The Labour Case for a Basic Income
As a Green Party policy, I feel a twinge of guilt for effectively trying to take the idea and set out the case for Labour to make it their own. I am actively promoting policy-stealing. But isn’t that what happens to the best ideas? All parties are now behind the concepts of the NHS, a welfare system for the most vulnerable and free education for all children but, at one point or another, these were all radical and society-changing ideas.
The time has now come for Labour to enact its next radical, society-changing idea. In every ‘why did you join Labour’ type discussion, I always come back to three clear reasons: the minimum wage, the NHS and the welfare state. When in government, Labour can do amazing things. These three amazing things changed my upbringing fundamentally as a child born in the UK in 1988. However an 1888 child would likely live in absolute poverty, potentially in a workhouse; have a high mortality rate, from no healthcare; and poor parents, from a damaging class system and no welfare state.
Today, poverty is less life-threatening that it use to be. You can still get your electric cut off, but you ought to generally have access to clean water and shelter thanks to human rights legislation and from the safety net of the state. Your healthcare is free, you may be on a waiting list but your life-saving treatment is always free at the point of need. Your employer needs to pay you a minimum wage, although arguably ‘some are more equal than others’ as your minimum will change according to your age. As does your entitlement to non-shared shelter, as under 25s can only get a small proportion of housing benefit.
It’s clear that the last 6 years of the coalition and now the Conservative government are already laying havoc to the fundamental building blocks of a healthy UK populous. So Labour has to not only defend these very precious things — and continue to fight for a more modern NHS, a living wage and better welfare — but to come up with new ideas.
The welfare state needs to be brought up to date and the way a citizen is taxed and assessed by need has to modernise. By this, I mean that no one working a minimum wage job should be in poverty. No one out of work should have to undergo humiliating assessments just to receive enough Jobseeker’s or ESA to live off, and be under fear of sanctions. No one should have to prove just how disabled they are, either physically or mentally, if they feel unable to work at that point in time.
Your health and wellbeing is your own, but the way the welfare state currently operates with a botched Universal Credit system makes it seem like the state owns it. Controls it. Tests it. Decides how ‘healthy’ you are and how exactly to get you back earning the minimum wage as soon as possible.
It’s not right. It’s not progressive. It’s not something one of the top economies in the world should be struggling with.
I’m calling for a Universal Income (as a rebranded Basic Income might be called). A Universal Income (or your UI) would perhaps be £70 a week. Enough for every person to have £10 a day to live off. Enough to get you some food, some heating and some transport. The very basics. £70 is not enough to live a life out of poverty. But it would mean no one every has to undergo a Jobseeker’s appointment again (unless they choose to). No one would have to prove how ill they are (unless they want to get a diagnosis). No one would have to be sanctioned for being 5 minutes late to an appointment. Ever.
£70 a week can replace Jobseekers, Employment and Support Allowance, the state pension, Education and Maintenance Allowance, tax credits and local authority crisis loans. How and how often this would be adjusted — for things like homelessness; care leavers; number of children — would be up for debate. But everyone with a UK citizenship would be eligible for £70 a week.
The benefits of this are innumerable. How about that part-time work would probably boom? Parents could decide to work more flexibly. Although wages may stagnate, as businesses find that people are happy to work for less hours a week, if they still receive a minimum wage.
The state would stop subsidising employers’ poor pay through working tax credit. They would probably subsidise less housing benefit for private landlords, as people find enough money for rent each month. ‘Benefit scourgers’ wouldn’t exist. You’d just be unemployed, ill or a carer. No other labels. Just circumstances. Choices. Decisions based on your own individual health, wellbeing and employability. Jobs wouldn’t exactly be ‘optional’; for any quality of life you’d still need a real income, but the Universal Income would ensure you never starved.
On the nicer side of things, it would massively help underfunded sectors like arts, culture and media. Freelance performers and writers could be assured that even with little work in one month, they can always afford a meal.
No matter what kind of pension you have, it wouldn’t matter. You’d get £70 a week, guaranteed. With two of you, that’s enough for a basic but not impoverished retirement. It doesn’t matter how lucky or unlucky you were in your employers’ pension offer; you’ll always have your Universal Income.
For the most vulnerable in society — those without families, money or skills — this is life changing. For the ill, the disabled and the vulnerable, fear the benefit office no more. No more describing how debilitating your illness is, unless you’re applying for some kind of extra credit income. By ‘extra credit’, I mean something akin to housing credit or disability credit, for the homeless and the disabled. If you didn’t quite fit the description for a particular credit, it’s ok, you won’t starve. Thanks to Universal Income.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. It’s very exciting that Labour’s Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell, is now actively considering this in policy talks. It could be the next big thing for Labour. After the NHS, the welfare state and the minimum wage, they could invent Universal Income.
