Oral Answers to Questions

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I absolutely can give my hon. Friend that assurance. There are about 500 organisations from the voluntary sector involved, large and small, ranging from the Prince’s Trust and similar-sized organisations through to local projects such as a walled garden project in Yorkshire. There is space for any organisation that delivers excellence in getting people back to work, and those that are really good at doing it have every reason to become involved in a payment by results approach.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

What steps are the Government taking to respond to the local variability in job opportunities, so that people are not penalised in the benefits system merely because jobs are not available in their area?

[Chris Grayling]

One of the things that we expect the Work programme providers to do is match individuals to vacancies. Even in Wales, as we know from the debate that the hon. Gentleman and I had last week, there are a significant number of vacancies. There has been private sector growth in the past few months, and unemployment has fallen. We have to ensure, through the work of Jobcentre Plus and the Work programme providers, that people on benefits take advantage of opportunities when they arise.

Worklessness (Wales)

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Wednesday 13th July 2011 Westminster Hall

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

I am pleased to have secured a debate on a pressing issue at an opportune time. Unemployment in Wales, particularly unemployment among young people, is worrying. The valleys, for example, have the highest benefit claimant count not only in Wales, but in the United Kingdom. The report, “Tackling Worklessness in Wales”, by Sheffield Hallam university, is therefore timely, and I commend it to hon. Members. It is makes for interesting reading, and it is condensed in both the introduction and the conclusion for easy reading—for some hon. Members.

Unemployment is only one side of the coin, as the titles of the debate and of the report indicate. Unemployment is in some ways merely a consequence of the lack of a job. That sounds self-evident, of course, but I sometimes get the feeling that some commentators—not all, by any means, on the Government side—see unemployment only as an aspect of a personal failing. Reading the tabloid press, it is sometimes portrayed as an aspect of personal wickedness, but obviously people cannot work if the jobs are not there or if their personal circumstances make it difficult or impossible for them to set up on their own. I left a secure job at a university to set up on my own six years before I was elected as an MP and fell in with a bad lot here. Six years of self-employment taught me a great deal.

There are two themes to my contribution: first, I will discuss the dire unemployment and economic activity figures; and, secondly and significantly, I will examine the need to take robust steps to create work. Sheffield Hallam university estimates that we need 170,000 extra people in work in Wales to bring us up to the standard of the best parts of the UK. That is a huge challenge. I immediately accept that the previous Government took great steps to increase the number of people in work. I know that this Government have that aim, but it is a huge number to reach.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

In the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs, which just met upstairs, the Secretary of State for Wales could not answer the question posed by the Sheffield Hallam report of where the private sector jobs will come from for the thousands of people coming off incapacity benefit due to the Government’s welfare changes. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the Government should slow down and look at the dire consequences of what they are doing?

[Hywel Williams]

I agree with the hon. Lady. The changes in welfare are being brought forward too quickly, but I am also concerned that the work on the other side of the coin—creating jobs for people who will hopefully be leaving the benefits system or unfortunately be moving to lower levels of benefit—is not being prosecuted sufficiently.

Figures were released in the report today, and the situation in Wales is particularly worrying. I hope that referring to only some of them will mean that I am not tediously repetitive, but they make for interesting reading. The total number of jobseeker’s allowance claimants in my constituency is 1,245, and there were 364 jobs available at the jobcentre in the month in which the figures were collected, which is 3.42 claimants per job. If one adds in everyone who is on Department for Work and Pensions benefits, the total figure goes up to 5,590. I share the Government’s ambition of moving people who have been long-term sick or disabled back towards work. I agree entirely with that, because work is good for everyone, but it is a huge challenge just in my constituency.

In the most dire example in Wales—Rhondda—there are 2,315 claimants, which is 28.23 claimants per job, so there are 28 or 29 people chasing every job. I accept that some jobs are not advertised, but are available elsewhere. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb) is smiling. Hopefully, I have drawn one of his teeth. I accept that statistics can be misleading, but there are 12,540 DWP benefit recipients, which means 152.93 claimants per job. The challenge is enormous. Incidentally, if, Mr Weir, you were sad enough to have looked at the debate on my ten-minute rule Bill about three weeks ago, you would have seen that the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) claimed that the figure is 84 per job. Presumably, he knows his constituency better than I do, and possibly the official statistician, but he says 84 and I say 152.93. The challenge is enormous.

I am afraid that the situation is the same throughout the valleys. For example, Cynon Valley has 122 DWP benefit recipients per job. Interestingly, when one looks at the other side of the coin—where the jobs are—Alyn and Deeside has more than 1,000 jobs posted, so the figure there is 1.55 claimants per job, which is almost a job for everyone who is claiming JSA. That is a good situation to be in, but it stands out in Wales as the exception rather than the rule.

[Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate. Does he agree that the situation in Deeside, for example, is indicative of the fact that the manufacturing base there is extremely strong? The Government will emphasise developing the manufacturing sector rather than depending on state-created jobs, as the previous Administration did.

[Hywel Williams]

I agree with the first part of the hon. Gentleman’s intervention. I have long been a supporter of manufacturing, although it is not a prominent sector in large parts of rural Wales. The situation in Alyn and Deeside is helped by the fact that it is immediately adjacent to the Cheshire plain, where there are many jobs, and the huge investment in Airbus. There are lots of reasons, but it is a situation to which some people in the valleys might aspire. Alyn and Deeside has had a lot of Government help to reach that position.

