MP DEBBIE Abrahams has delivered a broadside at Chancellor Philip Hammond’s budget and called for a “new Beveridge report” for the 21st century.

The original Beveridge report, published in 1942, is widely acknowledged to have been influential in the founding of the welfare state in the aftermath of the Second World War.

The MP for Oldham East and Saddleworth pointed out that the Chancellor “did not say a word about the rising level of homelessness” in his budget.

She went on: “I’m not just talking about the 169 per cent increase of rough sleepers since 2010, visible on our streets across our towns and cities and up and down the country, but of families living in temporary accommodation or people sofa surfing as they aren’t deemed a housing priority need.

“To this Government’s shame, statutory homelessness has quadrupled to 18,000 a year over the period.

“This epitomises the Government’s neglect of too many of our citizens and reflects not just their failure to ensure there are enough homes for us all, with social and affordable homes as part of that mix, but also of ill-conceived social security policies including their flagship programme, Universal Credit, which are contributing to this homelessness.

“One homeless shelter has said that UC is the reason a third of their residents are there.”

She also said that sick and disabled people who are in-work, were worse off with pre-budget UC and this has worsened following the budget.

“Those who are working and on Personal Independence Payment (about 13 per cent of low income disabled households) will receive about £28 a week or £1456 a year less compared with legacy benefits. I cannot fathom the decision-making that deems that this is acceptable.”

And she added: “We need a new Beveridge report for the 21st Century, defining a new social contract with the British people, addressing the poverty, inequalities and indignity millions of people, women and men, young and old, are enduring; bringing hope to a new generation as it did 76 years ago.

“Inequalities are not inevitable but to tackle them in all their forms takes commitment, it takes courage and it takes leadership.”