As Andy Burnham begins his term as Britain’s seventh prime minister in a decade, he takes charge of a country where young adults – even those who have “done well” in the eyes of their parents and grandparents – face increasingly bleak futures.
They can’t afford to move out of their parents’ homes. They head to the local Job Centre to be told there are no suitable jobs for them. As they get older, they question whether they can afford to have children or not.
Our new PM has been clear that their future is a top priority for him. In his first speech as Prime Minister, Burnham said: “We will help more young people into work by changing the education system and giving them more support [and] more mental health support.”
Previously, he described how voters’ complaints on the doorstep in Makerfield about the £12,570 threshold for the personal tax allowance are “lodged in his mind”. It has been frozen in cash terms since 2021. Much like the Rachel Reeves’s decision to freeze tax and student loan repayment thresholds last year, this acts as a drag on people’s pay rises, generating money for the Treasury at the expense of workers. Last year, at Reform’s conference in Birmingham, every single young Reform member I interviewed told me that the party’s promise to raise the personal tax threshold was the key reason they decided to join Nigel Farage’s party.
But improving the lot of younger people will be no mean feat when the bill for protecting the income of older people is so huge.
Publicly, Burnham and his team say that this is going to be a major “change moment” for the United Kingdom. Privately, they know they are constrained by Sir Keir Starmer’s 2024 manifesto commitments. Chief among them is the pledge to keep the triple lock on pensions, which ensures that the state pension rises every April by the highest of three metrics: average earnings growth, inflation or a minimum of 2.5 per cent.
Government data shows that spending on the state pension is forecast to reach £146.1 billion in 2025-26, accounting for almost half of the total amount Britain spends on welfare. In comparison, Universal Credit is the second largest at around £88.5 billion.
Politicians and economists are now accepting that we can no longer afford the triple lock, which means older people are guaranteed a pay rise when younger generations are not. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has recently warned that the triple lock is putting extra pressure on Britain’s public finances and creating long-term risks for our economy. But good luck to any politician who tries to tackle this – reducing benefits for pensioners is a politically dangerous move, as Reeves learned the hard way.
Since the 2008 recession, real wages have been more or less stagnant, making the last 15 years the worst for income growth in generations. Even though real house prices are now falling in some places, they grew so high so fast through the 2010s that buying a house is now almost impossible unless you have wealthy parents.
Whichever way he looks, the Prime Minister is in a serious bind. But young adults’ fortunes urgently need to be addressed.
Burnham has also made a pledge to end rough sleeping, which could prove costly. Bold and humane promises like this are one reason why polls show that Burnham is very popular amongst the young, but soon he will have to explain where the money is coming from to support working-age adults and keep pensioners on side.
By Labour’s conference in Liverpool at the end of September, we’ll know more about Burnham’s plan for young adults. Housing is top of his to do list. Youth skills and employment are also likely to be an area of major focus with the help of former Labour minister Alan Milburn, who is understood to be in close conversation with Burnham ahead of a major announcement in the autumn. Devolution of power away from Westminster may also help connect young people with more jobs, opportunities, education and affordable housing.
Under Burnham, all signals suggest that young adults may have more reasons to feel hopeful than they have for some time. The main issue, to paraphrase a note left by Liam Byrne when David Cameron and Osborne took over in 2010, is that “there is no money” to pay for everything that everyone needs and wants. Not everybody can be made happy, and communities that lose out will not easily forget. Some tough choices lie ahead.
Hence then, the article about young people won t forgive being forced to fund the triple lock pension was published today ( ) and is available on inews ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Young people won’t forgive being forced to fund the triple lock pension )
Also on site :
- ESMO 2026 .. Mabwell to Present Latest Clinical Data on Nectin-4-targeting ADC 9MW2821 for Triple Negative Breast Cancer in Oral Presentation
- ‘Heated Rivalry’ Is First TV Series Soundtrack in More Than a Decade to Achieve This Billboard 200 Feat
- On Sebastia’s hilltop, Israelis and Palestinians are fighting over who owns the past and controls the present