Baroness Keeley
Main Page: Baroness Keeley (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Keeley's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(10 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Duncan Smith
My hon. Friend is right. The way we have chosen to do this is to ensure that we test, learn and implement as we go along. This is exactly how we are rolling out the other programmes of change on disability living allowance and the personal independence payment, on the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission, and on the cap, all of which are now bringing benefits to many people throughout the country. The previous Government wasted £13 billion on the NHS computer system and £500 million on the Child Support Agency mess, including £120 million on the rescue scheme which was later scrapped. The benefits processing replacement programme, which some of those on the Opposition Benches were responsible for, was axed after £140 million of waste.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
Does the Secretary of State think he has the confidence of Treasury Ministers, given that as my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves), the shadow Secretary of State, told him, a Minister close to the Chancellor told The Times this morning:
“There are some ministers who improve in office”,
and there are those, like the Secretary of State,
“who show they are just not up to it”?
[Interruption.] No answer was given. How can a project of this scale be taken forward without the Secretary of State having the confidence of the Treasury?