Israel and Hamas: Humanitarian Pause

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Stephen Timms

Monday 27th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

It is great when the Minister gives very quick answers, which is what I asked him to do.

[Sir Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

The prospect of the carnage simply resuming at the end of this pause is a really dreadful one. What is the Minister’s assessment of the likelihood that the ceasefire might be made permanent if, over a period of some further days, all the hostages are released?

Department for Work and Pensions

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Stephen Timms

Tuesday 4th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I call the Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee to open the debate.

[Sir Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

I am very grateful to have been granted today’s debate about DWP spending.

I will focus in particular on universal credit, whose roll-out started 10 years ago in 2013. The DWP is forecast to have, by some considerable margin, the highest expenditure of any Government Department, at £279.3 billion in this financial year, followed by the Department of Health and Social Care, at £201 billion. DWP spending is the largest by a considerable distance.

Of course, the DWP forecast is uncertain. Almost all its funding counts as annually managed expenditure; it is hard to forecast demand-led spending. DWP’s admin spending—departmental expenditure limits—is 27% lower in real terms this year than in 2010-11. Universal credit spending is forecast to be £50.8 billion this financial year, which is £8.8 billion higher than forecast in these estimates last year, reflecting the recent much-needed uprating and a higher case load. In February, 4.5 million households were receiving universal credit payments.

A key argument in the business case for universal credit was the prospect of reducing fraud and error. Nearly a quarter of the £34 billion net present value gain expected over 10 years from introducing universal credit was due to come from lower fraud and error. In fact, fraud and error have been much worse than they were for legacy benefits. The Department’s statistics show that the universal credit overpayment rate decreased, but from an astronomical 14.7% in May 2021 to 12.8% last year. I know that the Department is setting out to address that problem, and that it has obtained resources from the Treasury to do so. Underpayments were at their highest-ever recorded rate last year, at 1.6%. I hope the Minister will be able to tell us about plans for tackling those problems.

An additional reason that it is so important to get decisions right at the moment is that universal credit is a passport to cost of living support payments. There was a strong case for merging the various benefits into universal credit, and the success of the system in getting urgently needed support out effectively during the pandemic was very important and very impressive. However, there are some big problems—above all, the problem of the five-week wait between applying for the benefit and receiving the first payment. With legacy benefits, the first payment would usually arrive a week and a half or so after applying. With universal credit, having spent hundreds of millions of pounds on what we were always assured was agile technology, the same thing now takes five weeks. That is a fundamental and unnecessary flaw; the security is absent from social security.

In January 2021, the Government rejected the Select Committee’s recommendations to eliminate the wait and instead pay all first-time claimants of universal credit a starter payment equivalent to three weeks of the standard allowance, just to tide people over. The Government response pointed out that claimants can access advances, but of course, those are loans. Repayments reduce the already low monthly awards, and repaying advances is a major driver of the explosive growth in food bank demand that we have seen. Our colleagues in the other place, those on the Lords Economic Affairs Committee—with its Conservative Chair—succinctly highlighted the consequences of the five-week wait in July last year:

“the five-week wait for the first payment…drives many people into rent arrears, reliance on foodbanks and debt.”

As such, I ask the Minister once again whether the Government will reconsider our recommendations, or whether we have to wait for a different Government for that fundamental flaw to be addressed.

I am very pleased to say that one area in which the Government have listened to the Committee is reimbursement of childcare costs for people claiming universal credit. I warmly welcome the lifting of the cap and up-front payments for childcare announced in the Budget, and I hope that our future reports will have comparable levels of success. Those changes will support people to be in work in future.

Last week, the Child Poverty Action Group published a fascinating report called “You reap what you code”, highlighting areas where the universal credit computer system does not deliver what it should. It gave the example that legislation and guidance allow some groups to submit a universal credit claim up to a month in advance, but the system does not allow that, nor is there an adequate workaround outside the digital system. As such, some care leavers and prisoners expecting release can miss out on an entitlement that they are due. For all its success in the pandemic—I am unstinting in my recognition of that success—the rigidity of the digital system is a problem. Can the Minister tell us whether a fix is planned for that problem of early claims, which the Child Poverty Action Group highlighted last week?

Does the level of benefits meet need in the way it is supposed to? Do benefits represent value for the taxpayer? The Committee is conducting an important inquiry into benefit levels in the UK, and will report in the first half of next year. Benefit levels are very low. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Trussell Trust told the Committee that

“the basic rate of Universal Credit—its standard allowance (or equivalents in previous systems)—is now at its lowest level in real terms in almost 40 years (CPI-adjusted) and its lowest ever level as a proportion of average earnings.”

