Today, Bright Blue has published new analysis entitled Stepping up: public attitudes to addressing the cost of living crisis. The analysis is covered by The Daily Mirror, Politics.co.uk and The Big Issue.
The analysis explores what the UK public thinks about the role of welfare for tackling the rising cost of living.
Bright Blue’s main findings from this analysis are:
- 72% of the UK public supports the idea that “benefit payments should be sufficiently high to allow people to pay for their costs of living, such as housing payments, buying essential food and heating their homes”
- 67% of the UK public supports the idea that “it is the Government’s responsibility to ensure that all people have financial support to meet their basic needs”
- 68% of 2019 Conservative voters support the idea that benefit payments should be sufficiently high to allow people to pay for their costs of living and 55% of 2019 Conservative voters support the idea that the Government is responsible for ensuring people meet their basic needs.
- There is a cross-party voter consensus that the finances of vulnerable groups have become worse off since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.
- The UK public are divided on whether a ‘typical benefit claimant’ receives sufficient or insufficient support from the Government with their regular expenses, such as food costs (34% and 38% respectively) and housing costs (35% and 34% respectively).
- 43% of the UK public believe that Government support with utility bills is less than sufficient, compared to 28% who describe it as sufficient.
