Baroness (Patricia) Hollis, a former government minister, an academic and a prize-winning author, was taking no prisoners when she discussed the question of, “Must the poor be always with us?”

Giving the John Garrett Memorial Lecture 2018, Hollis gave a hard-hitting assessment of what she sees as a welfare and taxation system that, combined with particular work and family circumstances, traps many in “persistent poverty”.

“Our poverty is driven by inequality so, yes, our poverty is inevitable if we do nothing about inequality. Do nothing and the poor will always be with us,” she said.

Among European countries, Hollis said Britain was among the most unequal, if not the most unequal.

“We’re down there with the USA and down there with failed and corrupt states because the better off in Britain have higher incomes and pay less tax than anywhere in Europe,” said the Labour peer.

“We refuse to tackle inequality that’s the worst in Europe so we apply a sticking plaster and we leave the inequality untouched.”

The lecture, given in Norwich City Hall’s council chamber because the original University of East Anglia venue was unavailable because of strike action, was peppered with disturbing case examples.

There was the woman with a disabled son who had to take napkins from McDonald’s because she cannot afford toilet paper; there were the parents who miss meals to feed their children; there were the people who pay one quarter of their income just to service their debts.

“This is persistent poverty that really scars, especially the children, their health, their education, their job prospects, their life chances,” said Hollis.

She criticised an “often a punitive and downright ignorant DWP [Department for Work and Pensions] culture” that, she argued, unfairly removes benefits for sometimes minor transgressions. Also condemned was press coverage that labels people on benefits “scroungers and layabouts”, with particular scorn reserved for the Daily Mail, which Hollis said “legitimises our darkest instincts”.

Hollis said the perception that people in work have to hand over a significant proportion of their income to those who are out of work was wrong; she said most of us receive back, in various ways, most of what we pay into the system.

Another subject was changes in how wealth is distributed between the generations. In recent years, Hollis said pensioners have received an £11 billion increase in their benefits, while working families have seen their entitlements cut by £7 billion.

“Total spending is capped and as pensioners take a larger share, it’s taken away from poor children,” said Hollis, who later clarified that she supported the “triple lock” on pensions, which means that will rise by whichever is the highest out of 2.5%, average earnings increases or price inflation.

Poverty statistics are dominated, Hollis said, by lone-parent families and by families with disabled members, including disabled children.

When it comes to remedies, Hollis said changes to the living wage/minimum wage would have a limited effect, as most of those earning it are either young people still living at home with their parents, or are part-time workers who are their family’s second earners.

She does not believe a universal basic income (UBI) is the solution either, as needs vary widely depending upon circumstances (a single person will need much less than a single parent with multiple children, for example). Therefore it has to be augmented by means-tested benefits, in which case, she asked, “Why bother with UBI?”

Hollis, who in 2015 masterminded a parliamentary revolt that prevented cuts to the tax credits system, said that benefit cuts should be reversed, with a particular need to improve in-work benefits.

“It’s the state that must support additional family needs,” she said.

Money could come from, for example, reducing tax relief on pension contributions and scrapping the Barnett Formula, which determines the funding balance across the UK and is often seen as benefiting Scotland at the expense of England.

“There will always be short-term poverty. What really matters is that it doesn’t become persistent poverty,” she said.

“Poverty is constructed by us because we tolerate the inequality that constructs it and drives it.”