– Labour says benefit reforms are a 'moral mission' – it looks more like moral panic
Ministers say it's their 'moral duty' to encourage sick and disabled people to work. But is this 'morality' driven by genuine compassion or cost-cutting?
– Getting Britain to work without blaming 'scroungers' – can Starmer change the narrative?
Labour has vowed to end divisive discourse demonising out-of-work people as 'scroungers' - but how does this fit with its tough warnings about people who don't 'engage'?
– Why demonising people as 'workless' won’t solve rising economic inactivity
The extreme levels of poverty endured by economically inactive people (as highlighted in the government's own data) are a direct result of deliberate political choices to continually erode benefits.
I think the point I was trying to make was that the interviews I carried out left me with a clear sense that people were looking for more of a ‘transformative’ programme, post-Covid/Brexit/austerity than…
Labour strategists seem determined to cast Starmer as the sensible 'adult in the room', but in order to win lost areas he needs to be much more radical than that.