Poverty Is Political, Not Personal
Poverty is routinely explained as the result of poor choices, bad behaviour, or individual failure. This framing is everywhere: in the media, in government policy, and in how people experiencing poverty are treated.
It is wrong.
Poverty Is Produced by Political Decisions
These decisions are not neutral. They reflect priorities:
Where Responsibility Belongs
When poverty is framed as personal, responsibility is pushed onto individuals and families in your communities.
When it is recognised as political, responsibility sits where it belongs: with systems of power.
What We See at Food & Solidarity
We see the same patterns repeatedly. Families doing everything they are supposed to do still struggle to eat, still face eviction, still live with constant insecurity.
These are not isolated failures. Indeed, the system doesn't consider them failures at all. They are predictable outcomes.
Treating poverty as personal justifies punishment and charity.
Treating it as political makes collective resistance possible.
Organize for Collective Resistance
Join members who recognize that poverty is produced by political decisions and organize together to challenge the systems of power that create it.
Become a MemberFrequently Asked Questions
Is poverty caused by individual failure?
No. Poverty is routinely explained as the result of poor choices, bad behaviour, or individual failure. This framing is wrong. Poverty is produced by political decisions about how much rent is allowed to rise, how low wages are kept, how benefits are capped, sanctioned, or delayed, and how public services are stripped back.
What political decisions cause poverty?
Political decisions that produce poverty include: allowing rent to rise unchecked, keeping wages low, capping and sanctioning benefits, delaying benefit payments, and stripping back public services. These decisions are not neutral—they reflect priorities that concentrate wealth and power.
Why does framing poverty as personal matter?
When poverty is framed as personal, responsibility is pushed onto individuals and families. This justifies punishment and charity. When poverty is recognized as political, responsibility sits with systems of power, making collective resistance possible.
What does Food & Solidarity see repeatedly?
Families doing everything they are supposed to do still struggle to eat, still face eviction, still live with constant insecurity. These are not isolated failures—the system doesn't consider them failures at all. They are predictable outcomes of political decisions.
37% of private renters & around 40% of social renters are in poverty after housing costs and that many households are only pushed into poverty once rent is paid.
After housing costs matter because it shows what people have left to live on, not what they earn.
Freezing Local Housing Allowance while rents rise is deepening hardship. We see this every week in the lives of our members. But increasing this allowance in a housing system without rent regulation does not solve the problem.
Sometimes change doesn't start with a big plan. It starts with people talking about what they're seeing every day, and deciding they can't ignore it anymore. That's how this campaign began.
It Started at a Members' Meeting
At a regular Food and Solidarity members' meeting, child poverty came up again. Members talked about how the two-child benefit cap was affecting families, and how immigration rules like NRPF (No Recourse to Public Funds) meant some families couldn't get help at all.
Someone suggested: what if we actually organised around this?
The UK Poverty report, published annually by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, is the authoritative analysis of poverty in the UK. Drawing on extensive data sources, it identifies who is most affected by poverty, tracks how levels have evolved over time, and examines what lies ahead. The report provides in-depth insights into overall poverty rates, deep poverty, and persistent poverty across different groups throughout the UK.
This Valentine’s Day, people across the North of England are choosing a different kind of love: comradely love. Love that looks like showing up for each other when rents rise, repairs are ignored, and eviction threats land on the doormat.
On 14 February 2026, housing groups, tenants, and people fed up with being pushed around by landlords and councils will come together in Sheffield for the Homes for Us North Grassroots Housing Gathering.
This isn’t a conference for professionals. It’s a gathering for people living in the housing crisis, and deciding to take action together, because nothing changes unless you and other affected people are directly involved.
Jan Forster estates limited recently called in administrators who downsized the company (reducing it to a single office and sacking staff) selling it off to the former managing director and daughter of the registered directors Angela Dennison (aka Angela Forster) as a phoenix company. The new company is DENNISON PROPERTY SERVICES LTD but will continue trading under Jan Forster Estates, in a triumph of personal vanity over brand viability.
This April, Food & Solidarity is running a practical workshop on housing organising - how to act when someone near you is in trouble, and how neighbours can back each other up instead of dealing with landlords and councils alone.
The day before, we're also taking part in a booklet launch that came directly out of that work.
These events are about what happens when neighbours stop dealing with housing problems alone - and start acting together.