WUNRN

http://www.wunrn.com

 

Women's Resource Center - UK

http://www.wrc.org.uk/resources/facts_and_statistics_on_womens_inequality_in_the_uk.aspx

 

UK - CUTS IN AUSTERITY PUBLIC SPENDING & IMPACTS ON WOMEN

 

Women and the Cuts 2012 (PDF 390KB)


Women and the Cuts 2012 (Word 616KB)
 


 

Introduction

 

Since the 2010 General Election, the Coalition government has introduced an unprecedented austerity package of cuts to public spending in order to tackle a national deficit of over £120bn. Within a context of global and acute European financial crisis, many people in the UK are facing unemployment, cuts to benefits, and financial hardship. Areas of the UK that were previously struggling, such as the North East, have fallen further into poverty and deprivation. The media is increasingly reporting news of a housing crisis, a ‘lost’ generation of young and long-term unemployed and the potential return of a 1920’s era Great Depression.

 

However, it is women who are at the sharp end of the effects of austerity: as the statistics in this briefing demonstrate, it is women who are increasingly unemployed or taking underpaid work; women who are losing money for childcare and other basic needs through welfare cuts; and women who are losing vital support from voluntary and community organisations which have closed due to lack of funding. With 88% of the cuts still to be implemented[i][i], it is clear that we are only experiencing the beginning of the impact of the cuts.  

 

Many of the reforms that have been announced are yet to become legislation and will be phased in over the next two or three years. There are a number of key issues that will affect women’s equality which will be introduced this year:








[i][i] Institute for Fiscal Studies (2012), The IFS Green Budget http://www.ifs.org.uk/budgets/gb2012/12chap3.pdf