Caroline Lucas

Brighton Pavilion’s Green MP has warned that government cuts in housing benefit will affect Brighton and Hove more seriously than anywhere else in the South East – and will leave more Brighton and Hove residents struggling to pay the rent, more falling into serious debt and ultimately more becoming homeless.
 
The Green Party leader and local MP was commenting on a new report by homelessness charity Crisis.
 
Caroline Lucas MP said:
“The cuts in housing benefit will affect well over 12,000 households in Brighton and Hove – more than 14 times the number of affected households in West Oxfordshire, which is within David Cameron’s own constituency.
 
“People in one-bed properties in Brighton and Hove are looking at paying an extra £728 a year – thanks to a higher cut in housing benefit than anywhere else in the South East for that type of property.

“As an example, consider someone earning £16,000 and receiving housing benefit. If they lose £728 a year in housing benefit, that would be the equivalent of paying an income tax rise of over 4.5 per cent.
 
“These particular Tory-Lib Dem cuts will leave more people struggling to pay the rent, more people falling into serious debt and ultimately more people becoming homeless.
 
“This is very unfair, coming at a time when many of these people are facing economic uncertainty or even redundancy.
 
“Once again we see the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition’s cuts hitting the poorer people in society. The government could avoid these cuts by properly tackling tax avoidance and tax evasion perpetrated by some of the wealthiest, which could raise billions of pounds a year.”

For more information about the Greens view:
www.brightonhovegreens.org