Abstract
Executive Summary
Oral histories provide insights into how welfare policy has impacted people over the last 100 years.
Working-class traditions of social solidarity and mutual aid are recurring strategies by which people respond to hard times.
A place-based sense of connection continues to provide an important starting point for practices of solidarity and effective care.
Policymakers must listen to the life experiences of those who are living with, or have lived with, poverty and their wider support networks.
DWP policy and state welfare provision must be ‘proofed’ to support citizens who experience life shocks and sudden changes in circumstances.