The final column of figures is striking. It shows that there are nearly 72,000 JSA claimants, which is nearly 4.5 claimants per job, and more than 350,000 people on DWP benefits, which is nearly 22 claimants per job. The figures are breathtakingly difficult to cope with for any Government, either here or in Cardiff. The total Jobcentre Plus jobs available in June was a little over 16,000. We are talking about an enormous problem, and I do not envy the Minister or the Welsh Assembly Government, who are of a different political stripe but who have the same sort of aim, their jobs.

Some groups are hit particularly hard, and there is an issue of gender. There are now more women claiming JSA than at any point since the previous Conservative Government were in power in 1996. Across the UK, the number of women claiming JSA rose by 9,300 last month to a 15-year high of 493,000. That shows that there is an issue for women. The figures are expected to worsen, because the coming cuts are to the public sector, where there is a preponderance female employment, so women will be hit harder again. About two thirds of people employed in the public sector in the UK are women, so there is a differential effect.

The cuts come at the same time as a report from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development notes that unemployment will remain high across the UK until 2015. The report was produced by crystal-ball gazers, so one has to take the figures with a pinch of salt, but that is their prediction. A real fact, which I think the hon. Member for Aberconwy has referred to, is that we know that 77,000 Welsh people have been claiming out-of-work benefits for 10 years or more. That is a startling and unhappy fact.

The Government’s welfare reforms are predicated on the assumption that jobs will be there for those who move off higher benefits. Welfare reform was originally partly introduced to encourage more people into work during a period of high unemployment, but it is now one of the more controversial aspects of the Government’s policies. The figures show clearly that the jobs are not available. I will not stray too far down this road but, in passing, there is a real danger that the net effect of job cuts, welfare reform and so on will be to force many people not into work but on to lower benefits.

Of course, the Government hope that the private sector will grow and take up the slack, but unfortunately growth is weak in the Welsh economy. In Wales, the private sector is weak and previous jobs growth in Wales was mainly in the public sector. I do not know whether there is a causal relationship and whether growth in the public sector leads to a weak private sector or the other way around—the private sector is weak and so public sector jobs take up the slack. We are talking about a complicated relationship.

We all agree that we must aim for jobs growth in the private sector. I do not blame the private sector in Wales, because we have to accept that the economy in Wales has been dealt successive blows for many years with the closure of heavy industry and the legacy of long-term illness and disability. As someone who belongs to a party that was in government until recently, I say that we must accept that economic policy in Wales, as conducted by Governments of every party, has not been as successful as we all hoped that it would be.

I hardly need to say therefore that I am in favour of developing the private sector. However, the private sector in Wales is intertwined closely with the public sector, and cuts in the public sector might endanger or even hamper growth in the private sector. The picture is complicated. The Sheffield Hallam university report states:

“The loss of public sector jobs will exacerbate the situation.”

We are looking at a complicated picture. Employment in the public sector is important but, of course, those sorts of jobs are going in the cuts. There might be a double blow to the Welsh economy of fewer public sector jobs and less business for the Welsh private sector.

I have long believed that we need to have better integration between job finding, job placements provided through Jobcentre Plus and the Work programme, and those Welsh Assembly Government Departments that can have a profound effect on people’s ability to take up jobs. I refer hon. Members to my ten-minute rule Bill, which I introduced a few weeks ago but did not get a Second Reading. I do not want to repeat the arguments that I made then, except to say that the Welsh Assembly Government have responsibility for services such as education and training, further and higher education, skills development, health and social services and child care—I could go on—and that a certain synergy could be achieved by better co-ordination with Jobcentre Plus and the Work programme. I have no doubt that those services could be better combined and co-ordinated to enhance jobseekers’ hopes of finding work.

The crux of my argument today is that we need not only to equip and motivate jobseekers better, but to introduce a variety of other policies that will provide jobs. We need a concerted effort at job creation and to provide long-term jobs rather than stop-gap placements that disappear after the target has been reached. That has been a feature of job creation in Wales over the past few years.

[Guto Bebb]

I could not agree more on the issue of creating long-term jobs. One of the sad facts of the situation in Wales is, in the 1990s, we were consistently at the top—or very close to the top—of the United Kingdom regional league table in terms of creating self-employment. In the past five years, we have consistently been in the bottom part of that league table and have, in fact, been in last position. The fact that the Government are introducing the enterprise allowance scheme again is a positive development, because a significant number of businesses in north-west Wales that were founded under the old enterprise allowance scheme still survive.

[Hywel Williams]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good and pertinent point. As I said, I am very much in favour of encouraging self-employers, and there are steps that we can take to do so. My entry into self-employment could not have been more disastrous. I left university and tried to claim a bit of benefit, as someone who supposedly knew something about the system, only to find that when I was down in Cardiff job hunting, I should have been at home signing on. I was therefore denied a bit of money that I might have claimed because I was not idle at home; I was out searching for that illusive job.

