Since early in 2010, that the cornerstone of the coalition government’s deficit reduction plan was radical and savage cuts to welfare spending. After announcing initial plans to reduce the benefits bill by £18 billion per year by 2014-15, they have ramped up the anti-welfare rhetoric further this year with the announcement that a further £10 billion is to be cut with a new round of reforms from 2017. What is absent from the government’s announcements on welfare ‘reform’ so far, however, is an analysis of just who it is that stands to lose and how exactly that loss will affect them. To some extent, the sheer complexity of the welfare system has assisted the government in hiding the cumulative impact of the changes.