They estimate from pretty careful research that a single adult needs £120 per week to cover essentials: food, utilities, vital household items and travel. That is excluding rent and council tax. Universal credit’s standard allowance is £85 per week for a single adult over 25. That is a shortfall of at least £35 per week, and deductions—for advance payments, for example—often pull actual support well below the headline rate.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Trussell Trust call for an essentials guarantee. They make the point—which has been suggested this week in the press—that we might get a below-inflation uprating of benefits next year, making those problems even worse. I would be grateful if the Minister gave an assurance on that front, because that would be very bad news indeed.

Budget Resolutions

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Stephen Timms

Thursday 12th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

It is a privilege to follow the hon. Member for Warrington South (Andy Carter) and to congratulate him on a warm and confident maiden speech. I welcome his generous tribute to Faisal Rashid, not only for his brief period in the House but his work as mayor and local councillor before that. The hon. Gentleman is right to highlight the potential of Daresbury science park in particular. The House will look forward to hearing much more from him in the years ahead.

The Financial Times pointed out this morning that yesterday marked the end of the Tory promise to eliminate the deficit. For a large part of the past decade, ending the deficit appeared to be the Tories’ raison d’être, but we cannot blame the current Chancellor for concluding yesterday that his Tory predecessors’ policies on the deficit had comprehensively failed and that the result has been, to quote the Chancellor yesterday,

“a decade-long slowdown in productivity.”—[Official Report, 11 March 2020; Vol. 673, c. 282.]

In what was a remarkable phrase, the Chancellor told us yesterday that his was a plan to “fund…our future prosperity.” I have never heard any Chancellor previously claim that we could spend our way to prosperity, but that is precisely what many Members on the Conservative Benches used to accuse Members on the Labour Benches of believing. It is now apparently official Tory policy. Repudiating past Tory policy is no bad thing, though, and I wish to welcome a number of the measures in the policy area of the Work and Pensions Committee, which I chair.

I warmly welcome the wider availability of statutory sick pay; the faster access to employment and support allowance; and the £500 million hardship fund for disbursement by local authorities, which recognises, as I suggested in my intervention earlier during the excellent speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), the need for central Government funding to replicate what the old social fund used to do until it was abolished by the coalition.

I welcome the changes on universal credit. The suspension of the minimum income floor means that self-employed people whose income takes a hit will get at least some extra help from universal credit. The truth is, though, that the minimum income floor should not be there, and there is a strong case for making its suspension permanent.

I also welcome the reduction in the maximum rate of repayment of advances, and the longer period of repayment, although those measure will take effect only from October next year.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon North (Steve Reed) said, the Budget did not address the fundamental problems with universal credit. Research by the Trussell Trust has found that people on universal credit are two and a half times more likely to need help from a food bank than people in otherwise similar circumstances who are still on the legacy benefits. That is a remarkable statistic that underlines the scale of the problems that universal credit is causing.

Even more startling is the article this month in The Lancet. I do hope that Ministers will weigh very carefully the dry academic prose in that article, which concludes that up to the end of 2018:

“An additional 63,674 unemployed people will have experienced levels of psychological distress that are clinically significant due to the introduction of Universal Credit”.

It goes on to suggest that over one third of them

“might reach the diagnostic threshold for depression.”

About one quarter of those ultimately expected to be on universal credit are on it at the moment. The Government say that the rest will be on it by the end of 2024. The Office for Budget Responsibility yesterday expressed its traditional and well-founded scepticism about that timetable, and suggested it is likely to take two years longer than the Department for Work and Pensions says. Given that the harm being caused by universal credit is so well documented, I do not think it is viable for the Government simply to press on.

What is it about universal credit that is causing such hardship? I think it is the delay—never before a feature of the social security system—of five weeks between applying for benefit and being entitled to payment. That is why the Select Committee has made it the subject of our first major inquiry. We want to work closely and constructively with Ministers and the Department to identify workable and affordable solutions to what is, incontrovertibly, a very serious problem.

I want to make one final point. One of yesterday’s Budget’s few revenue-raising measures was the increase in the immigration health surcharge. One might think that this is about increasing the charge to tourists coming to the UK to take advantage of the NHS, but it is not. It is a major burden being imposed on a large number of modestly paid working families, a large number of them in my constituency, and I cannot see how it can be justified. These are families who are settled in the UK, often with children who have been born in the UK, and who are on the 10-year pathway to indefinite leave. They are given leave to remain for two and a half years at a time. They are paying their taxes, like everybody else who uses public services, but every two and a half years they have to pay thousands, on top of their taxes, in visa charges, and now they will have to pay even more through this immigration health surcharge. They have already paid tax and national insurance. How can these swingeing additional charges be justified?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

It is a great pleasure to call, to make his maiden speech, Mr James Grundy.

