It is difficult to convey just how horrifying this council is.

On Tuesday, December 2, there was a meeting of the policy and resources committee. Tom Davey, head of housing, was asked about the plan to impose 80 per cent market rates on council house and housing association tenants. He confirmed this was now the goal but with the caveat that it would not be imposed on those already receiving housing benefit because they are too poor. How ostensibly reasonable that sounds and how staggeringly economically and socially illiterate.

An 80 per cent market rent for a two-bedroom house in Barnet would be around £200 per week and for three bedrooms £260. How many people in public housing does he think earn enough to pay those rents? The answer would be virtually zero. So these people would then have to apply for housing benefit, thus vastly inflating the public sector borrowing requirement and the national deficit, which the entire economic strategy of the Government is predicated on reducing. Sheer genius.

But that is not all. Not only does Barnet not pay full rent levels on housing benefit, once on it your earnings are severely curtailed and a marginal tax rate of 87 per cent is imposed, a level which no other section of society pays; certainly not Davey’s beloved Russian oligarchs. As a single parent to one child, living in private accommodation, my earnings discount is £71 per week after which the 87 per cent rate kicks in. But out of that £71 I have to pay £22 towards rent and council tax and find transport costs.

It is these policies that are driving people into huge poverty and causing the need for food banks. If only Keynes were alive today so Tom Davey could give him some much-needed advice.

Philip Clayton

Barnet Left Unity