> but they have increased universal credit amounts substantially, that will go some way to close the gap.
I don't think that is true.
They've increased UC by £20 a week. To our USA friends that is USD $23.30 a week.
I don't think that counts as substantial. It is barely going to touch the gap.
Almost nobody who was working last month self-employed is likely to be able to afford their rent and bills, or even just their family food bill, on UC going forward.
While on UC, in theory you can also get your rent paid. But only if you are renting somewhere substantially below the median market rate for the area.
Since the area is assessed over quite a large region, that means virtually everyone in a decent city has a rent level higher than is covered anywhere in the city, and people are normally required to move to the edges or beyond (or often into dodgy accomodation that would fail inspections).
But people cannot move now.
They can change their eating patterns, and refuse to pay bills (but watch out because debt collactors still have their jobs, and credit files are still recording).
And full tenants can stop paying rent, and avoid eviction. But watch out because when protective measures stop, evictions will resume because people will not be able to pay the backlog of debt. Especially if the landlord sees it as an opportunity to refurbish and raise the rent (I've seen this happen, find an excuse to get rid of the current tenant then add a 25% rent hike in the ad for the next one).
Worse than that: If evicted (eventually) due to substantial non-payment of rent, in normal times people struggle to find another landlord that will accept them aftwards, because landlords may contact a previous landlord for a reference.
But tenants can't move to a cheaper home suddenly, especially not all at once, and with no money or drivers to move everything.
(And lodgers, who are tenants living in someone's home with the landlord, are still not protected from eviction under current measures as far as I can tell. They are covered by different rules than tenancies, have few rights, are highly vulnerable if the landlord wants them gone. Notice can be as little as 1 week. There are a lot of lodgers in the UK.)
If there was rent deferral of some kind that would help. (Ideally where the government pays the rent so the landlord does not know the state of the tenants finances.) But the government has, currently, said no to direct help for renters. They have tweaked the housing allowance, but only by a small amount so it still doesn't cover the rent for the majority of people in suddenly changed circumstances.
And even with all benefits added up, it's still much less than the 80% that most salaried people are getting.
Self-employed are looking awfully screwed at the moment.
And people who got made redundant just recently are also getting a rough deal, unless they are lucky to have an employer who undoes the redundancy somehow.
Those people are unlikely to be able to get a personal loan to cover their shortfalls either. Many with already bad credit rating will get "computer says no", but those with good credit have a problem too: After passing the rating, they will be asked for proof of income, because it's the law in the UK since a few years ago that lenders must get that proof. Which people suddenly without jobs cannot provide.