8. Plaid Cymru Debate: Household debt

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:50 pm on 1 December 2021.

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Photo of Jane Dodds Jane Dodds Liberal Democrat 5:50, 1 December 2021

I thank my colleague for that intervention, and you’re absolutely right—the exponential growth of that debt adds to the real weight on that particular family.

The second idea, again, possibly seen as a socialist, utopian idea, is one of universal basic income, and I do welcome the Labour Government’s commitment to this. But I would also like to see it going further and extend it to beyond the care leavers plus arrangement that’s being proposed. Universal basic income is this generation’s national health service. And like the NHS in 1946, when Winston Churchill’s Tories voted against it 21 times, we still see continued resistance to universal basic income being enshrined in order to give everybody the opportunity of a basic income level, which makes sure that they can feed their children, which makes sure that they can heat their homes, which makes sure that they have got a life which is about dignity. Churchill said in 1946 that the NHS was a first step to Britain becoming a national-socialist economy. The universal basic income that’s been proposed is actually one that I would implore again everybody to listen to, everybody to learn about. Before you condemn it, look at the evidence and see how it really addresses poverty.

To conclude, I would like to see many ideas adopted in order to support people that are in debt. We cannot continue to go on like this. And the pandemic, as we have seen and heard, has put even more people into that position. I support this motion, I want to see the Welsh Government take this forward, and I also would just like to finish with a word about the Conservative Government in London, which, in my view, has put even more people into debt through the withdrawal of the £20 uplift to the universal credit. Please support this motion.