As a side note to my previous post, there was another interesting finding from the TUC survey I mentioned.
When asked about benefits, 48% of people supported limiting increases to below inflation (vs. 32% opposed). When asked how benefits should change, 35% of people said that they should increase in line with prices, and 15% that they should increase in line with prices or wages whichever is higher. Only 25% said that they should increase by less than wages or prices. As prices are currently increasing by more than wages (the whole rationale for the benefits uprating bill), this means there is some proportion of people who simultaneously think that benefits should track prices, but who also think we should hold them lower than inflation:
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