Other measures for which we in Plaid have argued in the past include a temporary cut in VAT to kick-start the economy. Of course, we recently had a vote on that. The Government parties voted against the proposals and I am afraid to say that the Labour party abstained. Some hon. Members will know that, since 2008, we have campaigned alongside the Federation of Master Builders and others for a specific cut in VAT on repair and renovation. Following last year’s ECOFIN decision, VAT on repair and renovation could go down to 5%. Other countries have followed that path by reducing VAT on labour-intensive industries, and they have had effective results. Many pre-1919 houses are in a particularly dire state and need fixing. That is peculiar to some parts of Wales, particularly the valleys. The work is available and there are, of course, the workers. What we need is a more favourable tax regime to encourage those workers to do the work. The Federation of Master Builders estimates that we could create about 100,000 jobs.

[Guto Bebb]

rose—

[Hywel Williams]

I will give way once more, but I am anxious to hear what the Minister has to say.

[Guto Bebb]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman. May I concur with the comments that have been made? As a Member for an area that is very dependent on tourism, I have also heard the argument for a reduction in VAT for the tourism sector. Any Government who want to create enterprise and employment should look carefully at using the tax system to do that although, obviously, that has to be put in place once we have the public finances in order.

[Hywel Williams]

That is a moot point. I do not have the figures at my fingertips, but when VAT on construction services was reduced in Italy, a large number of people who were working cash in hand realised that becoming legal and paying a lower rate of VAT was worth while. Allegedly, the tax take went up, so given the Government’s current situation, it might be useful to consider that. I have not seen the operation of the famous Laffer curve being proven in such a way before but, allegedly, that was the case in Italy at least.

The 100,000 jobs that it is estimated that such an approach could create would be local, but there is also a strong equality case in favour of the policy. I put this question rhetorically rather than to the Minister: why should a young couple pay more for renovating their terraced house when a banker who retired early with a big pension pot does not pay VAT on his newly built ranch-style property in the south-east? I had to get that one in. There is an equality issue, and lots of young people are trying to renovate their houses, so the proposal would be a great help to them.

Lastly, as I realise that time is moving on, we also need to boost self-employment. I agree with the FSB, which estimates that the self-employed contribute £21 billion to the UK economy every year. It argues persuasively that self-employment is a key driver to achieving economic growth. That is particularly the case in Wales, as self-employment is a feature of much of rural Wales.

I agree with the hon. Member for Aberconwy when he argues for enterprise zones, particularly enterprise zones themed around certain types of activity. The only thing I worry about is that if we have enterprise zones throughout the UK—not just in Wales—they will not act as an incentive hub for a wider economic picture. In some places in the early 1980s, jobs were poached from other areas and the net effect was less than one had hoped for because, rather than creating new jobs, companies moved in to benefit from the improved climate within the enterprise zones. That is a particular worry. I understand that the Government intend to have such an enterprise zone somewhere in the north-west. I am not sure what is going to happen, but I will certainly keep an interest in the matter.

Irrespective of welfare reform, we need in Wales to boost the private sector, to equip our workers and workless people better, and to improve the integration of services to ensure that there are jobs for our people and prosperity for our country. We need a work creation programme—that is the missing part of the jigsaw. If that sounds a bit like the case for a future jobs funds 2, so be it, particularly if that is aimed at those who are inevitably at the end of the queue when jobs are being handed out—the long-term unemployed, and those incapacitated by illness or long-term disability.

Pensions Bill [Lords]

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Monday 20th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

The upshot of the Bill is that many people will have to work longer than they expected, and at short notice. That is the point. People will have made their plans, but they will no doubt have to be changed if the Bill goes through.

I am sure the Minister knows better than I that pension planning is a long-term business, and that is why there is such value in cross-party consensus, in stability, in fairness and in any change being slow and clear. Those are, I think, the Pensions Minister’s own views, and that is one reason why there have been constant problems since a previous Conservative Government broke the consensus on pensions almost 30 years ago—a consensus that the Turner changes in the 2007 Act re-established to an extent.

I, too, have received a lot of correspondence, with constituents and others expressing lots of concern at what they see arising from the Bill as a sudden change, which, they also contend, does not have broad support across the parties or among people throughout the UK. Some see the change as a fundamental break in the social contract between government and people, while others accept that as life expectancy lengthens so too must the length of the working life, but all object to the change in the implementation time scale that the Bill proposes.

Hon. Members have already said that an estimated 5 million people born between 1953 and 1960 will have to wait longer to reach state pension age. Although the wait for the majority of people will increase by less than one year, about 500,000 women born between October 1953 and April 1955 will have to wait more than an additional year and 126,000 women born between December 1953 and October 1954 will have to wait up to two years, losing about £10,000 in pension. Those are the facts as we understand them.

Men and women on low incomes who are reliant on pension credit and have no private pension savings will be most affected by the changes, and we have many such people in Wales. A great deal has been spoken about the gender effects of the potential changes, and women will be hit hardest, but there are also effects on disabled people and potential effects on ethnic groups.

We have also heard about class effects. I, too, have looked at the Age UK briefing, and it states for example that a higher percentage of people in social classes D and E are unable to work on, with one third of such women, at least, being in ill-health. Age UK also points out that awareness of the changes among people in classes D and E is very much lower.

