Our vision
Include the excluded
About the project
During the pandemic millions were excluded from government income support schemes designed to support them. Our project was used to find ways in which the government could extend support to these people and highlight the difficulties they were facing.
Our vision
We want to include as many people excluded from the income support schemes as possible.
Millions of people and businesses have been excluded
The Self-Employed Income Support Scheme and the furlough scheme were set up to support people during the pandemic.
Our solutions would include them
We have created numerous solutions to include employees and business owners in the governments income support schemes.
These plans will boost the economy
Our plans would boost the economy and would support small businesses.
Read the plans
We wrote four papers during the pandemic in order to include more people in the governments income support schemes. In total these plans came to 126 pages with solutions for those who were excluded and a call for a public inquiry into how this happened. You can see our papers here:
This paper shows how the UK could implement a new scheme to support small businesses and workers whilst also filling skill shortages.
This paper sets out the case for a public inquiry into those excluded from the Self-Employed Income Support Scheme and the Furlough Scheme.
This paper shows how the government could expand the furlough scheme to support more workers during the pandemic.
This paper provides solutions for those individuals excluded from the governments income support schemes.
Supported by
New Starter Justice
Basic Income UK
Excluded Unity Alliance
The Gaps in Support APPG
After we published our plans to include more people in both the Self-Employed Income Support Scheme and the furlough scheme we then launched a campaign on the issue.
Around the same time the All Party Parliamentary Group on Gaps in Support was created consisting of 216 MPs. The overall costings for our first set of plans were presented to the APPG and then our Expanding Furlough plan was presented to the group which you can see below. The APPG later encouraged the government to look into this solution.
The Expanding Furlough plan and our paper calling for an inquiry into the issue both received a response from the Treasury. Our campaign was also covered multiple times in the Yorkshire Post.
Campaigning on our plans
The next step was to spread awareness amongst the general public and to speak to those people who have been excluded. Thats why we had speakers at events in both London and Liverpool.
At this event we were joined by a few other members of the Centre team in Liverpool including Jasneet Samrai and Ryan Frendo. At the event Torrin explained just how large the six million people we calculated have been excluded from support really is. He also spoke about how it compares to Liverpool itself, the COVID-19 memorial wall, Wales, Scotland and Cyprus. He then spoke about the individual stories he heard whilst researching the issue of people who had been excluded and couldn't support themselves.
On the 30th of July members of the Centre team were in London to campaign for more people to be included in the governments income support schemes. This was alongside the Excluded Unity Alliance who organised the event on behalf of those who have been excluded. Alongside Torrin Wilkins, the Director of Centre, the speakers included Members of Parliament and Prospective Parliamentary Candidates.
Research team
Torrin Wilkins
Director and Founder
Torrin founded Centre in 2020. In the role has written numerous papers including one backed by the Gaps in Support APPG which contained 260 MPs. He has also written policies for political parties and appeared on a wide range of media including TV and radio. He has a Political Studies degree from Aberystwyth University.
Janey Little
Janey is a member of the Liberal Democrats and won a British Education Award in 2020.