Cost-of-living crisis is impacting women in Camden worst

Over the past three years we have been completing vital repair and refurbishment work to our town hall – fixing the building’s structure and fittings – so that the building can be a centre for civic life – campaigning, community collaboration and democratic leadership – for generations to come.

We returned this week for our first full council meeting in our town hall. We have continued to work on ways to open our council meetings to partners, citizens and communities – using technology but also building relationships with citizens and communities to help us open up the democratic process to more people.

This couldn’t be more important for huge societal issues – such as the continuing daily inequality facing women, girls and families. Last night, full council discussed a report by the Camden’s Women’s Forum which found that the cost-of-living crisis is disproportionately impacting women and making recommendations to the council and to government to create a better social and welfare safety net for some of the most vulnerable in our communities.

Cllr Nadia Shah says that women are coming into the cost-of-living crisis from a disadvantaged position (Image: Camden Council)

The forum interviewed 100 women living and surviving at the hardest edge of this crisis, hearing stories of women making impossible choices between eating, paying for heat and bills, paying for travel to work or to care for a relative or paying for school uniform.

Findings showed that women are coming into the cost-of-living crisis from a disadvantaged position as women continue to earn less than men in employment, that as 90% of single parents and 60% of informal carers are women, they’re experiencing increased levels of stress and isolation, and that inflation is also hitting women unequally. 

As a borough, we’re committed to doing everything we can to address this – women shouldn’t be going without food so their children can eat, or unable to find work around caring commitments.

We’ve already taken urgent action to respond to the forum’s recommendations, including promoting flexible working, creating a new uniform fund, and extending the Mayor of London’s primary school free meals for all pupils, but we know we must go much further, and we will be responding to the full list in a cabinet paper in July. This includes making national asks of government to take urgent action to invest in our welfare system, our public services and in crisis support, including increasing access to flexible working and funding good quality, affordable childcare for all children up to five.

Camden Town Hall has a proud history of campaigning, social change and radicalism – and we are proud that this will continue with new generations of Camden citizens, activists and partners.

Cllr Nadia Shah is cabinet member for Voluntary Sector, Equalities and Cohesion at Camden Council.