Majority of UK voters (81%) across main political parties agree UK Government is responsible for ensuring disabled people’s essential needs are met, new poll shows

Voters are unimpressed by the UK Government’s current record on poverty – especially people intending to vote Reform. The current government was elected on manifesto pledges to end the need for emergency food parcels and to make sure Universal Credit tackles poverty. Yet across the UK, 59% of voters told researchers the Government is ‘doing badly’ on reducing the number of people experiencing poverty across the UK. That includes 69% of Conservative voters, 28% of Labour voters, 61% of Liberal Democrat voters and 82% of Reform voters.

This comes as the Government announces cuts of over £5bn in social security payments to disabled people, which will risk leaving many people without enough money to buy essentials such as food, the charity says. Already, 75% of people referred to a food bank in the Trussell community live in a household where someone is disabled.

Slashing the incomes of disabled people who most need our collective protection from hunger is in no-one’s interests, says the charity, not even the Prime Minister and Chancellor’s. Just 57% of people who voted for Labour in the 2024 election currently say they would vote for them in a General Election, the poll finds.

Trussell says already more than three quarters (77%) of people getting Universal Credit and health or disability payments are already having to go without essentials. More than four in 10 (43%) are already missing meals to try and keep up with other essential costs. A fifth (19%) have had to turn to a food bank in just the last month.

This situation will get much worse if the UK Government pushes forward with these ‘cruel and counterproductive cuts’, the charity says. The public doesn’t want to see more people forced to food banks. Trussell says 85% of people in the UK agree that people receiving social security payments should be provided with enough money, so they don’t face hunger.

Helen Barnard, director of policy and research at Trussell, said:

“People we support have already told us they are ‘terrified’ of how they might survive cuts. It is truly extraordinary for the government to make huge cuts to the incomes of people already facing such severe hardship. These cuts risk damaging the lives of disabled people, and increasing the costs to our public services and economy by pushing up hunger and hardship. And these new figures clearly show they are out of touch with what the public wants.

“The public voted in this government for change. Irresponsible cuts risk the UK government’s pledges to us all. These cuts will cause immense harm to individuals, families and communities and risk driving more people to need to use food banks – which are already stretched to the limits.”

She says: ‘we all agree the system should work better’.

“The Department of Work and Pensions is making some positive changes to improve employment support, making it easier for disabled people to test work, and increasing the appallingly low level of the basic rate of Universal Credit. But these sensible reforms are being utterly undermined by the Treasury’s insistence on driving through record cuts,” she adds.

“There are more effective and compassionate ways to do this, to benefit current and future generations. Over the next four years, we need to see a new model of long-term employment support for disabled people and carers, so anyone able to work is genuinely supported to enter and stay in work. This means joining up work and skills schemes with better access to healthcare, action from employers to reduce barriers disabled people face at work, and overhauling job-seeking rules.

“The UK government is demanding disabled people bear the brunt of the challenges our country faces at home and abroad. This is both cruel and counterproductive. We urge the Prime Minister and Chancellor to safeguard disability payments from cuts and put the needs and voices of the disabled community at the heart of its plans.”