Migrant benefits at forefront of EU negotiations

UK says migrant benefits at forefront of EU negotiation (Financial Times) 

Philip Hammond said on Tuesday that Britain’s efforts to renegotiate its membership in the EU would look to reduce the “extraordinarily generous” benefits paid to migrants from the rest of the bloc.
 
The foreign secretary told the House of Commons that in-work benefits such as tax credits “distort the labour market and create a pull factor towards working in the UK that we need to reverse”.

“These issues are right up there at the front of our renegotiation,” Mr Hammond said, whether other EU countries “like it or not”.

“The basic principle of freedom of movement to work is not being challenged,” he said, “but changes to access to welfare are not merely technical.”

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Quarter of Londoners 'in poverty', though majority in working families (BBC News) 

A quarter of London's 8.6m people live in poverty, the majority of them in working families, according to a new report.

More than a million of the 2.2m people in poverty come from a family where at least one person works.

While joblessness in the capital is at its lowest since 2008, the charity Trust for London said the fall had not cut poverty.

UN inquiry considers alleged UK disability rights violations (The Guardian) 

The findings of a UN inquiry investigating alleged violations of disabled people’s human rights in the UK as a result of welfare reforms will not be published for two years, The Guardian has learned.

The UN launched its confidential investigation at a closed hearing in London on 14 October, at which UN officials took evidence on the effects of welfare cuts from UK campaigners, lawyers and disability service users.

The inquiry by the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) marks the the first time a country has been investigated by the committee over human rights breaches.