Housing Benefit (Abolition of Social Sector Size Criteria)

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Barbara Keeley]

rose—

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

I have given way to an Opposition Member, so I give way to my hon. Friend.

[Angie Bray]

I absolutely appreciate the principle that we need to match housing to housing need, and we certainly need more family-sized houses for larger families. Does my hon. Friend agree, however, that for the spare room subsidy policy to work fairly, as well as effectively, there will have to be a sufficient number of one-bedroom properties for those who have to downsize to move into, so that they do not face penalties when they are trying to do the right thing but cannot?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend makes a good and sensible point. It is worth putting on the record that there are 1.4 million one-bedroom homes across the social rented sector, with significant turnover. Sixty per cent. of social sector tenants require only one bedroom because they are single or childless couples, and local authorities and housing associations are now starting to match their new building more accurately to that profile. Seventy-seven per cent. of homes approved under the new affordable housing scheme are one or two-bedroom homes—up from 68% in the last round—and the proportion of one -bedroom homes is up from 17% to 20%. The policy is having the desired effect in terms of the building of new homes.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Monday 10th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

We are, at the moment, continuing with Labour’s constraints on NEST, and the reason is that those constraints were designed to encourage NEST to focus on low-income savers. It has therefore innovated on, for example, products and on language and has been a good thing. If we think that NEST is unable to achieve the job it is there for, we will change the rules, but the early evidence does not support that.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

5. What recent steps he has taken to prevent benefit tourism.

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[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

The European Commission wants to end the habitual residence test. As a result, we would have to pay benefits to EU migrants as and when they arrive and they would not have to prove that they have been here, are working and have a residence. I believe that that is fundamentally wrong, as do the Government. The habitual residence test is vital to protect our benefits system and to stop such benefit tourism. I also do not believe that the EU has any rights in that area, and we are working with other countries that feel much the same.

[Angie Bray]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. Does he agree that any measures that encourage benefit tourism place an intolerable burden on counties, such as ours, that provide generous welfare provision and that we need an agreement across Europe to protect countries from that threat?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Yes, I agree with my hon. Friend. I referred to working with other countries, and a large number of other member states also have real concerns about the move and believe that they, too, will be affected. Among them are 17 member states, including Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Finland, that attended a conference we held and they all expressed their concern. We are working with them on a set of agreed principles that we will present to the EU, which I hope will end this nonsense.

Specialist Disability Employment

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Tuesday 10th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

I confirm that I met the specialist disability training colleges some three weeks ago and have further extended the contracts available to them to provide specialist support. They will have an important role, and we are working with them to ensure that we define that role carefully so that it meets the needs of disabled people.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

Those working in the Remploy factory in Acton will obviously be disappointed by today’s news. Can my hon. Friend provide some reassurance that they will get full support as they lose their jobs, and will she give us some details of the timetable for that support?

[Maria Miller]

Both the Secretary of State and I have visited the Acton factory in my hon. Friend’s constituency, and I know that this will be a difficult time for the 31 people who work there. I can confirm that we are already ensuring that a tailored package of support is in place for each individual who is affected. It is important, however, to acknowledge that that factory, like the others that we are discussing, has sizeable operating losses—more than £700,000-worth last year. I am sure she will agree that we could use that money better to support more disabled people into work.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Monday 25th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

19. What recent assessment he has made of the benefits for jobseekers of undertaking work experience.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Early analysis shows that approximately half of participants are off benefit within 21 weeks of starting a work experience placement. I am delighted that, despite a campaign run by anarchists and members of the Labour party, just like hon. Gentlemen on the Benches opposite me, to try to blight the chances of these young people, employers continue to come forward to join this excellent scheme. Young people have overwhelmingly shown that they want this valuable experience by continuing to volunteer to do their part.

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[Mr Duncan Smith]

I agree with my hon. Friend. One of the big problems we had was that some people, including the Labour party and those anarchists, have tried to stop those companies from doing that. I sometimes get confused as to who the anarchists are and who the Labour party members are when I look at the Opposition line-up, but the reality is that this is good for the young people who do it; it is good in terms of their experience; and they actually ask for it in the first place.

[Angie Bray]

When travelling around my constituency, I have been very struck by how enthusiastic young people are to get work experience. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, despite what the cynics say, young people are very keen to get work experience because they know that it helps prepare them for a real job?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I agree. Actually it is so good that they volunteer for it; I wonder whether we should run a work experience programme for those on the Opposition Front Bench.

Living Standards

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Wednesday 30th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right—and that is why unemployment is set to spiral over the course of this Parliament, with £24 billion on the benefit bill, which means a £1,000 extra bill for every household in this country.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

As I have found before, the right hon. Gentleman does not like history. The fact is that a note was left saying, “There’s no money left,” and that had consequences. This country is living and breathing the consequences of how Labour managed the budget. We are in deficit, which is why we talk about it so often, and it is about time the Labour party recognised the consequences of the way in which it managed this country’s finances.

