Conservatives and Labour disappoint while Greens take the lead in addressing poverty, say academics
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Ahead of the 2015 General Election, Academics Stand Against Poverty UK have published an audit of the main political parties’ manifestos, measuring their policies’ impact on UK and global poverty.
Each party and policy area has been scored on their impact, with the key findings as follows:
- The Conservatives and Labour are cautious and lack creativity in addressing poverty in the UK, scoring no more than average across the board.
- Labour significantly outperforms the Conservatives on Disability and Education in particular, but on Health, Crime & Justice, and Money & Banking they rank the same.
- The Green Party consistently scored the highest across a number of policy areas.
- UKIP performed very poorly, driven by low scores on Crime & Justice, and on Immigration. In Disability and Housing they actually do better than Conservatives but overall they lag behind.
- The Lib Dems were in the middle of the ranking, often outperforming Labour and the Conservatives. They scored very highly in two policy areas, Disability and Money & Banking.
- The worst performing areas, where all parties do badly, are Social Security and Employment.
- None of the main parties, except the Greens, have an effective strategy to address poverty.
Catarina Tully, Co-Chair of Academics Stand Against Poverty UK, said: “Neither of the policy platforms of the two main parties inspired confidence in our authors. We are disappointed to see they scored worse than average. This audit has reinforced how much the potential coalition parties matter in this election.”
Goldsmiths' Dr Johnna Montgomerie, Lecturer in Economics (Department of Politics) and Dr Clea Bourne, Lecturer in Promotional Media (Department of Media and Communications) contributed to the audit in the areas of money and finance.
Dr Bourne says: “Our politicians have collectively drawn a line through the financial crisis and put paid to further banking reform, while UKIP still sees a future shaped by finance-led growth. The Conservatives, Labour and Lib Dems all support more small-business lending, but offer no real vision for wider financial inclusion."
“The Greens are most radical, with their plan to transform the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) into a People's Bank. Yet no major political party seems willing or able to tackle our biggest financial crisis - the rising mountain of UK household debt, including student loans," explainsDr Montgomerie.
The final scores are as follows:
|
|
Conservative |
Greens |
Labour |
Lib Dems |
UKIP |
|
TOTAL |
1.7 |
3.9 |
2.6 |
3.2 |
1.4 |
|
Crime & Justice |
1 |
4 |
1 |
3 |
1 |
|
Disability |
2 |
5 |
4 |
5 |
3 |
|
Education |
2 |
4 |
4 |
4 |
2 |
|
Employment |
1 |
3 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
|
Fiscal policy |
2 |
3 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
|
Health |
2 |
5 |
2 |
4 |
1 |
|
Housing |
1 |
4 |
3 |
3 |
2 |
|
Immigration |
1 |
4 |
2 |
3 |
1 |
|
Migration & Security |
1 |
4 |
2 |
3 |
1 |
|
Money & Banking |
3 |
4 |
3 |
3 |
1 |
|
Social Security |
2 |
3 |
3 |
3 |
2 |
|
Sustainability & Environment |
2 |
4 |
2 |
3 |
1 |
Key: 1 = Very Low confidence, 5 = Very High confidence in the party’s manifesto in addressing poverty and enabling a flourishing life for the UK public
About Academics Stand Against Poverty
Academics Stand Against Poverty (ASAP) is an international association focused on helping researchers, students and teachers enhance their impact on poverty. It does so by advancing collaboration among poverty-focused academics, with an emphasis on South-North connections; promoting effective outreach to policy makers and broader public audiences; and helping academics pursue applied research and intervention projects as well as campaigns on specific issues.
The audit is led by Academics Stand Against Poverty (ASAP) UK. The contributors, peer reviewers and advisors come from over twenty different universities.
For more information, visit www.UKPovertyAudit.org, like the Facebook page, or follow @AcademicsStand and the hashtag #standagainstpoverty on Twitter.