There are also national and regional effects, which have had less attention. The changes will hit some sectors of society harder than others, and we in Wales, as in Scotland, have more people in those sectors than other parts of the UK. In Scotland, life expectancy is four years below the European average at 76 for men and 80 for women. Glasgow has the lowest life expectancy in the UK—71.1 years for men and 77.5 for women. These people will be severely hit.

[Jonathan Evans]

The hon. Gentleman is right about life expectancy numbers. Somebody with a fund who has a poor health record will get a bigger annuity than somebody who has a healthy record. How would he resolve that in terms of the state pension situation? He seems to be saying that he would not change the current arrangements.

[Hywel Williams]

A large number of people are unable to get an annuity in the first place because they do not have that sort of pension. Nobody is arguing against the fact that life expectancy is extending—of course, that should be welcomed. However, the fact that the change is being brought in quickly will particularly affect certain groups in relation to class, gender and where they come from.

The effects in Wales will be much more pronounced. That is demonstrated by figures for July 2009-10 on the composition of the work force taken from the ONS publication “Regional Trends”. The average proportion of the population in the UK who are managers and senior officials is 15.6%, the figure for the south-east is 18.3%, and the figure for Wales is 13%. Managers and senior officials will not be hit as hard by the changes, because they have other sources of pension income and live longer. In Wales, we have fewer such people who are able to depend on a decent pension and expect to live longer; unsurprisingly, the south-east has many more. Likewise, in the case of process, plant and machine operatives, the UK average is 6.7%, the figure for the south-east is 5%, and the figure for Wales is 7.3%. As regards people in elementary occupations, the UK average is 11.1%, the figure for the south-east is 9.7%, and the figure for Wales is 11.8%. Workers and future pensioners will be disadvantaged in Wales, as in the rest of the UK, but the effects there and in Scotland will be more pronounced.

Plaid Cymru Members welcome the continuation of automatic enrolment in pension schemes. Given the increases in short-term employment, casualisation and multiple part-time jobs, we share Age UK’s concern about the earnings threshold, particularly the possible negative impact of the three-month waiting period and its effect on staff who might not stay in the job for long enough. We have the same concern about those who have multiple low-paid jobs and therefore may not reach the threshold and be excluded.

In a speech I made some months ago, I expressed reservations about the indexation process, so I will not labour that aspect. My final point is about the Pension Protection Fund, which was raised by the hon. Member for Cardiff North (Jonathan Evans) and is referred to in part 3 of the Bill. The PPF came about partly as a result of pressure put on the former Labour Government by Members in all parts of the House arising out of the ASW steelworkers scandal: a very difficult situation in which the Government had to be persuaded—I use that word advisedly—to act. Unfortunately, the ASW campaign is still ongoing. I recently met some of the workers, and I have tabled early-day motions and attended meetings on the subject, as has the hon. Member for Cardiff North. In November 2010, the pensions specialist Dr Ros Altmann suggested possible ways in which the coalition Government could assist the ASW workers. Will the Minister tell us what progress is being made in that case? That would go a long way towards responding to the campaign by those workers.

Oral Answers to Questions

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Monday 13th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

I can assure my hon. Friend that certain disabled groups have a blanket exemption: those who qualify for the severe disablement premium are automatically exempted from these proposals.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

There is a particular problem in rural areas, where the housing stock is inflexible and where it is difficult to provide rooms for under-25s, let alone under-35s, as the North Wales Housing Association pointed out to me recently. It fears the drift to HMOs—houses in multiple occupation—particularly in seaside towns and urban areas. Can the Government introduce any flexibility on this issue?

[Steve Webb]

Although HMOs are one response to the problem, young people will have a range of alternatives, which will differ from individual to individual. For example, one third of single people aged 25 to 34 live with their parents. I recognise that this is not an option for some, but it may be an option that others will take up. Some will use the Government’s “Rent a room” scheme—whereby an owner-occupier will rent out a room, from which they can get more than £4,000 tax free—and some may be able to rent a room from a social landlord, which is something that we are looking to explore more.

State Pension Reform

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Monday 4th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

The hon. Gentleman has raised an important point about people’s ability to afford to save. One of the key aspects of automatic enrolment is the fact that an employee’s contribution will trigger an employer contribution of nearly as much, plus tax relief. If an employee contributes 4% of his salary, the employer’s contribution will raise that to 8%, so this is a very affordable form of saving. Of course we want to ensure that people who make such sacrifices in order to save will be better off as a result, and our reforms will make that outcome far more likely than it is at present.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

Plaid Cymru has long campaigned for a living pension, and we welcome the Government’s single tier proposals. The current system does not ensure an adequate income for all pensioners. As Jackie Ashley wrote in today’s Guardian,

“On this issue of complexity Labour in power got it wrong, and should admit it.”

However, does the Minister accept that on the accelerated equalisation of state pension age, the Government are in some danger of getting it badly wrong for about half a million women in their late 50s? What assurances can he give about that?

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for expressing support for the proposal of the single tier on behalf of the Welsh nationalists. As for the issue of state pension ages, the Green Paper involves moves beyond the pension age of 66. The issue raised by the hon. Gentleman will be dealt with in the Pensions Bill, which will be presented to this House shortly, but, beyond that, we are trying to establish a more automatic mechanism that takes account of changes in life expectancy and, perhaps, of other factors as well, such as notice periods—which is, I think, the issue that he has raised—in a more systematic way than we or other Governments have done so far.

