Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has launched a furious attack on UK Prime Minister Theresa May‘s record on national inequality.
The pair butted heads during Prime Minister’s Questions, the day that after Corbyn tabled a no-confidence motion against May’s government following their thumping defeat in the vote over May’s proposed Brexit deal.
Corbyn said in the House of Commons: “Four million working people are living in poverty. There are half a million more children in poverty compared to 2010.
“The Rowntree Foundation confirms in-work poverty is rising faster than the overall employment rate. With poverty rising, can the Prime Minister tell us when we can expect it to fall – for the time she remains in office?”
May retaliated with absolute poverty figures – based on 2011’s median income – while Corbyn had been referencing relative poverty numbers (people who earn below 60 per cent of the current median household income). “We now see one million fewer people in absolute poverty,” she said. “That is a record low. We see 300,000 fewer children in absolute poverty. That is a record low.”
The PM also claimed that income inequality is lower than at any point under the last Labour government, and said a Corbyn-led Westminster would cost UK households £35,000 each.