UNIVERSAL CREDIT increased by £1,000 per year earlier this year in a temporary uplift which is lasting 12 months. In an exclusive interview this month, DWP minister Will Quince spoke to Express.co.uk about the uplift, confirming the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak is going to review the measure in the spring.
As we head into 2021, we re fast approaching a full year where contractors and freelancers have effectively been left out in the cold.
The self-employed have been hit hard by the pandemic with recent research from the Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed (IPSE) showing government support is not having much of an effect on the sector s fortunes.
They found the number of solo self-employed workers in the UK has fallen by five percent compared to last year.
Additionally, around 591,000 people became self-employed between 2019 and late 2020 and given the rules around SEISS, none of them would have been able to benefit from the support.
BRITAIN faces an exodus of self-employed workers unless the government urgently introduces new support for the sector, a new report has warned.
An inquiry into the impact of the coronavirus crisis on the sector found that less than a third are confident that they want to continue working for themselves.
The inquiry’s interim report, published today, found that more than half of self-employed workers had lost between 60 and 100 per cent of their income in 2020.
The findings were based on a survey of 2,500 people promoted by trade unions Prospect and Community.
The inquiry launched by the two unions called on the government urgently to introduce a new self-employment stabilisation scheme.
The last few days have provided a new context for the economic impact of the response to the Covid-19 pandemic. I had kept warning that the optimistic forecasts for next year were mostly based on the fumes of hopium and now it is clear that it will be a rough first quarter at least. Just like wars pandemics are supposed to be over by Christmas but seldom are. That feeds into our subject of the day which is the UK public finances which will be on a different path to the one previously expected.
Indeed that theme we could say is a different path squared as we note the way that they have changed this year already.
It fears that in up to 34 percent of cases furloughed workers may have continued to work while companies claimed grants.
The MPs are demanding that HMRC publish a full list of the companies which have signed up to the furlough scheme by the end of next month.
They report that HMRC “still does not know the actual level of fraud and error in the schemes” and will not have a complete estimate “until the end of 2021 at the earliest”.
There is also concern that the Treasury is not able to “provide even a ballpark figure for the expected cost” of the furlough scheme, even though more than £55billion had been invested in keeping people in work by mid-October.