Leaving the EU: Data Protection

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Stephen Timms

Thursday 12th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Timms]

I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for his work on that Committee, and his suggestion could well solve the problem. What I have proposed is amendment 151 to the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, to require Ministers to put on to the statute book a clear statement that UK citizens have a fundamental right to the protection of their personal data. But he is right that we could equally well insert that wording into the Data Protection Bill, which is before the House of Lords at present. I should also point out that, splendid though it is, I cannot claim credit for the wording of my amendment, as it was drafted by techUK, in recognition of the issue’s importance to the industry.

I want to make a final point about the Data Protection Bill and postal direct marketing. I welcome the fact that the Government are implementing the GDPR, or general data protection regulation, but the Bill changes the basis for opting out of postal direct mail communications. At present, if somebody does not want to receive advertising addressed to them through the post, they can opt out by signing up to a register. As I understand it, the Bill will change that and companies will not be allowed to send people postal direct mail unless they opt into receiving it. I think that is the current arrangement for direct email, but there has been an opt-out arrangement for postal direct mail until now. There is a lot of concern that that change would be very damaging to the UK direct mail industry, which is a substantial industry, and that it is not required by the wording of the GDPR; indeed, legal advice has been taken on this point and the GDPR does not require that change to be made. If that is right, the Government are gold-plating the regulations that have come to us from the EU. They are absolutely right to be implementing the GDPR and to be doing so scrupulously, but they should not be gold-plating them, as I fear they might be in this case.

I am grateful to have had the chance to set out to the House a bit more fully the thinking behind my amendment to the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, and hope I might have persuaded the Minister that, after all, it might be an amendment that he can support.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

I am delighted to call to make his maiden speech Mr Matt Western.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Stephen Timms

Thursday 9th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

Let me begin, as others have, by congratulating all those who have made their maiden speech during the debate: my hon. Friends the Members for St Helens South and Whiston (Marie Rimmer) and for Bradford South (Judith Cummins) and the hon. Members for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (Calum Kerr), for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Dr Monaghan) and for North Warwickshire (Craig Tracey). The House enjoyed hearing from each of them today and we look forward to hearing from them again in the years to come.

Yesterday’s Budget contained a number of ideas that we support, not least because we campaigned for them at the election. For example, we argued that the pathway to a surplus that the Chancellor committed to in March would in fact lead to spending cuts so extreme that they would not be credible. We discovered yesterday that the Chancellor had caved in and accepted our argument. He has deferred the planned surplus for a further year, and I have to say that that was a sensible U-turn. He might have told us that that was what it was, but he did not. As a result of his U-turn, the scale of the cuts, though still substantial, will no longer be as extreme as he suggested in March.

We said that it was unreasonable to try to take £12 billion out of the social security budget in two years. The Chancellor has done a U-turn on that as well. He now plans to do it over four years. We also campaigned for Britain to have a pay rise, stating that an increase in the national minimum wage was key to reducing the cost of welfare. The Chancellor has accepted that argument. On the basis that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, we welcome his change of heart on that as well.

It is a great disappointment, however, that productivity growth is so low. My hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) was right to draw the House’s attention to what the Office for Budget Responsibility had to say about that. It has stated that productivity growth has fallen short of expectations once again. It is a relief that this Budget speech at least mentioned productivity—there was no such mention in March—although it was accompanied by a very thin package. My right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) and my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) pointed out that the cancellation of the electrification of the TransPennine line was a glaring failure if we are to bring about the infrastructure investment necessary to improve productivity across the country. It is a big disappointment that so little is being done.

It is a tragedy that the Chancellor is accompanying his welcome U-turns with such a swingeing attack on the incomes of working families. The analysis published today by the Institute for Fiscal Studies highlights the fact that the proposed tax credit cuts focus on working families. It is working families that are going to be hit. They have been badly let down by a party that had promised to be a party for working people. That promise seems to have been torn to shreds in everything other than the rhetoric. Vital support has been ripped away at a time when so many of those working families are already struggling to make ends meet.

In 2010, the Chancellor promised

“we will bring down the benefits bill”.

