the rich gets the gravy and the poor....

Today's Independent newspaper reports on a report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the crusading anti-poverty think tank.

Perhaps the most salutary finding of the report is that 2004 was the year when poverty, unemployment and house repossession began to increase. This was obviously before the recession began.

The recession has made things worse. Poverty, at least as measured by one indicator, is at the same level as in 2000, with 2 million children in low-income households. Unemployment is at the highest levels since the middle 1990s, and re-possessions are at six times the level of 2004.

It is difficult to see what any government could do about these problems immediately, with the public finances in such a mess, but clearly some attempt must be made as soon as things are under control again.