Alexandra Jones, Policy Manager at Gingerbread, spoke to us about their recent research into the impact of Universal Credit sanctions on single parents and subsequent #SupportNotPunish campaign which urges the Government to scrap the sanctions regime.
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Gingerbread is currently funded under the Foundation’s national influencing programme, and we are supporting their influencing work to improve the social security system. Alexandra Jones, Policy Manager at Gingerbread, spoke to us about their recent research into the impact of Universal Credit sanctions on single parents and subsequent #SupportNotPunish campaign which urges the Government to scrap the sanctions regime.
Gingerbread supports single parents across the UK. We have peer support groups that meet in-person and online, as well as an advice line where single parents can seek support on issues such as finances, social security and their rights. Alongside this, our policy and campaigns team are advocating to improve things for single parents at a national level.
Our recent research, funded by the Foundation, investigated the impact of Universal Credit (UC) sanctions – having social security payments reduced or stopped for failing to meet a condition – on single parents. Off the back of this, we’ve launched our #SupportNotPunish campaign, which calls for a less punitive Universal Credit system that provides a safety net for people who need it.
Single parents only have one income and are likely to have fewer savings than coupled parents, alongside the practical challenge of not having a partner to share the load of everyday tasks. This means that it can be more challenging for single parents to meet the ‘conditions’ of Universal Credit, such as attending meetings if they have childcare issues, putting them at increased risk of sanctions. It also means that they can be hit harder by sanctions as they have less of a financial safety net to fall back on.
There are 2 million single parents in the UK, making up almost a quarter of all families. These families are significantly more likely to experience financial hardship and they are almost twice as likely to be living in poverty than coupled parents.
- Gingerbread
The majority of single parents are receiving some Universal Credit, while also being in work, which highlights how vital UC is to help them make ends meet. But social security policies can often have negative consequences for single parents, because there is sometimes an implicit assumption that every household has a dual income. There is also a lack of research on single parents and the impact of policies on them. That’s why we felt like this project was particularly important and timely since the Government has committed to a Universal Credit review and overhaul of job centres, as well as developing a strategy to tackle child poverty.
We involved people with lived experience at every stage of the research – from designing the questions to feeding back on the written report. We worked with our partners Himmah and HomeStart Lambeth to carry out desk research, surveys, and interviews with single parents about their experiences of the social security system, sanctions and their relationships with their work coaches at Job Centres.
A key finding from our research was that single parents found the social security system confusing and hostile, with sanctions (and the threat of them) impacting negatively on their mental health and often pushing them into financial crisis. It’s not just parents that suffer – the effects of sanctions are felt by the entire family. As Kelly, a single parent of two pre-school aged children, told us: “they (the DWP) are sanctioning the children.”
Kelly was sanctioned for missing an appointment and had to sell household items, borrow money from family and friends and rely on food vouchers to fill the gap that sanctions had created in her finances. She successfully appealed the sanction but getting the money back took a long time.
A common theme in our discussions was a sense that the social security system makes people ‘jump through hoops’, with unclear guidance. One parent said: “It feels like a very stressful process, and you are always on edge about if you are doing the right thing or if you aren’t following their rules. I don’t find the staff very empathetic or easy to talk to at all when there are queries.”
Citizens Advice told us that people they have supported were often sanctioned for missing meetings due to ill health, caring responsibilities or phone or internet issues. For single parents, we know that access to childcare can pose a major barrier to attending appointments which puts them at increased risk of sanctions. In our research they told us that they had been sanctioned despite doing everything they could to avoid it and then had to work hard to challenge sanctions.
Our research provides a compelling argument as to why sanctions can be so detrimental – not just to single parents, but in general – and we want the Government to consider the benefits of scrapping the sanctions regime. If sanctions are to continue, we want the Government to ensure that they are only used in the most exceptional circumstances and with forewarning.
Alongside that, we want the Government to revoke the changes to conditionality which now requires lead carers to work, or look for work, 35 hours a week. Many single parents are happy in a part time job or are in part time education and these changes put increased pressure on people to take jobs that may not be suitable, while also juggling caring responsibilities. We're also asking for the Government provide specialist work coaches that really understand single parents’ needs and some of the additional challenges that they might face so that they can appropriately support them.