At the beginning of this year, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said:

“Real terms benefit spending…is forecast to be almost exactly the same in 2015–16 as it was in 2010–11.”

The benefits bill has not been brought down. The reason is that, in the previous Parliament, the Government failed to tackle low wages and rising private rents, which are the real drivers of welfare spending. As a result we saw 400,000 more people who are in work forced to rely on housing benefit to pay the rent, and 1.5 million more people paid less than a living wage at the end of the Parliament than was the case at the beginning. That led to a £25 billion overspend on welfare by the Secretary of State’s Department. With this Budget, working families are being told to pay for that failure—so much for being on the side of working people.

The Chancellor is cutting tax credits immediately, but taking five years to increase pay. As my hon. Friends have pointed out, the tax credits cuts hit immediately, full scale, from the beginning of the next financial year. The pay rises intended to compensate for them, which in fact do not compensate for them, are being phased in over five years. Working families are losing out in a very big way. This is not about making work pay, but about making working families pay, which is wrong.

Today, the IFS said:

“Unequivocally, tax credit recipients in work will be made worse off”.

That is the reality of what was announced in the Budget yesterday. The Chancellor’s decision to cut tax credits leaves 3 million families worse off. Working families who are doing the right thing are finding that the rug has been pulled out from under them. A couple with one person working full-time on average earnings will lose more than £2,000 in tax credits next year. A single parent trying to provide for her two children, working 16 hours a week, will lose £860 in tax credits next year. Those losses are nowhere made up for by the modest pay rise that that person is likely to receive.

I cannot help wondering what happened to the families test. The Prime Minister promised that

“every single domestic policy that government comes up with will be examined for its impact on the family.”

Well, here are working families being hammered. The measures clearly fail the families test, but they are being announced nevertheless. That is another broken promise from this Government when so many families are losing out.

The IFS says that the striking consequence of yesterday’s cuts is that the work incentive effects of universal credit—if we ever see universal credit; only 1% of benefit claimants have been switched on to it so far, and at that rate it will take 150 years or so to roll out fully—are being substantially reduced.

I have made it clear that we welcome the increase in the national minimum wage—indeed, we campaigned for it. However, as my hon. Friends have pointed out, just because the Chancellor calls it a living wage does not make it a living wage. My hon. Friends the Members for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) and for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) emphasised that point in particular. The Living Wage Foundation, the custodian of the living wage, made the position clear last night. It said that

“this is effectively a higher National Minimum Wage and not a Living Wage.”

That is the reality. Simply calling it a living wage does not make it one. The Chancellor is trying to sell us a dud.

That was not the only dud in the Budget speech. I cannot resist the temptation of quoting what the Financial Times said about the Budget speech yesterday: “When you heard” the Chancellor

“say six times in his Budget speech that he had moved British towards a ‘lower tax society’, he made a small but important mistake. He really meant ‘higher tax’.”

Of course that is right. The living wage is based on the full take-up of benefits such as tax credits and housing benefit. With the cuts to tax credits, the current figure for the living wage will no longer be enough and will certainly have to be revised upwards. We are in favour of tax cuts for those on middle incomes and we support the increases in the personal allowance and the higher rate threshold, but cuts to tax credit mean yet again that the Chancellor is giving with one hand and taking away with the other.

What a missed opportunity the Budget was to promote a proper living wage by introducing Labour’s plan for tax breaks for firms that pay a proper living wage! My hon. Friend the Member for Brent Central (Dawn Butler) drew attention to the excellent initiative that Brent Council has introduced along those lines. It is clearly succeeding, and our make-work-pay contracts could have started to boost wages straight away.

My hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) was right to point out that, once again, young people have been badly hit by the Budget, but where there are good reforms, we will support them. We support the Government’s plan for a youth obligation, which is strikingly similar to our manifesto pledge and the Institute for Public Policy Research proposal that underpins it. The principle of earn or learn is right. Of course, it is absolutely vital that the right exemptions to the withdrawal of housing support should be in place. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) underlined that absolutely rightly. Can the Minister confirm in winding up that young people leaving care, those who are at risk of abuse or homelessness and those who are the parents of young children will still be eligible for housing support under these proposals?

We will not support cuts for disabled people. We were told in the election campaign that the £12 billion package would protect the vulnerable and the disabled, but cutting employment support allowance will hit those who are assessed as not fit for work, which is the reason why they are not on jobseeker’s allowance. That includes people with cancer and people with Parkinson’s disease. Ministers said that they would protect sick people in these changes; instead, they are cutting their support, and that will hit some very vulnerable people very hard. It will also drive even more claimants into the ESA support group at even higher cost. In 2010, Ministers said that they would cut the cost of ESA. In fact, given their failure to manage assessments and the failure of the Work programme for ESA claimants, costs have rocketed. ESA will cost £4.5 billion more this year than they said it would in 2011, but that is no justification for punishing the sick.

