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Universal Credit is a recently introduced state benefit which enables claimants to enjoy instantaneous debt by delaying their initial payment for up to five weeks.
Devised by the former Conservative Prime Minister, Ian Didn’t-Last-Long-in-that-Job, its principal aim is to ensure that work is always more remunerative than being on benefits, mainly by setting the level of these some way below the average weekly income of a single person under 21 on a zero hours contract with Sports Direct or Deliveroo. It has also sought to simplify a sometimes complex and daunting system by merging a number of different benefits into a single monthly payment which no-one could possibly confuse with an amount sufficient to meet their basic needs.
Although it has met with a measure of dissatisfaction among claimants, Universal Credit has been warmly welcomed by organisations such as pay-day lenders and food banks, both of which have seen a significant increase in demand since its introduction.
In addition, Universal Credit has also been used as the model for the introduction of PIP (Personal Independence Payments), which remove large measures of financial support in return for not using the word “disability” and thereby enabling recipients to apply for a much wider range of jobs which they are obviously unable to do.