Since launching the report, we’ve had several influencing opportunities, including the Labour Party conference, where we co-hosted an event on social security reform with the Institute of Public Policy Research, and one of our single parent campaigners, Faith, shared her experiences.
Our report has really resonated with single parents and hundreds of them have shared it with their MPs. Encouragingly, there has been a positive response from policy makers and Alison McGovern has said that the report is going to inform the child poverty taskforce’s work. This is so important, since 44% of children in single parent families are in living poverty and we didn’t want issues specific to single parents to be left out of the conversation.
By the time I was getting ready to attend the [Labour] party conference, there was of course a bit of nervousness of talking to a whole crowd of politicians and policymakers who will have their own presumption about benefit recipients.
In the beginning when I was asked to tell my story, it was like delving into my ordeal once again. The difference this time is that I felt heard and even at the end had a fellow single parent stand in solidarity with me.
- Faith, single parent campaigner with Gingerbread
Faith shares her experience of UC sanctions at the Labour Party Conference
One of the main successes of this project is that we’ve been able to connect with more single parents. The feedback we received from participants was that the discussions about UC sanctions and the opportunity to contribute to the research helped them feel like they can get their voices heard by policy makers and that they’re not alone. Having these conversations has helped to remove some of the stigma surrounding sanctions, encouraging parents to open up about their experiences and, in turn, enabling them to get more support. Some of the parents involved have subsequently joined local Gingerbread groups and are keen to be more involved in our advocacy work.
Since launching the report, we’ve found that more single parents are turning to us for support with sanctions related issues. Previously, we haven't necessarily been the organisation that they've been gravitating towards, or maybe they've internalised that sense of blame and felt they had to deal with it alone. So, it’s been really encouraging that single parents affected by sanctions are now reaching out for support.
Being part of The Foundation’s national influencing programme has helped us connect with other charities in the cohort that are doing similar things. For example, we met Public Law Project through a Foundation networking event. They are doing a project on sanctions as well, looking at whether sanctions can be legally challenged and how to support people with that. Knowing that there's an organisation doing that has been really useful and we’ve been able to refer some people to them for support and legal advice.
The Foundation has been very good at supporting and amplifying our projects, as well as highlighting to us other projects that we might not have known about. It’s been particularly good to see what some of the smaller charities are doing around influencing the social security system, because often identifying national issues comes from finding out what smaller charities are hearing and experiencing in their local areas.
- Alexandra Jones, Policy Manager, Gingerbread
Moving forward, we will be making the most of the influencing opportunities as part of the Government’s Child Poverty Strategy and the upcoming Universal Credit review. We’ll be asking for meetings with ministers and civil servants and inviting single parents with lived experience to be involved in the discussions.
As charities, we want to be challenging MPs and calling out injustices but we also have a role to play in making it as easy as possible to understand the issues that people are facing. That’s why it was so important to us that the sanctions report was accessible, and why we welcomed all MPs in the new Parliament with a letter outlining a couple of our key campaigning priorities. If we can build a supportive relationship with MPs and present information in an accessible way, then we hope that they will feel confident to raise this issue in a debate and support the changes we are asking for.
In Spring/Summer 2025, we are going to hold a cross-party parliamentary event where there will be an opportunity for MPs to hear stories from single parents in their constituencies. Including people with lived experience in our influencing work on this issue has been challenging because people can understandably be reluctant to speak about it publicly as it can be an emotive and sensitive issue. So, we want to humanise the issue in creative ways, while preserving people’s anonymity if preferred, with an exhibition of words, images and voice notes.
Having this compelling research with people's stories at the heart of it is a powerful tool that we will continue to use in our influencing work. We hope that our campaign will continue to gain support from members of all political parties so that changes will be made to ensure that single parents and others are supported rather than punished by the UC system.
I would absolutely encourage other single parents to get involved with campaigning as it gives us an opportunity to challenge the status quo respectfully and be seen, which without this, changes cannot be achieved in policies for single parents.
- Faith, single parent campaigner with Gingerbread
