Back in 2009, months before the coalition government unleashed sweeping austerity, the then Conservative backbencher Iain Duncan Smith produced a study that would go on to lay the foundations for the rollout of universal credit. Now, nearly two decades later, Duncan Smith and his thinktank, the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), has published State of Dependency: a landmark report promising to expose “the full scale of Britain’s worklessness crisis”.

The study paints a picture of mass benefits reliance: it identifies 3,400 local areas where more than half the working-age population are on out-of-work benefits, or “economic opiates”, as the authors call them. They’ve even provided an interactive map (in the yellow and black colours of a road hazard sign, no less) so members of the public can type in their postcode to see if their neighbourhood is “a welfare hotspot”.

This is not just another ugly social policy report from a politically sidelined former minister – it is a gauntlet being thrown down ahead of Britain’s big benefits debate.

Next month, the government is expected to release two major reports into the social safety net: the Timms review on personal independence payments (Pip), which pays for some of the extra costs of disability in England and Wales, and the Milburn review into young people who are out of work.

It wouldn’t be overstating the importance of Westminster reviews to say their recommendations could shape the future of our welfare state for decades to come. With almost 1 million young people not in education, employment or training (Neet) and the disability benefits bill rising in cash terms, Andy Burnham will face immense........

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