Impacts of Debt

Debt on our Doorstep is embarking on a major review of Government policy to assess the impacts of debt on national aims in the following areas:

We have initiated this project by looking at survey evidence from the Bank of England on the distribution of unsecured debt, which reveals that low income borrowers pay back out over three times as much of their disposable income in debt repayments than their wealthier counterparts. Initial analysis indicates that, for the poorest households, the increase in debt repayments in recent years offsets any income growth brought about through tax and benefit changes. This has considerable implications for the Government's ambition to eradicate child poverty by 2020. Although the child poverty target is measured in terms of income increases, it would appear that growing indebtedness will mean that the living standards of many children will not have significantly increased.

We are currently seeking partners for this work and will report further on expected timescales for this project in the next few weeks.