Frankie W

Fellow participants may disagree but I would like it if Child Benefit could be moved from the 13 payment 4-weekly cycle to a fixed 1st of the month 12 payment monthly cycle bringing it in-line with Universal Credit. This would help me with budgeting as I try to put as many bills as possible onto the 1st of the month where I know UC and pay will be in my account to ensure these are paid and I don't fall into any arrears. This is a relatively straightforward change for government which could be implemented quickly but make quite a big difference for people on low-incomes planning their finances.

The two hardest costs to manage are childcare and food.

The latter is the one which fluctuates the most. Things I do to manage costs: plan meals well in advance and do as much shopping in bulk as possible to take advantage of coupons and Tesco's Clubcard+ 10% discount for £8 a month service. Nonetheless, there's a limit to how much freezer space I have for buying in advance and the quid-pro-quo of clubcard offers and the discount scheme is I'm pretty much locked into shopping with Tesco. The idea of shopping around for deals at other supermarkets is pushed by the CMA but isn't realistic for busy working single-parent households.

With childcare the biggest issue is that only 85% is reimbursed not 100%.

The biggest things I think that government could do here are:

- Radically rethink the Healthy Start scheme by extending eligibility to be either universal for parents of children up to age 11 or 16, or cover all Universal Credit claimants receiving Child Element. Government should work with the major supermarkets, including growing players like B&M, to simplify the scheme so that it works more like a discount card than a separate payment, it shouldn't be beyond supermarkets and government to co-design an app that where scanned would then automatically deduct cash from eligible products purchased.

- Expand free fruit scheme for Key Stage 1 pupils to Key Stage 2 at an estimated cost of about £108million per annum. Not only could this boost child nutrition and help low income families meet the 5-a-day guideline (especially if combined with the next point which in total would mean schools providing 3 out of the 5-a-day) it could also give a small boost to UK fruit farmers.

- Extend free school meals at primary and secondary to be universal (ideal) or at the very least to all Universal Credit claimants receiving Child Element.

- The introduction of free breakfast clubs is very welcome and will save me £142.80 per year (this is the 15% cost not reimbursed for breakfast club costs incurred for my two children twice a week). The government must try to match the ambition with free, universal, after school clubs long-term (see IPPR report https://www.ippr.org/media-office/a-universal-childcare-guarantee-for-children-up-to-11-would-boost-economy-by-extra-13-billion-a-year-report-finds) but as an immediate measure though they could pay Universal Credit childcare costs at 100% instead of 85%, in my case this would save me £252 a year and more importantly it could allow government to shift to a model where registered providers invoice government directly for reimbursement rather than claimants thus making financial management much easier.

A third irregular set of costs that are difficult to manage are:

- not getting paid when your child is off sick and you need to stay home with them (don't have an obvious solution to that one!)

- school uniform costs (here my bold proposal is that if you work for a retailer or chain restaurant your uniform is provided by the employer, why couldn't schools be made responsible for the procurement and supply of their own uniforms to pupils each year with charges incurred for additional items where damaged or lost). Schools could then charge a fixed price for these (forcing schools to negotiate cheaper prices) and UC claimants could get them for free (or, again, it could just be universally free).