[Mr Byrne]

Perhaps the hon. Lady’s memory of history is suddenly faltering, because she should surely remember that in the Chancellor’s emergency Budget, borrowing turned out to be £20 billion less than my right hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West projected when he was Chancellor. Unlike his, the Conservatives’ borrowing forecasts have come in £158 billion higher than originally projected. That means thousands of pounds more for every household in this country—and of course, the price of the consequences is being paid by the hon. Lady’s constituents. More than 7,000 families in her constituency are now seeing their tax credits cut to pay the higher bills of higher unemployment.

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[Brandon Lewis]

My hon. Friend is right, and directs me perfectly to the point I was about to make, which is that apprenticeships are a hugely important part of raising living standards. In my constituency alone, the number of people taking up apprenticeships has increased by about 60%. Apprenticeships give opportunities for people to get real-time work experience and for companies to train people so that they have the skill set that readies them to take on work. One of the things the Government have done well and that we can do more of is highlight the value of apprenticeships, so that young people do not regard university as their only or primary option, but see apprenticeships and going straight into the workplace as a genuine, viable and valuable way to contribute to their own family as much as to society.

[Angie Bray]

Does my hon. Friend agree also that the Government’s creation of the national citizen service scheme, which is giving 16-year-olds the chance to train together, work together and develop projects together, provides a sure-fire way for them to gain the self-esteem and the confidence they need to take them forward into the workplace?

[Brandon Lewis]

Absolutely, and I would add that we also need to look at how to get businesses growing faster and quicker to employ more people. Having more people working in the private sector is without doubt the best way to raise living standards both for them and for our country, because having more jobs reduces welfare costs. That is hugely important and it is why I was so pleased to hear the Chancellor’s announcement yesterday about fuel duty being frozen and not increased in January. That, combined with the work already done to get rid of the fuel duty escalator, will get prices, although high, lower than they would otherwise have been. That is important—

Youth Unemployment

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

Under the Labour Administration, youth unemployment was 300,000 lower on average than under this Government today, even while the economy is supposed to be in recovery.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

I recall writing a letter to my local newspaper in November 2009 berating the then Labour Government, whom the right hon. Gentleman served, for a 59% rise in the latest unemployment figures. Although he does not want to talk about history, does he accept that context is very important and that his own Government had a lot to answer for in relation to youth unemployment?

[Mr Byrne]

Let me remind the hon. Lady that under the previous Government, even at a time of recession, youth unemployment and long-term youth unemployment were coming down. That is because in the face of a crisis we chose to act. The question that she has to answer—

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Monday 28th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The hon. Gentleman will therefore be pleased with the design of the universal credit, because the one thing that it will tackle hugely, which is why there is an extra cost to it, is under-claiming, which will stop. Those who are eligible and who should have their money will be able to get it. Better still, that will improve the level of those coming out of poverty, as opposed to what happened under the previous Government.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

The Secretary of State may recall a row that broke out when a family on benefits was moved into a house in Acton worth well over £1 million, which people on average salaries would only dream of. Does he agree with those constituents who tell me that these reforms are fair not only to those in work, but to the taxpayer? Why has it taken so long for common sense to prevail?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Most people who work hard and who are on marginal incomes will consider it reasonable that the benefits system does not pay more than average earnings, which turn out to be about £36,000 gross. Most people who are in work would consider that to be a reasonable level of income. Those who complain about that complain about something that they should have resolved anyway.

Housing Benefit

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Thursday 10th March 2011 Westminster Hall

[Steve Webb]

Indeed. In co-operation with our colleagues at the Department for Communities and Local Government, we are working through the way in which we can ensure that these affordable rent tenancies—80% of market rent tenancies—have a guaranteed revenue stream that will enable the investment to take place and those discussions are ongoing.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

I apologise for coming in so late. I absolutely agree with the Minister when he says that landlords will inevitably adjust. That is what the private sector does. When the benefit changes, there will be so many tenancies affected that there will be a sizeable effect on the market. The Opposition sometimes forget that this is about not just cost-cutting but fairness and balance. We must remember the taxpayer in all of this. In Acton, we had that amazing example—some called it grotesque—in which a family was plonked into a house that was worth well over £1 million. Very few people in Acton can afford to live in a house of that value. There are some really unfair things that must be addressed.

