benefits

Social Security and Covid-19: An inadequate response to crisis…

Ulster University on May 21, 2020, 3:41 pm

| Readers 1534

By Ciara Fitzpatrick, Ulster University, School of Law Lockdown due to the Covid-19 global pandemic has had far reaching consequences for life as we know it. The economic repercussions will be huge – recent analysis by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has shown a 10 percent spike in unemployment, equating to around 2 million more people out of work in the UK. In the three weeks to 9 April, 45,000 new claims were made for Universal Credit (UC) in …

Counting the cost of Welfare Reform

Peter Donaghy (Salmon of Data) on February 8, 2015, 10:01 pm

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One of the most significant outcomes of the Stormont House Agreement was an agreement to extend to Northern Ireland the reforms to the welfare system that have been introduced in Great Britain. These reforms were persistently blocked by Sinn Féin, who did not want to endorse what they termed “Tory cuts”. The Treasury has fined the Executive £114m in the current budget for failure to implement the reforms, but they now look as though they are going to be introduced. …