Universal Credit: Rollout

Baroness Sherlock Excerpts

Wednesday 20th June 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Sherlock]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have for the continued rollout of Universal Credit following the report by the National Audit Office Rolling out Universal Credit.

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

My Lords, we will continue to deliver universal credit as planned, completing the national rollout for new claims by the end of 2018, and from 2019 we will start to move people from the old benefits system and tax credits to universal credit. We have taken a test-and-learn approach; we have learned a lot, and we will continue this. We have made changes—advance payments, direct payments to landlords, the two-week housing benefit run-on, removing waiting days, support for kinship carers and extending transitional protection—and I have no doubt that the list will get longer.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, Ministers claimed that universal credit would be fully in place by 2017, that it would be more efficient and better for claimants and that it would help more into work. A National Audit Office report says that only 10% of claimants are on universal credit and it will be 2023 before it is rolled out. Every claim costs £700 to process, and the NAO found no evidence that universal credit will be cheaper to run. It says that the DWP has no idea whether universal credit is reducing fraud and error, and that it found no evidence for the Minister’s repeated claim that it will help an extra 200,000 into work. Meanwhile, 40% of claimants are in financial trouble and, on top of the planned delay in payment of five or six weeks, 10% of new claimants waited 11 weeks or more for full payment and 5% waited for five months. When universal credit hits an area, food bank use rises and rent arrears go up. My question is simple: the DWP keeps insisting that all is well but it is not, so will the Government now urgently review universal credit and stop pushing people into debt and hardship?

[Baroness Stedman-Scott]

My Lords, we are trying desperately to put a new system in place that will make work pay for people. There have been issues. The National Audit Office report—I have read it and I urge all noble Lords to do so—has serious concerns about the programme, I acknowledge that. However, we are serious about the way we are going to deal with those problems; we are committed to doing that and we are committed to making things better. We have a business plan for the rollout. In any good business you have a business plan with targets, you measure them, you review them and, when you do not hit them, you revise your plan. We will approach this in a business-like but compassionate way to make sure that we do all to serve people who are influenced by it.