Oral Answers to Questions

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Monday 28th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The key is to get people back into work, to reform the system so that it is simpler and to ensure that work always pays. As we approach April, when the Darling plan was meant to start, I have yet to hear one single figure for anything that the Opposition say they would have reduced, had they introduced it. Instead, apparently, the Leader of the Opposition now lines himself up with Pankhurst, Mandela and Martin Luther King. Miliband does not quite work, does it?

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

What account does the Secretary of State take of arguments by disability campaigners such as my constituent, Mr Rhydian James, who points out that much of the increased cost of the system is due to demographic matters and to reduced under-claiming?

[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.

Disability Living Allowance

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2011 Westminster Hall

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

I am glad to have secured this timely debate on the reform of the mobility component of disability living allowance—the debate could scarcely be timelier. I am also grateful to the hon. Members who are here, as well as to those who have expressed their interest but cannot be here. Lastly, I am grateful to the many organisations that have provided briefings to me and others for this debate.

Disability living allowance is highly valued. Currently, the lower rate is £18.95 and the higher rate is £49.85. As the response to the Government’s consultation states, DLA, and attendance allowance before it,

“had a major positive impact on recipients’ lives…DLA recipients of working age were unanimous in expressing views that DLA made a big difference to them.”

Many people depend on DLA. With some reservations, I say that the application and decision making processes are clear. I will refer to that later, but at least we know where we stand. Research also shows that DLA is unlikely to be subject to fraud: the Department for Work and Pensions estimates fraud at 0.5%, the lowest rate in the entire benefits system. The system seems to be working. As a rural MP in north Wales, I know that DLA is particularly valuable to people in rural areas, who generally face intense problems with mobility. The money can transform people’s lives.

My concerns about the Government’s proposals relate to the assessment system, the threats to automatic entitlement, the extension of the waiting period, mobility payments for people in residential care and assessments regarding the use of aids and adaptations. However, my overarching concern is about the prospect of cuts of up to 20%. If cuts are made, who will pay for them? I strongly suspect that it is people with a disability who will be hit.

To rehearse the history, the mobility element of DLA was introduced in its earliest form, mobility allowance, by the Conservative Government in 1973. At the time, the Government were responding to the consensus between parties and civil society organisations that something had to be done to address the changing circumstances in which people with disabilities were living. They were living, living longer and living in the community rather than in residential care, and they were often younger than the disabled people who would have been living in the community 10, 20 or 30 years earlier. The world was changing, and the attendance and mobility allowances were introduced in response.

I have personal experience of those allowances. A close relative of mine, a young person severely injured in a car accident, was in just such circumstances in the early 1970s and was living in the community after extended medical treatment. At the time, mobility allowance made all the difference. It transformed his life then, and it still does now, given that he lives in a remote rural area and depends on his own transport.

The Government say that DLA needs reform. I agree, but my grounds for reform might be somewhat different from theirs. I think that the application process can be a disincentive. Many people have come to me, as their MP, in dismay over the substantial form that must be filled in, and I have been glad to refer such people to the citizens advice bureau. I pay tribute to the CAB’s work in the benefits field in general, but its expertise in the particular instance of DLA is truly inspirational. The application process could be changed.

I worry about take-up. There are few current statistics about the level of take-up of DLA and the mobility element of DLA. I did a bit of research with a colleague and found a reference to research in 1998, more than 10 years ago. The family resources survey estimated take-up of the mobility element at between 50% and 70%. Will the Minister tell us, now or by letter, whether any more recent estimates of the take-up have been made? I think that many people do not claim DLA or DLA mobility, even though they would clearly benefit from it.

As I have said, the application process could be improved. The number of successful appeals suggests that the initial assessment is not what it should be. Also, the DLA mobility element is age-restricted. Mobility allowance was initially subject to age restrictions—it was confined to people between 25 and 45—which were gradually expanded over the years. However, as one elderly constituent said to me recently, that benefit, which would help older people with mobility problems, is deliberately denied them by the age limits, which seems somewhat paradoxical. Will personal independence payments for mobility awarded before retirement continue to be paid afterwards, as DLA is at present? People are worried, perhaps unnecessarily.

The Government are proposing changes, as we will see this afternoon, and introducing PIP. The proposals will be subjected to detailed debates. As I have said, I worry about the possibility of 20% cuts and share people’s concerns and perception that there is a problem.

[Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his success in securing this debate. He has returned to the issue raised in the press of the possibility of a 20% cut in the numbers applying. If we take that figure with his earlier figure of less than 1% fraud or abuse of the system, we see the inevitable consequence that, even if the Government’s reductions target all those who fraudulently abuse the system, more than 19% of those targeted will still be genuine claimants, who will suffer unnecessarily.

[Hywel Williams]

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. The fundamental question is who will pay if cuts are made. The people squeezed out of the system will be genuine claimants who are disincentivised, or people with lower-level needs.

