Seventy-fiveyears ago William Beveridge published his report on Social Insurance and Allied Services which founded the Britishwelfare state, we have also seen it’s impact and influence on many othercountries social welfare models .
The five giants , which were explained by Beveridge, were : Want (which addressed the mainsocial problem of poverty in Britain in the 1940’s), Disease (whereby the National Health Service act was passed), Ignorance (which stated secondary schooleducation should be compulsory while providing services such as meals andmedical needs), Squalor (reducingthe issue of housing shortages and overcrowding by building more housing) andfinally Idleness (keepingunemployment rates low) B. William , 1962. These ‘ five giants’ provide almosta blueprint to a successful welfare model if all these needs are addressed. Iam going to discus the country of Sweden which I believe has fared well interms of social provision and compare it to Nigeria , a country which has poorsocial welfare provisions in my opinion. Sweden, acountry that follows a Nordic social welfare model and regarded highly insocial policy provision has abided by the ‘ five giants’ to successfully providea fair social welfare system for the country funded by taxes. The Swedishhealthcare system is a public service operated by county councils which giveseveryone equal access to the services with the highest technology available androutinely updates .
This decentralised healthcare system was initiated byBeveridges plea for Disease. This honourableSwedish system is contrasted by the inadequate healthcare provision in Nigeria whereby the are an underwhelming amount ofboth privately and publicly run healthcare establishments. The government failto provide sufficient infrastructure and access to drugs, supplies andresources . Though recognising and addressing the deplorable healthcare issues, the Nigerian Government have failed to implement any changes due to the poorlevels of economic growth.
Dr. M. Osain , 2011. By not providingsatisfactory healthcare to its residents, Nigeria has still not successfullycombated the Disease giant set out by Beveridge and therefore has a failedwelfare model in my opinion. Housing conditions in Nigeria is one ofthe most prominent social welfare problems that the country has failed tohandle under Beveridges report on squalor. With the population rising from 40million in 1950’s to a staggering 170millioncurrently, the country is unable to provide decent housing to the populationand has resulted in a country that is severely over crowded and a majority ofthe population living in slums and poverty with up to 50 people sharing one bathroomE. Rosenthall, 2012.
The source of this problem is partly due to the culture of largefamilies in African countries with the average being 11 members per family in Nigeria. In an effort to decrease this number in the hope to reduce over crowding, the governmentmade contraceptives free to their citizens, but it failed to provide any sufficientresults due to the lack of healthcare facilities and because of culturalappropriations regarding contraceptives. There are essentially no benefitsprovided by the government in terms of social housing the only financialsupport being that loans are made available for building private housing. From myunderstanding the Nigerian government will struggle with this issue for muchlonger as poverty and overcrowding go hand in hand and the population shows nosign of slowing down. As a juxtaposition to this crisis I will discuss Sweden’ssuccessful approach to housing aid.
The localcouncils provide public housing which unlike many other European systems, arenot restricted by income and provide almost 20% of all Sweden’s housing stock CECODHAS, 2017. Social insurance in Sweden also provides benefits such as housing supplementfor pensioners and maintenance allowance along with a means tested housing allowance. anon, gov.
uk , 2017 providing these benefits increases the availability of accommodationand also the accessibility and support for citizens to be able to afford theirrent/mortgages thus tackling the problem of over crowding and squalor addressedin the ‘ five giants’.