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for setting that context. During the course of this debate, one or two hon. Members have said that this is all about chasing the headlines in the red tops—the tabloids—and it is that that is shaping policy. Clearly, this is not a policy about a small number of extreme cases. The hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn says there are about 90 cases, but let me give one example. The top 5,000 cases of people to whom we pay housing benefit cost us £100 million a year. For 5,000 people to live in properties—

Welfare Reform Bill

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

I am afraid that the Secretary of State has still not provided an answer to my question—he still cannot tell us how he will encourage people to save. Tuition fees have trebled, and people in my constituency are asking, “How on earth do we encourage our young people to go to college, and how on earth can we afford to get our young people into university?”—[Interruption.] I know the Secretary of State does not have those challenges to face, but thousands of people in our constituencies need to save to get their kids to university. The regime that he is proposing will strip in-work benefits from them, kicking the ladder away from aspiration in our country.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

Surely the right hon. Gentleman must recognise that tuition fees are not payable until such time as people come out of university and earn a salary of £21,000 or more. His argument is a red herring.

[Mr Byrne]

I do not know what the hon. Lady’s constituents are saying to her, but many in my constituency live in fear of debt—they want not to burden their children with debt, but for them to get a first-class education, so that they can contribute to the future of our country.

The wider point that is emerging is that we do not know enough about how the Bill affects families and savers, but there is also a question over how it will affect the self-employed. Over the last few weeks, we have heard a great deal of pitch-rolling from the Chancellor and the Prime Minister, who are now worried about the damage that their last Budget did to our economy. All of us hope that the Chancellor can upgrade his growth forecast at the forthcoming Budget after doing so well over the last year, and the Prime Minister is now promising that his next Budget will be the most pro-growth Budget in the universe. He told his spring conference:

“At its beating heart this is still a party of start-ups, go-getters, risk-takers…We’re the party of practical men and women, people with a passion and a mission to build a business and see it grow...We are the party of enterprise.”

No doubt, then, the Bill is part of that plan—no doubt the Bill will make it simpler, easier and more encouraging for people in this country to start a business and to make that entrepreneurial leap. Well, my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) asked the Secretary of State about the self-employed on 9 February. To be fair to him, I think he recognises the problem. Surveying the position of the self-employed, he told her that

“we are conscious that that area is the slight blip in the system.”

This is what the blips in the system at the Federation of Small Businesses told me yesterday. Mike Cherry, the FSB national policy chairman, said:

“We are concerned that the Government has assumed that entrepreneurs with a new business will be paying themselves…and will therefore lose all benefits under the Universal Credit system…A measure such as this simply creates yet another barrier towards self-employment which is particularly unhelpful at a time when we are relying on the small business sector to grow the economy”.

So much for the party of enterprise.

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[Mr Byrne]

Not at all. The point that we are making is about the way in which this reform has been adopted and steamrollered through, and about the lack of consultation between the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Department for Work and Pensions. This has been so mismanaged that many people—the Mayor of London, Shelter, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government—are now saying that the cost of housing benefit could go up. Surely that is not the DWP’s intention. We need a bit more detail about a policy that might actually deliver the necessary savings on housing benefit.

[Angie Bray]

I was recently talking to some constituents in Acton, and I discovered that these proposals for changes to housing benefit are among the most popular proposals that the Government have introduced. My constituents like the idea that it pays to work, and that those on benefit will not be able to afford better houses than those in low-paid work can afford. They also wonder why it has taken so long for any Government to introduce a measure that is simply fair, regardless of the money it might save. They wonder why the Labour Government never did anything about this when they had the chance to do so.

[Mr Byrne]

I am sure that the hon. Lady will have set out, with equal eloquence, the view of the Mayor of London that the measures might actually cost more taxpayers’ money than they will save.

Housing Benefit

Baroness Bray of Coln Excerpts

Tuesday 9th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The answer is no for existing tenants. Our policy will apply to new tenants and new build, so the hon. Lady should check her facts.

Let us not forget that the private rental market is dynamic. That is the point that the Opposition fail to mention.

[Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

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[Mr Duncan Smith]

The impact assessment does not say that, and it is typical of the Opposition to take a figure for those who will be affected and assume automatically that they will be driven out of their homes. That is shameful.

[Angie Bray]

The scaremongering is a disgrace, and I am sure that many of us have had scared constituents coming to us having been worried unnecessarily by stories that they have heard from Labour Members. I have been looking online at some of the properties on offer in the private rented sector in Ealing and Central Acton. There are some remarkably good offers around that are well within the proposed caps—for example, a four-bedroom house with a garden at under £400 a week, and a flat for about £250 a week with access to a swimming pool. The situation is really not as dire as the Opposition are suggesting.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

My hon. Friend is right. We believe, and our calculations show that one third of all properties are available and will be ready for those who have to move. I say “have to move” because that assumes a static marketplace, and this marketplace is not static. I will return to that point in a second.