What Are The Effects Of Austerity On British Cities

A Literature Review Investigating the consequences of austerity on British cities and the people within them?

Introduction - Understanding Austerity, who and what it has affected?

The UK's social situation has changed since 2010's government call for austerity, which has continued to today. Austerity is how a government changes their use of spending, through taxes and cuts welfare, to reduce the budget deficit; the spending of more money than it makes in taxes and other incomes received (Financial Times, 2018). Former conservative chancellor George Osborne called it "maxing out the credit card" (Stiglitz, 2017). Whether the initiative was right or not it has created hardship for the lowest earners and the unemployed in the UK. This literature

An approach that has created hard poverty dividing people Georgina Lee (2017) points out the wealth gap has increased, and house prices have outpaced wages; consequently, homelessness has risen, and people struggle to afford food. This has started since welfare in the UK has been cut from, Housing Benefits, Disability Living Allowance (DLA), Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA) and Personal Independence Payment (PIP); along with the Bedroom Taxation (Mendoza, 2015). This is also seen across Europe with many countries, rich and poor, trying to reduce the deficit (Bhattacharyya, 2015). Bhattacharyya also states that austerity causes attacks on pension rights and shrinking

UN reports have criticised how the UK government have conducted the rights of the disabled, mishandling their benefits (parliament.uk, 2017). Furthermore, the upsurge of gentrification in London separating family, friends and communities; leading some to homelessness. Crisis and the Trussell Trust have not been able to help the populace that is overlooked and the stereotypes that have been built up. Despite all this hardship people face they are singled out as a problem and have created their own situations. Also, if the claims of Johann Hari are true, that a lack of support and isolation leads to addiction, the UK further inflicts difficulties to societies most destitute (Hari, 2015). This Results in long term adversity for people in most cities in the UK. There is a need to change the method of production, delivery and consumption of food. This issue can be avoided by starting to plant food within cities, growing locally to the market demand (Lim, 2014) and using our waste more affectively (Go Copia,