The UK’s most recent round of welfare reforms since 2010 have had far-reaching effects, leading to greater poverty, homelessness, indebtedness and foodbank use. But until well into the 2010s they were very popular with the public, who increasingly felt that welfare claimants did not deserve help. These changes were not matched in other European countries experiencing similar economic and social trends. Focusing on policies that provide relief from unemployment, poverty and disability, in this book Tom O’Grady sets out to answer two questions: why has Britain reformed its welfare system so radically? And why, until recently, were the reforms so popular with the public? He traces the evolution of British welfare policy, politics, discourse and public opinion since the 1980s, arguing that from the 1990s a long-term change in discourse from both politicians and the media caused the British public to turn against welfare by 2010. That, combined with the financial crisis, left the system uniquely vulnerable to cuts. He explores the roots of public opinion on the welfare system and the motives of politicians who have revolutionised the system, and how they talk about it. This an account of how, in the eyes of the public, deserving recipients of help came to be seen as scroungers; of when and why politicians and the media vilified them; of political parties whose discourse and policies were transformed, almost overnight; and of Britain’s journey from providing welfare as generously as the average European country in the 1970s to becoming an outlier today.