Reality Check

Is Britain’s welfare state still a safety net or has it become a pipeline for long-term dependency? Almost one in ten six-year-olds are now categorised as disabled through the benefits system and, on current trends, that figure would rise to one in four 16-year-olds.
Reality Check’s Michael Simmons speaks to The Times's Fraser Nelson – former editor of this parish – about his investigation into Britain’s welfare system: why mental health and behavioural claims among children have surged, how disability benefits can follow young people into adulthood and why the system can leave people financially worse off for working.
Can Britain break the welfare ‘pipeline’ and what would real reform look like?
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Produced by Patrick Gibbons.
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For this special edition of Reality Check, economics editor Michael Simmons hosts a panel from Conservative Party conference on Britain’s growing NEETs crisis: the hundreds of thousands of young people not in education, employment or training. He is joined by shadow education secretary Laura Trott, the CBI’s Megan Bulford, Spectator commissioning editor Lara Brown and the CPS's Daniel Herring.

Why are so many young people struggling to enter the labour market, and is the problem education, welfare, the cost of hiring or something deeper? The panel debate the value of university compared with apprenticeships, whether tax and employment regulation are shutting younger workers out, and whether Britain’s welfare system is making it too easy for young people to fall out of work altogether. Plus: are rising anxiety and poor mental health driving the crisis or are they symptoms of a labour market that is failing the young?

Produced by Patrick Gibbons and Oscar Edmondson.
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Will the next debt crisis arrive as a sudden market rout – or is Britain already in the foothills of a slower one? Bond markets are back in the headlines, with every move in gilt yields read as a verdict on Westminster.

Michael Simmons speaks to the editor of FT Alphaville Robin Wigglesworth, author of A Fabulous Debt, about where bonds came from, who the 'bond vigilantes' really are, whether Liz Truss has a point about the Bank of England and why Britain's index-linked gilts have become so expensive.

This episode is brought to you by Artemis Fund Managers, for more information on our fund range please click here https://www.artemisfunds.com/

Produced by Oscar Edmondson and Henry Lloyd
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Michael Simmons is joined live at Labour conference by TUC general secretary Paul Nowak to discuss the state of Britain’s labour market. Are higher wages and stronger employment rights making it harder to hire, or are taxpayers subsidising too many low-paid, insecure jobs? They also discuss energy costs, social care, taxing wealth and banks, and Labour’s biggest mistakes in government.
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What is fiscal ‘headroom’ – and why does it matter? Michael Simmons explains how Britain’s fiscal rules really work, why changes in borrowing costs can wipe billions off the Chancellor’s buffer, and why losing headroom does not automatically mean another round of tax rises.
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