Throughout this election period we have challenged party leaders to get to grips with the most insidious issue corroding Britain today – poverty.
In our Big Issue Blueprint for Change we set out key policies we believe will help lift millions out of the deep poverty trap they are in and help build to a better future.
In recent weeks over 12,000 Big Issue readers and backers have signed a petition to demand an end to poverty following the 4 July vote. This week our ambassadors Daniel Mays, Christopher Eccleston and George Clarke joined the push.
We have taken this call to the two men who are fighting to be the next prime minster, Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer, and to John Swinney and Sir Ed Davey, the two other leaders likely to see their parties command the next largest collection of seats in Westminster.
We also, among others, brought them questions posed by our Big Issue vendor colleagues.
This, then, is the state we will be in.
Keir Starmer Labour
Poverty is a moral stain on our society. The last Labour government lifted over half a million children out of poverty and the next Labour government will build on that legacy. We’ll have an ambitious, wide-ranging child poverty strategy, we’ll give all children in primary school free breakfast, protect renters from arbitrary eviction, slash fuel poverty and ensure work is decent and secure for all. We will deliver the change our country needs, with an ambitious agenda to bring hope and opportunity to the next generation, and ensure everyone is better off with Labour.
Rishi Sunak Conservative
Work is the best way out of poverty, as Big Issue shows, and our welfare reforms have helped around four million more people move into work since 2010. We have brought child poverty down since 2010 and reduced the number of children living in workless households by around a third. As part of our clear plan, we have significantly expanded free childcare for working parents so that parents can go back to work or increase their hours. This is so important because children living in households where all adults work are around five times less likely to be in absolute poverty than those living in workless households. We have also provided a £108 billion cost of living support package over the last few years to help households through the period of high inflation caused by Putin’s war, preventing 1.3 million people from falling into poverty.
John Swinney SNP
I have made the mission to eradicate child
