The high levels of interest in our work reflect the sobering reality of the growing significance of the issues of low pay and insecure, poor quality work.

While successive governments have touted ‘work as the best route out of poverty’, the rising tide of working poor across the UK tells another story. The growth in high risk, low remuneration jobs – typified by the gig economy, zero-hour contracts and other forms of casualised labour – has meant that work doesn’t always pay.

The UK is currently experiencing a sustained period of labour market success. Yet, the experience of local authorities, charities and support services from across the country tells a very different story.

Walcot Foundation has made grants for the relief of poverty in Lambeth for more than 350 years but Step Up is the first time we have funded support for people in work.

Data from the 2017 London Poverty Profile paints a mixed picture for Londoners. Whilst employment participation has steadily improved across the capital – 73% of the working-age population now in employment – other indicators tell a different tale.

How do we repair this breakdown between work and prosperity – or at least work and a decent standard of living? From a skills point of view, we must start by building an effective post-16 education system so that a low-skill, low-pay job ceases to be anybody’s only option.

Families with children are the most likely to be locked in poverty despite being in work, and the risk of in-work poverty has increased for them since 2010 – especially lone parents.

While there is much to celebrate about the record high rates of employment, an increasing amount of attention is being paid to the types of employment that people are in.

As seems to be post-2015 norm, it’s been an eventful week in the world of politics and, as usual, the rumblings-on of Brexit seems to have drowned out other important happenings…