Blog posts by Julia Unwin CBE

Does Housing Benefit reform spell a new era of Big Brother?

by Julia Unwin

Husbands and wives grow apart and no longer want to share a bed. Young people leave home and come back battered and scared when it all goes wrong. Grandparents provide more support for grand children whose parents are only just coping. We put up young people who are our children's friends - and a long weekend turns into three months. The children of a first marriage choose to spend more time than originally planned with the absent parent. And so it goes on. The point of family life is that it adapts, supports and flexes. For most of us this is a purely private matter.

Growth is not the enemy of people in Poverty

by Julia Unwin

The UK has always been a hugely centralised country, and London persistently dominates the national agenda. This year, in particular, all eyes are focused on London and the economic and social benefits the Olympics will bring to the country.

Budget 2012: the missed opportunities? #Budget2012

by Julia Unwin

Now the dust has (almost) settled from the Budget, it’s worth thinking about the missed opportunities. What didn’t we see this week that would have been welcome?

Here are three big things this budget didn’t do:

Budget 2012: A budget to help poorer people?

by Julia Unwin

We all know Budget 2012 is going to be tough. We've been told this often enough, and the eminent Tony Travers reminds us that the choices in front of the Chancellor are real and his room for manoeuvre limited.

So is there anything the Chancellor could do to help poorer people? Here are the five things I would like to see in the 2012 Budget:

Why we must celebrate – not ignore – ageing

by Julia Unwin

This decade is one of transition – transition as we adapt to our economic circumstances, transition as we try to reduce the impact of climate change, and transition as we conserve resources of all kinds. But it is also a time of transition in terms of demography.

Welfare reform debate ignores the facts about poverty

by Julia Unwin

The last month has been dominated by the parliamentary debate about welfare reform, and it has been tempting to see this as – finally – a big and public debate about poverty.

The Health Select Committee report on Social Care: let's hope it's not the Committee that cried wolf

by Julia Unwin

The Health Select Committee published a report today, on social care. It's a welcome contribution - and echoes much of JRF's research on how to improve the quality of care.

Reading the riots – challenging the received wisdom

by Julia Unwin

There was an immediate rush to try and explain the August riots. Within days – if not hours – pundits of every political stripe had taken to the airwaves to provide instant, fully-formed theories as to why our cities saw four days of looting.

This is entirely understandable, but it is also dangerous. Public policy cannot be developed by intuition alone.

Time to confront our fears of ageing

by Julia Unwin

For decades we have known that we are living longer, and that the coincidence of this with the ageing of the baby boomer generation means that we have both an opportunity and a challenge. That challenge has not been taken: pensions, social care, the retirement age, the notion of transition have all been filed in the 'too difficult tray’. The debate about ageing, and in particular the policy responses to it, has induced paralysis.

The Better Angels of our Nature

by Julia Unwin

I have spent some of the last week carrying a hefty book around on trains. The Better Angels of our Nature, by Stephen Pinker, has had a great deal of coverage and carries an important message. Pinker argues, eruditely and compellingly, that on almost every measure you can think of life has got better for everyone over the last few centuries.