I am concerned by the Government’s conflation of the arguments about promoting the take-up of work and the need for reform. DLA literally helps some people get to work, but it is not a work-related benefit; it exists to assist with the additional costs of living with impairments or long-term health conditions. There is a coincidence between receiving DLA and experiencing difficulty finding work, but that means only that work for people with a disability is scarce. DLA is a marker rather than a cause, as the consultation paper seems to suggest. The work problems that I see confronting people with a disability involve ignorance among employers about the value of disabled workers. But perhaps, Mr Davies, I am straying into a subject beyond the strict bounds of the mobility element.

I am concerned about mobility and people in residential care. When I first thought of applying for this debate, that was the main issue that I wanted to address, as it is of concern to a great number of people. I certainly welcome the Government’s decision to delay the provision and to review it until 2013. That is unsurprising, given the view of the Social Security Advisory Committee, which said:

“This measure will substantially reduce the independence of disabled people who are being cared for in residential accommodation, which goes against the stated aim of the reform of DLA to support ‘disabled people to lead independent and active lives’.”

I very much welcome the postponement, but it is only a postponement and people are concerned.

[David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. A Library research paper notes:

“The DLA mobility component is however not affected if a person is in a care home. In a written answer in 2005, the then DWP Minister Malcolm Wicks said that this was because ‘care homes do not cover mobility needs’.”

It is now 2011. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that nothing has changed and that more than 90% still do not provide that?

[Hywel Williams]

The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point on a subject to which I shall refer later. Another concern is that the loss of the mobility component and of the Motability scheme in particular would have an effect on families with children in residential schools and their participation in family life.

The possibility of direct payment of money to claimants to fund their self-assessed mobility needs would be relatively simple compared with the complexity of ensuring that a residential setting provided similar, individually tailored mobility provision. We hardly need to think about the comparison. Many disability organisations have pointed out that current contracts do not provide an element of mobility. If the move is towards tackling duplication, as the Government see it, will we merely require the renegotiation of contracts as opposed to any other cost-saving change? Will such a renegotiation be at a further cost to the public purse?

I do not want to dwell on this issue—time is short—but I draw the Minister’s attention to the fact that health and social services in Wales are devolved. Changing the benefit system run from London does not necessarily mean that local authorities in Wales and the Welsh Government will follow what happens in England. I should perhaps point out the complications of a general welfare system that is run by two Governments—one concerned with care, the other with benefits—with possibly different priorities. I will not go down that route today, but it is a further complication that the Government need to consider between now and 2013.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Some Members present will be aware that the level of those with a disability in Northern Ireland is greater than it has ever been compared with other parts of the United Kingdom. Does the hon. Gentleman share my concern, as an elected representative, that, under the proposal to reduce 20% of DLA claimants, which will save £2.1 billion, it will be those people who need DLA who will lose out?

[Hywel Williams]

I suppose that that is the overarching concern behind all this. Eventually, some money might disappear, and the question is who will pay it. That is unclear at the moment. Many years ago, I used to repeat endlessly to some of my more starry-eyed social work students that, “It is not as simple as that,” which is a general rule for politics.

I was a young social worker in the late ’70s. I have promised the Minister that I would not use a lot of Welsh, but, inevitably, I would like to make one little point. I used to take some of my clients out on social occasions to try to improve the quality of their lives, and the only practical way to do that at that time was by minibus. It was a big, yellow minibus, which said on the side, “Cymdeithas Plant Araf eu Meddwl,” which translates as the society for mentally handicapped children. Needless to say, the people with whom I worked were neither children nor mentally handicapped, which was a loaded term even then but, for the non-Welsh-speakers present, “araf eu meddwl” is even more loaded—it literally means “slow of mind,” so I was taking people out in a big, yellow bus that said that they were slow of mind. I would say, therefore, that social security and social and health provision have developed over the past 30 to 40 years towards a more normalised provision, based on autonomy and choice.

If we depend on institutions to solve people’s problems of mobility, we will soon get institutional answers, which is something we should avoid.

[George Hollingbery (Meon Valley) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate. Does he not think that there is room for some standardisation or effort by central Government to ensure that those who are in residential settings and need mobility have at least some consistency of provision across the board? Surely, without that, there would be as much confusion as there would be otherwise.

[Hywel Williams]

I agree entirely with the hon. Gentleman. The provision in the public and private sectors of residential care needs to be looked at, but should that be done by reforming DLA in the way proposed? Would that be a blunt instrument? Are there other ways that that can be done?

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

As someone who lost to the hon. Gentleman in the 2005 general election—I represented, in a poor standard, the Welsh Conservatives in the former constituency of Caernarfon—I am particularly enjoying his passionate reverie of the 1970s. It is beyond question that he represents his constituency very well indeed. We all accept that there is likely to be a degree of cuts ahead. Does he accept the need for this issue to be reformed?

[Hywel Williams]

We can take a look at DLA, but that is the budget that I would cut almost last, because of its targeted nature and its efficiency and because of the needs of those who receive it and a host of other reasons. I accept the hon. Gentleman’s general thrust—everything should be open to review and reform—but I would start elsewhere before addressing the provision under discussion.

[Jim Shannon]

Surely, the real concern for many people is that 20% will become a target that must be achieved. If so, the target, rather than the people affected, will become the be-all and end-all of the achievement. Surely, the Government must say, “Let’s make improvements, but not set a target.”

