxfam, as well as a host of sports stars and celebrities have spoken up about the crisis. They may be better positioned to reach some sceptical audiences than refugee organisations. In this context, philanthropy is playing a critical role in providing additional capacity for campaigners to push through doors that might be starting to open.
Helping to change the larger debate
In the longer term, foundations are uniquely placed to connect immediate responses to the crisis to work to understand public attitudes and concerns about migration and refugee issues in Europe. The differential impacts of both the crisis and migration generally throughout the continent, as well as variations in the way the debate is conducted from country to country means that ‘one size fits all’ approaches are unhelpful. But in countries such as the UK, where migration and refugee issues are highly contested and politicised, a hostile and polarised debate can hinder wider efforts to promote the fair and dignified treatment of refugees, asylum seekers and migrants.
This is why many foundations, including the Barrow Cadbury Trust, have focused efforts on the complex and often overlooked arena of communications around migration. From our perspective, ignoring the need to change the dynamic of the wider migration debate over time could thwart shorter-term gains in terms of building support for refugees.
Finally, investing in integration is another way in which foundations can add significant value in managing the impact of the refugee crisis in Europe. Some governments are providing basic, short-term assistance to refugees to help them adjust to the countries where they have sought sanctuary. However, this still leaves considerable scope for philanthropy to continue to invest in initiatives that support creative approaches and share expertise on what works within communities affected by rapid change. For example, the Cities of Migration website highlights good ideas in immigrant integration from all over the world.
Questions remaining
There are many compelling reasons for foundations in Europe to respond to the refugee crisis, but there are also potentially harmful consequences to consider. Is there a risk of entrenching unhelpful dichotomies between ‘deserving’ refugees and supposedly less worthy migrants? What would an increased focus on refugees mean for other vulnerable groups, such as Europe’s several million undocumented migrants? What will happen to those arriving who are not given refugee status?
There are no easy answers of course, but a useful starting point could be to situate responses to the current crisis in the wider context of Europe’s complex and rapidly shifting demographic realities. If philanthropy is to play a constructive role, the ‘refugee issue’ should not be seen as a separate problem to be fixed but as part of wider efforts to reduce inequality and achieve inclusive, equal societies.
Ayesha Saran is Programme Manager – Migration at Barrow Cadbury Trust.
Improving the lives of women and girls in the criminal justice system will involve more than “new rehabilitation techniques and smarter ways of managing prisoners” as was suggested by David Cameron in his recent prison reform speech.
Listening, understanding, validating, valuing and holding hope for women when they can’t hold it for themselves may be more compelling ways of making a difference, according to debates among practitioners and academics at a conference at Sheffield Hallam last week. Undoubtedly, for the most serious and dangerous female offenders, imprisonment may be an appropriate and necessary response. However, this is a minority group within the current prison population and we need to be mindful that experiences of trauma (often as a result of relationships) feature strongly in many women’s pathways into crime.
The experiences of mothers in prison
The experience of imprisonment can ‘re-traumatise’ women by separating them from their children and requiring them to ‘fit in’ with a system which has been designed for men. At the conference, a former prisoner described how the allotted time for phone calls home was between 3 and 4 in the afternoon, precisely the time when children would be walking back from school so not at home to take the call. She also described how she was rushed into making a decision about whether to apply to keep her baby with her in a Mother and Baby Unit during her prison sentence and how prison staff ‘advised’ that her baby may be better off being cared for in the community.
We heard about one woman who had been returned to prison after giving birth to her baby and put in a cell without being given sanitary towels, another who was placed in segregation, just a few weeks after giving birth. Given the dehumanising nature of these experiences, it’s clear that a crucial element of support for women in conflict with the law should be for this harm to be repaired by creating new, nurturing relationships which offer hope for a different way of relating, as women attempt to build a better future for themselves and their children.
What’s needed and what’s missing?
For example, key workers in women’s community centres and staff in prison Mother and Baby Units can provide positive templates for healthy relationships. Interventions which foster connection and communication between imprisoned mothers and their children are also essential. But it’s not just these interpersonal relationships which matter but also the relationship which society has with women in conflict with the law. What we ‘do with’ women lawbreakers needs to be considered in the context of how women’s lives (and inter alia their experiences of prison) are different from men’s.
