Welfare Reform Bill

Debate between Baroness Howe of Idlicote and Baroness Turner of Camden

Monday 12th December 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Howe of Idlicote]

My Lords, I support the views that have been expressed today. They were not as clearly enunciated in Committee, as we have already heard, but they have been spelt out pretty effectively today. I also accept that the money has to come from somewhere. The important thing may be the transition period and keeping an eye on just what the effect of the transition period is. However, when one thinks that 100,000 disabled children will be less well off as a result of some of these changes, one becomes worried. Four in every 10 lives will be lived in poverty—that was the figure given by the Children’s Society.

Although I accept that it is a difficult decision for the Government to make, I would like to think that there are other pockets from which rather more could be produced. I urge the Minister to look hard in those directions.

[Baroness Turner of Camden]

My Lords, I, too, support this amendment. I have been reading in newspapers lately that parents of disabled children have begun to get very worried lest the changes being brought about by this Bill reduce the benefits that they already get. This has made a number of them extremely nervous, with the result that we have had a fair amount of lobbying from the organisations that represent disabled people.

One of the attractive things about this amendment is that it seeks to ring-fence the benefits that people have at the moment so that they do not decrease as a result of this Bill. We have heard today from a number of speakers that bringing up disabled children is really quite difficult. Very often parents give up their work in order to care for them. It is often also extremely expensive to look after disabled children. It therefore seems to me that there is some merit in ring-fencing what people have at the moment, so that people who look after disabled children at least have some assurance that they are not going to be worse off as a result of the benefits being introduced under the welfare Bill before us this evening.