Basic Income for Greater Manchester: Plans for a feasible, affordable and popular pilot

This Basic Income Research Group, UBI Lab Network and Common Sense Policy Group report sets out the evidence base for Greater Manchester to commit to a Basic Income pilot. The pilot would involve people from deeply disadvantaged backgrounds who are experiencing homelessness or are at risk of homelessness and connect to the Housing First and/or the Youth Homelessness Prevention Pathfinder initiatives.

The pilot specifically supports the the Mayor’s policy priorities which have mitigated a devastating growth in homelessness since 2010. As successive governments at all levels have recognised, prevention is better than cure in all the key outcomes that matter within Britain: homelessness, mental and physical ill-health, educational under attainment, economic inactivity and crime. There is considerable evidence that the most impactful approaches are those that address social determinants, most importantly poverty, inequality and insecurity.

We argue that a Basic Income pilot will offer immediate and practicable evidence by which to pioneer the development of ambitious policies that enable progressive policymakers to demonstrate their capacity to fix social problems. Crucially, the scheme piloted must provide the income security that is so important and genuinely remove disincentives from all types of activity, from physical to economic. Alternatives to Basic Income, such as Minimum Income Guarantee/National Living Income do not do this, and instead will likely make things worse. They would effectively bring the entire population into means testing and disincentivise any employment income below the guaranteed threshold.

Basic Income has the support of comparable communities and builds on the experience of similar interventions, such as the Welsh Government Basic Income Pilot for Care Leavers. There are clear pathways to fund an intervention of sufficient size without requiring revisions to tax codes. Most importantly, this is an opportunity for progressive politicians within the region, and others, to be brave and to demonstrate that big thinking can solve crises of insecurity.