Big Issue founder John Bird called for fundamental change to social housing and the NHS during a debate on intergenerational fairness in the House of Lords yesterday.
The crossbench peer pointed out how flawed decisions made by past governments had led to current day problems.
He said: “When I decided to apply to become a crossbencher it was because I realised all the work that I was trying to do around social intervention was always passing through the prism of government.
We were trying to turn the homeless into workers, but the government turned them into beneficiaries
“For instance in the 1990s, I [gave] homeless people the opportunity to stand on their own two feet, earn their own money and morph their way out of poverty. At that very moment, Mr Blair started to put a shedload of money into giving people social security who were on the streets.
“We were trying to turn [them] into workers, while they were turned into beneficiaries. That is one of the reasons why there is such a clogging up in the social housing system even today.”
Lord Bird went on to emphasise how prevention should be at the heart of policy, especially when it comes to health care.
