90's Britain: The Big Issue

The Poll tax riots begun on the 31st March 1990 located mainly within Trafalgar Square, London with the intention of abolishing the poll tax.

The poll tax introduced a fixed-rate tax from all adult residents within one household, replacing the usual domestic rates. All 38 million adults eligible to vote in general elections in the UK had to pay the tax, which is why it is called a ‘poll tax’ - it was about taxing people, not property.

Many considered the Poll Tax regressive and unfair. The tax hit low-income individuals and families the hardest because all adults had to pay the same amount regardless of income. By default, the Poll Tax took a larger percentage of low-income individuals than high-income individuals.

The 1990's recession was a moment of financial failure within the UK. This consisted of things such as high-interest rates, falling house prices and an overvalued exchange rate.

“Rising unemployment and the recession have been the price that we have had to pay to get inflation down. That price is well worth paying.”

Norman Lamont, then finance minister in John Major’s Conservative government, uttered his infamous words.

Unemployment rose from 6.9% of the working population in 1990 to 10.7% in 1993, coming close to 3 million by the end of 1992.

The inflationary pressures of the Lawson Boom were one of the reasons given for the UK's entry into the European Exchange Rate Mechanism in October 1990, a move that was supposed to help restrain inflation but instead sent the United Kingdom into recession.

Homelessness was also a rising issue within the 1990's United Kingdom. In 1990, the central government launched the Rough Sleepers Strategy; a strategy to target people who were homeless. The goal was to reduce rough sleeping by two thirds, this was achieved by 2002.

Many argued that one of the main causes has been under-investment in house building and the operation of the policy of the right to buy for council tenants.

In 1990, 125,000 families were registered as homeless and a further 1.3 million were on council waiting lists.