David Cameron’s proposal for increasing the use of community sentences for women offenders (especially those with young children) is welcome. However, what’s missing is an explicit recognition that women who commit crime are often already traumatised by their experiences as victims of crime, particularly domestic and sexual assault at the hands of men. For some women, prison is the best home they’ve ever had and, in a shocking indictment of the systems which are meant to protect women, the safest place they’ve ever known. Thus a commitment to addressing the violence and abuse of women and girls, including preventative measures as well as responsive ones, is a serious omission in his proposals.
Creating a positive future
As the primary care-givers of children women are disadvantaged in the workplace which means that women in conflict with the law have limited opportunities for creating more positive futures for themselves. And policy drive in criminal justice has a strong male bias. So I wonder if, as the Government considers its ideas for “full-on prison reform”, is it not about time that wider issues of inequality and social injustice (and the gendered nature of these) become a key part of criminal justice rhetoric?
One of the more controversial policies introduced during the last parliament to reduce migration to the UK was the family income threshold.
Since July 2012, UK citizens and settled residents must show they earn at least £18,600 if they want to bring their spouse here from outside of the EU. By 2015, just over 40% of British employees did not earn enough to qualify, as the latest Migration Observatory report shows.
The policy was designed to reduce the likelihood that family migrants who come to the UK might place a financial ‘burden on the state’ and—particularly — that they might receive welfare benefits such as tax credits and housing benefit.
But the income threshold raises some difficult philosophical and empirical questions for people who are interested in welfare, poverty and discrimination.
Should all UK citizens have the same right to live here with the person they love? Clearly there would be outcry if the Government were to decide that most men should be allowed to choose a foreign spouse but most women should not; or that Londoners should have an easier time bringing their partner here than people living in the rest of the UK.
The family income threshold does not do this: it discriminates only on income. However, because people’s gender, place of residence and age affect their income, it also affects whether they can bring a non-EU spouse to the UK.
In 2015, a majority (55%) of female British employees did not meet the income threshold, compared to 27% of men. Immigration rules require the income to be earned by the UK-resident partner rather than their spouse living abroad, because of concerns they will stop working after coming to the UK. This will also affect women more than men, because they are less likely to be the main breadwinner in the family. While family migrants have lower employment rates than the UK average, at least half of them do work after they arrive, according to the available data.
Londoners also earn higher wages than people outside the capital so are more likely to be able to bring a partner than those in the regions – 27% of British employees in London did not earn enough in 2015, while outside the capital that figure was 43%.
For people concerned with tackling poverty in the UK, the income threshold raises several empirical questions that remain largely unanswered. Does the income threshold reduce the incidence of poverty in the UK by preventing the entry of people with low income? Does it increase the risk of poverty for the individual families concerned, by preventing UK citizens from bringing a second earner into the household? And if the threshold only delays entry to the UK while a couple is waiting to acquire sufficient savings or income, how will this delay affect the integration prospects of the non-EEA spouse once they do arrive? These longer-term possibilities could be quite important in shaping the overall impacts of the policy, but they remain very difficult to quantify.
Three years ago, Bite The Ballot (BTB) launched National Voter Registration Drive (NVRD), a campaign to get as many young people on the electoral register as possible in a single week of co-ordinated national action. During BTB’s NVRD 2015 campaign, we put 441,000 people on the electoral register, breaking the record previously held by (US campaign) Rock The Vote, and making history. This week marks the third annual NVRD, and it is bigger and more impactful than ever.
Founded in a classroom in 2010, BTB is a party-neutral movement on a mission to engage, inform, and inspire citizens age 16-25 to register to vote and stake a claim in society, sparking a journey of active citizenship among a generation and ultimately leading to a more just society and a stronger democracy.
By developing and delivering resources to younger citizens in classrooms, campuses, community centres, faith centres, youth clubs, public spaces and online platforms, BTB has engaged and registered millions of people in the UK. From our acclaimed interactive democracy workshop, ‘The Basics’, to our popular voter advice application, Verto, BTB has been breaking ground as it innovates and delivers resources created by young people for young people with the ambition of making sure that every citizen believes that their opinions matter and that expressing them counts.
BTB knows that engaging young people in democratic participation is vital to a healthy and diverse democracy. With 800,000 people reported to have fallen off the electoral register due to changes to the voter registration system in June 2014, our democracy is neither strong nor representative. This is why campaigns like NVRD are vital.
