Wednesday marked one year since the unpopular and unfair Bedroom Tax came into force, and Emma joined with MPs and Unite the Union to protest against the policy, which has caused financial hardship for some of the most vulnerable households in the country while doing nothing to tackle problems around housing supply.
Wednesday was also the birthday of Iain Duncan Smith, the Work and Pensions Secretary, who introduced the policy and has called it a “great success”.
But in South Shields the majority of people paying the tax do not deserve to do so. The tax is supposed to encourage people with spare bedrooms to move to smaller homes, but in Shields there are eight households affected by the policy for every smaller home available. This means seven out of eight people are penalised through no fault of their own. This situation is reflected in constituencies across the country, and that is why Labour has pledged to scrap the Bedroom Tax if it wins the next general election in 2015.
Altogether the Bedroom Tax affects more than 1,400 households in South Shields, and nationwide the tax affects nearly half a million people. Shockingly, two thirds of these are disabled people. Around half of the people affected now find themselves unable to keep up with rent payments, and councils now report that they are seeing shortfalls in their rental income which prevents them from funding new housebuilding work.
Emma said:
“One year on the Bedroom Tax has proved to be a disaster, just as Labour predicted. Vulnerable people are being punished for under-occupying properties, but the fact is that the vast majority simply have nowhere else to go. It is unfair and ineffective, and I am proud to say that a Labour government will repeal this policy if elected in 2015.”
Last year Emma led a debate on the Bedroom Tax in Parliament, which can be read here. She has also voted to scrap the tax together with Labour MPs, but unfortunately the Coalition defeated Labour on this vote.