There is nothing in the Budget to boost the number of homes being built. The cost of renting and buying is soaring out of reach, particularly in London and south-east. My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) drew attention to that. Yet again, rather than tackling the housing shortage and bringing rents down, the Government have chosen to cut housing support.

We welcome the Chancellor’s U-turns from his election campaign, but this is not the Budget that working people need. It leaves working people worse off. Working people needed a Budget that supported them and their families, not one that cut the support that so many people rely on. We support reform that protects those who cannot work and that makes work pay. We will not support cuts that make working families pay.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Before I call the Minister, the House should note that several Members who have taken part in the debate were not here for the beginning of the speech of the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms). That is discourteous. Some Members who have taken part in the debate are still not here. That is extremely discourteous and has been noted.

The Economy

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Stephen Timms

Thursday 4th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

Thank you and congratulations, Madam Deputy Speaker. As you have said, we have had a good debate, which has demonstrated the seriousness and commitment with which we are ready to take up our duties as Opposition Members.

It has been widely acknowledged in this debate that my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), the former leader of our party, made a fine and powerful contribution. It was especially welcome for being so soon after our bruising election defeat. He addressed the topic of one nation, which was the theme of his leadership as well, drawing attention to the problem of rising inequality across western democracies. He spoke of the rungs of the ladder getting further apart and reminded the Prime Minister of his 2006 commitment to address relative poverty. I think the whole House will look forward to my right hon. Friend developing those ideas in the months ahead.

We have had valuable contributions from both sides of the House. I particularly congratulate everyone who has made their maiden speech today, including the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), the hon. and learned Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Lucy Frazer), the hon. Members for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens), for Horsham (Jeremy Quin) and for Cannock Chase (Amanda Milling), my hon. Friends the Members for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) and for Cardiff Central (Jo Stevens), the hon. Members for Mid Worcestershire (Nigel Huddleston), for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Roger Mullin) and for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake), my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Louise Haigh) and the hon. Members for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) and for Charnwood (Edward Argar). I congratulate each of them and wish them well for their membership of this House. The whole House will look forward to hearing more from each of them in the years ahead.

At the heart of this debate is the security of working families. Many families feel deeply insecure at the moment, in ways spelled out in a fine maiden speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich. How is the programme that has been announced going to affect them? We have yet to hear clear answers from the Government on how they plan to strengthen the foundations of our economy so that we can deal with the deficit, control social security costs and secure better living standards and a better future for the working people of Britain.

My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) began by highlighting the fragility of our economic recovery. Productivity continues to stagnate, leaving output per worker far behind that of comparable advanced economies—a point that was highlighted by the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie).

The right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) was right to point out that employers are struggling to find people with the right skills for their jobs. Many employees have roles that do not make full use of their talents and potential, and we have heard a great deal in the debate about the grave challenges relating to infrastructure and the need for more progress. Those underlying weaknesses will make it harder to get the public finances in order and to get social security spending under control.

Fragility in the economy translates into insecurity for working families, who have seen their living standards go backwards over recent years and still worry about whether they will be able to keep on top of their bills. Working families are struggling to balance the demands of work with the rising cost of childcare. They wonder whether the NHS will still be there for them when they need it in future and want their children to have a decent career and a realistic prospect of getting on the housing ladder. Too many at the moment are stuck in low-paid, insecure work and a growing number are depending on housing benefit to make ends meet. Those families all want to know what difference the measures in this Queen’s Speech will make to them.

There are welcome commitments in some areas, but questions remain about how some of them will be paid for. It is, however, what has been left out that gives the greatest cause for concern—actions not taken, details not provided—and makes many families less secure and fear for the future.

We all support any cut in taxes for low-paid workers, but we also need a serious plan to tackle low pay and boost wages for the majority by raising investment, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff Central pointed out in her excellent speech. The hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton also rightly called for the adoption of a living wage in the UK. We need to raise the levels of skills and productivity across the economy, securing sustainable tax revenues and reducing the reliance on in-work benefits.

It was disappointing to have sprung on the House this afternoon, without any proper detail or explanation, a series of spending cuts in the Chancellor’s speech. There is a press release that outlines what they are, but there is no proper information. We should have had a statement so that the House could scrutinise the cuts. They include a significant cut to the skills budget.

