The United Nations’ poverty expert, Philip Alston, has called the UK government’s coronavirus response “utterly hypocritical” following policies of austerity and public-sector cuts implemented by successive administrations. Tara Pilkington reports.
Philip Alston, a UN poverty expert, has said that that globally “the most vulnerable have been short-changed or excluded” by official responses during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Alston has also commented on how the most vulnerable members of society have been neglected during this time, with many being forced to work in unsafe conditions in order to sustain their income.
Warning that the pandemic could push a growing number of additional people into poverty, he said: “The policies of many states reflect a social Darwinism philosophy that prioritises the economic interests of the wealthiest while doing little for those who are hard at work providing essential services or unable to support themselves.”
He added “Governments have shut down entire countries without making even minimal efforts to ensure people can get by… Many in poverty live day-to-day, with no savings or surplus food. And of course, homeless people cannot simply stay home.”
Regarding the UK’s response to Covid-19, Alston said to the Guardian: “As for the UK, my thoughts of course hark back to the sense of how utterly hypocritical it is now to abandon ‘austerity’ with such alacrity, after all the harm and misery caused to individuals and the fatal weakening of the community’s capacity to cope and respond over the past 10 years.”
While the government has sanctioned cash injections into wages and businesses as well as announcing £14bn for the NHS and local authorities to minimise the economic fallout of coronavirus, many other social areas have been found severely underfunded during this period.
For instance, food banks, which many have become increasingly reliant on in the past 10 years, have lacked critical supplies. Additionally, frontline workers in care homes have struggled to obtain PPE.
Looking to the future, Alston said: “This pandemic has exposed the bankruptcy of social support systems in many countries.
“While some governments have embraced far-ranging measures previously dismissed as unrealistic, most programmes have been short-term, stop-gap measures that merely buy time rather than address the immense challenges that will continue well into the future. Now is the time for deep structural reforms that will protect populations as a whole and will build resilience in the face of an uncertain future.”
- For more news on the UN and coronavirus, follow: https://news.un.org/en/tags/covid-19
