Ruth Porter

Jobs must surely be one of the great success stories of this government: 1.8 million more people in work, and unemployment at its lowest level since 2008. Increasingly the coalition's welfare reforms are taking the plaudits for this successful turnaround. This success will only continue as the reforms bed in. The roll out of Universal Credit is important, not just because of how it simplifies the system and improves incentives, but also because once there is proper infrastructure in place it will be possible to move to a new generation of more personalised welfare services. The next critical step is to ensure that the hardest to help - people with multiple challenges - are given the assistance they need to help them into training and ultimately one day to find a sustainable job.

Industrial relations experts have said that the latest public sector strikes are unlikely to have any impact on government policy. I don’t think you have to be an ‘expert’ to reach that conclusion. The last time industrial action led to substantial demands being met was probably back in 1981, when the Thatcher government backed down over a planned programme of pit closures after an NUM strike ballot. And little wonder this was the last taste of success for strikes. Strikes do little but alienate people. The present set of demands – anger about a rise in the pension age for fire fighters from 55 to 60, a demand for substantially more pay all round and basically the undoing of almost all Michael’s Gove’s education reforms – lack public support.

Part of the role of the Church is to give the poorest in society a voice. It should be front and centre of the public debate about welfare reform, but the most recent intervention by Archbishop Nichols seems directed at the wrong target. The current disincentive for work in the welfare system is indefensible. It is telling that no voice has been heard in the debate on any side suggesting that it is a good idea to have a situation where people can earn more than the average wage on benefits or that moving to Universal Credit (a simpler system with a reduced disincentive to work) isn’t, at least in theory, a positive step. Welfare spending in the UK is now up around 40% of government spending (depending on what you include in the measure - this includes health).

With the recent anniversary of the Beveridge report, TV channels have been packed with an array of documentaries on our welfare system. Most of these have been fairly hopeless, trying to make their points with extreme cases. Channel 4’s ‘How to get a council house’ was a notable exception. With devastating clarity it showed how our social housing system is nothing of the kind. My grandfather, an electrician, spent most of the Second World War on Malta with the RAF. His house in East London was destroyed by bombing during the war. With no home of his own he stayed with relatives when on leave and happily fell in love with my grandmother who lived next door. They married on VE day and after a few years had a daughter, my mum.

We all want there to be some new quick fix for tackling poverty and a ‘living wage’ is the latest fad in this area of simplistic marketing slogans. The reality is far more complex. It is great that KPMG and many other companies are doing well enough that they can afford to pay their employees well. But some companies are barely surviving. In industries such as electronics manufacturing there are huge success stories, but there are also plenty of tiny family run factories that have struggled to survive offshoring –for companies like this paying their staff more simply isn’t an option.

More money, better services? You might have thought that Gordon Brown had already tested that theory to destruction, but here it is again in the coverage of today's Institute for Fiscal Studies report on education and schools spending. The IFS highlights that education is facing the biggest cuts over a four year period since the 1950s. And the coalition's opponents are gleefully seizing on this as a problem in and of itself. But it isn't, really. As CoffeeHousers will know, education funding increased massively during the past decade. The IFS admit this themselves: “Over the decade between 1999–2000 and 2009–10, it grew by 5.1% per year in real terms, the fastest growth over any decade since the mid-1970s. As a result, it rose from 4.

The elderly have been sheltered from cuts, so far at least. New research from the IEA suggests that the government could save an additional £16bn a year simply by cutting the various non-means-tested benefits older people receive and by making some minor changes to the pensions system.   Such a cull would include: the abolition of free bus travel (which would save £1.3bn per year), free TV licences (£0.7bn) and the winter fuel allowance (£2.1bn). In addition to those cuts, the state pension age should be raised to 66, which would save an extra £5bn. Abandoning the “triple lock” policy for pension increases from 2011 would save another £5.