We will welcome any help for working parents with childcare, but families can be forgiven for believing it when they see it, after five years in which it has become harder, not easier, to afford the childcare they need. There is a worry that the proposals in the Queen’s Speech are likely to result in fewer affordable homes and bigger housing benefit bills for taxpayers.

Britain succeeds only when working people succeed. Hard work should be rewarded, prosperity should be shared and we should protect the most vulnerable. Those elements, which are vital for our society, need to be underpinned by a strong social security net. The Opposition support the work that local authorities are doing under the Government’s troubled families programme, but we are aware that a majority of the families involved still have nobody in work and that the Work programme is not doing enough to help them. We will be glad to see additional money for apprenticeships.

We have made clear our support for the principle of a benefit cap to ensure that people are better off in work and for reforms to ensure that young people are earning or learning, and do not become caught in a benefits system that at the moment does too little to improve their skills and prospects. We will scrutinise—[Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I hesitate to interrupt the right hon. Gentleman. There is no heckling or bad behaviour going on, but there are an awful lot of private conversations. He has a difficult job to do and he should be given peace in which to do it.

[Stephen Timms]

We will scrutinise those proposals with great care. The well-meaning rhetoric on apprenticeships needs to be matched by action on the quality, as well as the quantity, of the apprenticeships that are being created. When the rules are changed on benefits for 18 to 21-year-olds, we will look carefully at the safeguards for the vulnerable young people who will be included. We need to ensure that reducing the benefit cap does not end up costing more than it saves.

Those measures amount to only a fraction of the £12 billion reduction in social security spending that the Government promised. We want to see savings where they can sensibly be made. We have argued consistently for keeping the system affordable. We have said that that requires a readiness to take tough decisions on low-priority spending, alongside action to tackle the underlying drivers of rising benefit bills, such as low pay and high housing costs. The unwillingness or inability of Ministers to explain to this House or the public how they intend to make the reductions that they have set out is adding to the insecurity that is felt by many working families today.

There will be widespread relief that the Prime Minister has, reportedly, overruled the Secretary of State on child benefit. However, working families need to know whether the tax credits and other in-work benefits that they depend on will be taken away. The Prime Minister yesterday declined my invitation to reaffirm his election campaign commitment that benefits for disabled people are safe. The Institute for Fiscal Studies says that it will be virtually impossible to achieve a £12 billion saving without hitting low-income working families hard.

When he gets to his feet, the Secretary of State needs to assure those who are clearly not well enough to work that support for disabled people and their carers will be protected. Government failures in that area—the failure of the rushed and ill-prepared incapacity benefit reassessment exercise and the failures of the Work programme for people in receipt of employment and support allowance—mean that the Government are spending nearly £5 billion more this year on employment and support allowance than they forecast five years ago. That is a serious failure.

We heard a Queen’s Speech five years ago that promised

“to simplify the benefits system in order to improve work incentives”.

That was a worthy aim, but there has been very little progress since then. My hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) touched on the problems with the IT for universal credit. In 2011, the Secretary of State told us that universal credit would be complete in six years; now he is telling us that it will be complete in another six years. In four years, completion has slipped by four years.

The Opposition will continue to stand up and speak for the working people of this country, who have endured years of falling living standards and economic uncertainty. They now need assurances and action from the Government to promote their security and to secure their finances and the public services that they rely on, and on which all our futures will depend.

Legislative Reform Order (Epping Forest)

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Stephen Timms

Thursday 30th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Laing]

Yes, it was. I am glad to be able to make that absolutely clear.

As the Minister explained, the Metropolitan police are making a significant payment to the conservators of Epping forest, in lieu of rent, and in addition to the payment for the restoration of the site. I hear what Opposition Members say about the amount involved, but the important point is that the entire amount paid by the Metropolitan police will be used for the enhancement of Wanstead Flats. Opposition Members argue that the amount should be greater, but I do not agree. Money paid by the Metropolitan police is taxpayers’ money, and if it is used for the enhancement of Wanstead Flats, it obviously cannot be used for the prevention of crime and the maintenance of law and order. There is a wider interest. It is absolutely right for an amount to be paid for the enhancement of Wanstead Flats, but it should not be larger than the amount that has already been negotiated.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Lady interpret the order as meaning that the restoration must be completed before the end of the 90-day period? My reading of it does not make it clear whether it means that the Metropolitan police must have left by then, or that the restoration must have taken place.