[Hywel Williams]

The problem with targets, of course, is that they must be fulfilled, perhaps at the cost of the needs of individual claimants. I would start by looking through the other end of the telescope to see what the system of assessment and so on generates, rather than—I do not think that this is what the Government are actually doing—by imposing a rough, across-the-board 20% cut.

I must press on, because other hon. Members are anxious to contribute to the debate. My further concerns centre on the proposed assessment system. The current system assesses via a variety of sources of information—the claimant, a carer, a support worker, a GP, a specialist, a physiotherapist and so on—and I worry that, by slimming down that evidence to one assessment based on specified activities, the impact of disability on the individual may be missed. We have experience of using medical assessments in employment and support allowance applications. Like many other hon. Members, a large amount of casework in my constituency has been generated by the operation of that system.

As I said, I have received a number of briefings. An interesting and striking one came from the National Autistic Society, which suggested that those carrying out assessments will possibly fail to recognise the needs of people with conditions such as autism. I am concerned that reassessments should be fair and accurate, especially in relation to the suitability of people who have fluctuating conditions or mental health conditions. We must accept that mental health conditions are particularly difficult to assess.

Another concern relates to the proposal on delay, because increasing the waiting time to six months may cause hardship, although people with terminal illnesses will continue to have no waiting period.

Automatic payment is also a concern. I shall not go into that now, other than to say that the current system allows automatic payment in certain self-evident and extreme conditions—for example, double amputations. I am worried that automatic reassessment of those cases might lead to a waste of public money. If we remove those automatic entitlements, it may increase the cost of assessment and lead to the same outcome as we had under the original system—such people might still receive the higher rate.

On aids and appliances, it has been pointed out to me that if too much notice is taken of their use—particularly in unfamiliar situations—and that leads to a loss of money, it might be a disincentive to people using them. Will that be a disincentive?

As I said earlier, I am very happy that attention should be paid to the needs of disabled people. I am happy to consider the benefits system for disabled people at any time, but I worry that the proposals will not be much help. I am glad that the provision in respect of people in residential care has been delayed until 2013, and I look forward to contributing to the debate between now and then.

In summary, I fear that the changes might limit lives and increase disability poverty and demand for mental health services. Consequently, they might increase the demand for primary care services and lead to a loss of employment. Those fears might all be laid to rest by the Minister’s response and as the debate progresses over the next months and days—I accept that entirely—but it is important to put such concerns on the record.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Fuller]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. He echoes a point that was made by my hon. Friends the Members for Banbury (Tony Baldry) and for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan). This is an opportunity to provide a clear map of the requirements and also to identify, not in a naming and shaming way but in a positive way, what local authorities and care homes should provide and where evidence shows that they are falling short.

I believe that this is the second debate on disability living allowance that the hon. Member for Arfon has secured. Is that correct?

[Hywel Williams]

No.

[Richard Fuller]

I am sorry. It is the second debate that I have attended on the subject. It shows how important it is to hon. Members that we get the correct answers. This debate is a bit more heartening in that it is not focused so much on cuts. The Minister needs to lay this to rest: the changes are not being made to reduce funding but to ensure that the funding that is available is directed in a way that gives clarity to families and the recipients of care in various care homes. It is extremely important that that message is made clear. [Interruption.] If hon. Members disagree, we need to continue to bring that to the Minister’s attention. I fundamentally do not believe that that is the intent of the policy, and I look forward to listening to those who think differently.

I should like to thank the 27 charities—the number is growing—that have provided information to other hon. Members and to me in their reports, “Don’t Limit Mobility”, and, more recently, “DLA mobility: sorting the facts from the fiction”. A number of them are in an expert position because they also operate care homes. I would be interested to hear from the Minister how many of them have come forward with examples from their own experience of the uniformity of provision across their network of homes. Has she received such representations or evidence from them about whether they experience differences in the various local authority areas in which they operate? That would be a useful body of evidence, and it behoves the charities to provide such information to the Minister, so that we can have a clearer picture.

In their reports, the charities provide some information about the rationales for the changes. I admit that several have been presented over the months, but I should like to pick up on two that are particularly pertinent and germane. I thought that the first one they listed was very interesting:

“The responsibility for mobility/transport costs should be met by the care home provider”.

What struck me in the evidence that the charities provided was that they saw a lack of clarity in what has been provided. They stated:

“Related legislation and guidance make no specific reference to mobility… While guidance places a responsibility…it contains nothing about how this is paid for… This guidance is not contract terms… the guidance does not provide a legal requirement.”

That points to the comments that were made earlier by my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury and others about the need for clarity and a road map.

Welfare Reform Bill

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

That is not our intention, and it is why we were are proceeding carefully and consulting about our proposals. The purpose is to maintain incentives to go to work. Universal credit is designed to encourage lone parents to go to work, but it recognises their need to meet their child care responsibilities. We can debate the various elements, but the principle is that the measure should be more than helpful to them. We will move on to the finer detail as we get to Committee stage.

