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Concerns raised in Bradford about cuts to welfare in Chancellor's Spring Statement

On March 27, during a scrutiny committee meeting, Plaid Cymru MS Llyr Gruffydd questioned First Minister Eluned Morgan about the reforms announced in the Spring Statement, particularly regarding their impact on Wales.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves' Spring Statement aims to reform the welfare state, targeting a £4.8 billion annual reduction in welfare spending by the end of the decade, including halving incapacity benefits under Universal Credit for new claimants, with the stated goal of fixing a "broken" system.
Critics like Mr Gruffydd and Baroness Mark Isherwood warned that the reforms would disproportionately impact disabled and lower-income individuals, potentially pushing 250,000 people, including 50,000 children, into poverty and straining public services, while the Resolution Foundation estimated an average annual loss of £500 for the poorest half of the population by 2030.
First Minister Eluned Morgan, while acknowledging potential impacts on families, defended the reforms by pointing to a £1.6 billion boost for Welsh public services in the 2025/26 budget and highlighting the need to address unsustainable increases in benefit claims, further stating, "I dont think trapping people in welfare poverty is a great position either."
While Naz Shah MP and Matt Rodda MP welcomed aspects of the Spring Statement, such as the rise in minimum wage and investments in public services, others like Lee Bloomfield expressed concerns about the cuts to the welfare budget and their potential impact on low-income households, with the OBR downgrading predicted growth for the year to one per cent.

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