Between 1-7 February thousands of people around the UK will join BTB and engage young people and marginalised communities in voter registration activities, from workshops and registration drives to discussions with decision makers and film screenings.
For instance, in the Black Country, our Community Engagement Officer (CEO), Jessica, will be engaging people across Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall and Wolverhampton, running workshops in sixth form colleges and holding voter registration drives in public spaces like local libraries. She is one of seven inspiring young CEOs around the country who are running peer to peer engagement activities and empowering people in their areas to express their opinions and participate in democracy.
“As a Community Engagement Officer, I see it as my role to build and facilitate relationships between those living/working in community groups (be it schools, youth groups, support groups) and local decision makers” says Jessica.
“Whilst voter registration is at the heart of the work I do, what is important to me is trying to create cohesion and continuity in my community partnerships. By delivering Bite The Ballot’s interactive democracy workshop ‘The Basics’, I hope to establish a platform where communities then keep me in mind for further engagement/awareness work, particularly in the coming months with local and PCC elections and the impending EU referendum.
“The National Voter Registration Drive has been a platform for me to cement the relationships I have built so far by running events throughout the week alongside community partners as well as targeting new actors and creating new links. During campaigns week, events ranging from voter registration rallies and student union democracy races to ‘The Basics’ and ‘Make a Manifesto’ are part of the Black Country’s push to generate discussions about politics and inspire citizens to register to vote.”
The National Voter Registration Drive is taking place nationwide between 1-7 February 2016. Find out more about Bite The Ballot on its website: bitetheballot.co.uk and go to the NVRD website to find out more about NVRD.
Contact Jessica by email [email protected]
Going to court can be confusing, intimidating, and frustrating for anyone. For young adults (aged 18 to 24), who make up roughly a third of people sentenced in criminal courts each year, these reactions are intensified.
Criminal justice interventions aimed at adults but applied to this age group often fail to prevent further offending. In fact young adults serving community orders have the highest breach rates. We believe these two facts are related.
Our courts can and should play a leading role in reducing crime and ensuring a fairer justice system. There is clear evidence that how decisions in court are made and how the process feels to participants (a concept known as procedural fairness) can be as important as the sentence itself to young people’s perceptions. A number of studies have demonstrated that defendants reporting high levels of procedural fairness are more likely to comply with court orders, to perceive laws and legal institutions as legitimate authorities, and to obey the law in the future. But we know that standard practice in adult courts generates a number of important barriers: the process can be difficult to understand and follow, intimidating, and leave participants feeling disengaged and unfairly treated. This is particularly important for young people, who are especially attuned to perceptions of unfairness and signs of respect.
In a new report, [Young adults in court: developing a tailored approach], we outline a number of feasible adaptations to standard court practice for young adults. These include measures such as use of simplified language to aid participants’ understanding, taking steps to ensure the process is comprehended, encouraging family participation, and adapting the courtroom environment to make it more conducive to engagement. Taken together, we believe that these adaptations hold out the prospect of increasing perceptions of procedural fairness and improving rehabilitation for this distinct population.
Many of these changes are relatively modest. And much of this practice already exists, at least in aspiration, in our youth courts. Since the youth court was established by the Children Act 1908, we have learned much more about the variable and protracted development of the young brain, and undergone more than a century of social change. Today, a hard cut-off between jurisdictions based only on chronological age makes increasingly less sense. Aspects of justice system practice in England and Wales have adjusted in recognition of this – for example, adult sentencing decisions include maturity as a mitigating factor, and the Crown Prosecution Service takes maturity into account as part of its public interest test. But this approach has not yet reached the court process itself.
In the course of our research, we spoke with many court stakeholders who inherently recognised a need to develop a tailored approach for young adults, and who were enthusiastic about delivering adapted practice. The Lord Chancellor has recently lent his support to the concept of specialist “problem-solving” courts which would play a more active role in the process of rehabilitation. We hope that this may signal a willingness to allow interested areas to pilot new approaches. To this end, in the next phase of this work, the Centre for Justice Innovation and the Transition to Adulthood Alliance are keen to work with a small number of courts to plan, implement, and evaluate pilot young adult court approaches. We believe that our courts can provide a better response to offending by young adults, and in so doing make a positive difference both to their lives and to our communities.
