A report has found that over 1.5 million people were destitute in the UK at some point in 2017, including 365,000 children. The chief executive of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation said that many rely on social security when hit with unexpected job loss, relationship breakdown, or ill-health. Yet local authorities and utility companies are forcing people into a corner when they are penniless and have nowhere to turn. Social security should hold people steady against powerful currents of rising costs, insecure housing and jobs, and low pay. Instead people are becoming destitute with no clear way out. To be destitute doesn’t mean getting by on very little, it’s losing the ability to keep a roof over your head, eat often enough, or afford warm clothes when it’s cold. You can’t keep yourself clean or put the lights on. This shouldn’t happen to anybody, let alone over 1.5 million people.