As we increase support to make work pay, it is right to ensure that claimants do everything they reasonably can to find or prepare for work. As the House knows, we will tailor conditionality to individual circumstances, and require all claimants to accept what I call a claimant commitment. From the outset they will be asked to sign up to the idea that we will provide them with the necessary support and access to universal credit, but we will also expect them to recognise that the sanctions regime is applicable. It is easy to understand. If they do not comply with that as they go further through the process, they are likely to encounter that sanctions regime at key moments.

The toughest sanctions will apply to those who are expected to be seeking work but fail to meet important conditions. They should understand that if they keep on crossing a series of lines, they will invoke the sanctions regime. The problem at present is that the regime is often confusing. I have visited jobcentres a number of times—and I see on the Opposition Benches one of the Members who used to be a Minister in the Department. As he knows, if one talks to jobcentre staff, they will say that the problem is that when claimants reach the point where they are about to hit sanctions, it comes as a big surprise to many of them that sanctions will be imposed and that the situation is real and serious.

By letting claimants know much earlier and by introducing a regime that is easy to understand, with a simple tripwire process, they will know from the word go. That should disincentivise people from taking the wrong turns. Benefits will be taken away for three months after a first failure, six months after a second, and three years after a third. That will apply to those at the top level—in other words, those who are fully able to search actively for work and to take it. There are, however, other categories. The same conditions would not apply to lone parents, for example.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

The rate of worklessness and the availability of jobs vary from area to area. What account will the sanctions regime take of that variation?

Social Security

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Thursday 17th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jenny Willott]

As I understand the way in which that relates to working-age households, people who are on benefits are much more likely to be living in social housing and so will not face large fluctuations in mortgage costs. For those of working age who are on benefits and do have mortgage costs, there is a lot of assistance from the state. They are not bearing the full brunt of mortgage interest fluctuations because a lot of that is borne by the state. Therefore, I believe that CPI relates appropriately to that group, too.

The financial implications, over this Parliament and beyond, for the Government of the difference between CPI and RPI have been discussed a lot today. We are in very difficult financial circumstances and the Government have had to make some extremely difficult financial decisions. The Minister has laid out why the Government believe that CPI is the right measure to use, but the financial benefits of that for the Government coffers are significant. By introducing the triple lock, the Government are protecting the most vulnerable pensioners. The people potentially most penalised are being protected, while the amount of money saved is quite significant and will help the economy to grow in future.

The shadow Minister, the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms), eventually made it clear that the Opposition will not vote against the orders and will support the changes and the uprating, which seems to suggest that they understand the logic and agree with the overall decision. Whether it be for the moment, for three years or until the next Parliament, I am not entirely sure, but it is good to see it when occasionally agreement breaks out across the House. It is also good and quite a novelty to see Labour Members finally supporting measures that will save the Treasury some money. If they plan to return to RPI in the future, I look forward to seeing how they plan to find the billions of pounds that will be necessary to implement it.

I congratulate the Government on introducing the triple lock for pensioners, which is a significant step forward. It is also pleasing for me as a Liberal Democrat to see a manifesto commitment implemented.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

The hon. Lady is generous. She has mentioned the triple lock many times. Is she at all concerned about the ratcheting effect of implementing it, which has been a consideration in the past?

[Jenny Willott]

I would have thought that being too generous to pensioners was a good thing.

[Hywel Williams]

I am unconcerned about it being too generous. When the ratcheting effect was considered in the ’80s, when Barbara Castle presented her proposals for pensioners, I was supportive of her, but concern was expressed in the House at the time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

I begin by welcoming the Government’s change of mind on housing benefits. If that had not happened, there would have been a disastrous effect on constituencies such as mine which have high unemployment rates and slim prospects of people finding a job within a year. There will be a general welcome for that. I wanted to say that because I have campaigned about it in the past, as have many of my constituents.

I should like briefly to refer to correspondence from pensioner constituents who are concerned about the change from RPI to CPI. At the very least, there is a problem of perception. People see that RPI for the third quarter of 2010 was 4.6%, whereas CPI was 3.1%. They see that the current rate of inflation under RPI is 5.1% and that it is 4% under CPI. Clearly, people are worried. People have made long-term financial decisions on expectations that might not be realised. I raised the triple lock in an intervention and I do not want to discuss it in detail, but I worry about its longevity because of concerns that have been expressed many times in the past.

I have received correspondence about CPI and RPI from the Public and Commercial Services Union, the Civil Service Pensioners Alliance, Age UK and my constituents. My attention has been drawn to some statistics and I would like to read them into the record. The PCS states that using the base of 1988, had CPI been used to uprate a £10,000 pension, its value now would be £18,035, compared with £20,935 under RPI—a difference of 16%. A pensioner on the median public sector pension of £5,500 who has been retired for 20 years would now be on £4,845—a loss of 12% or £655. It is those sorts of figures that worry people.

Obviously, CPI has been higher than RPI in some years—1991, 1993, 1996, 1999 and 2008—but the Treasury itself reckons that over the next five years, RPI will consistently be higher than CPI. Perhaps that is because of the predicted steeper rises in housing costs. I refer the House to table C2 in the Budget Red Book, which puts the overall change to 2016 of CPI at 13.7% and of RPI at 22.1%. That is a substantial difference. Of course, a gloss has been put on, but I will not go into that at the moment.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

One argument for the change to CPI is that many of those in receipt of a pension are insulated from fluctuations in housing costs because they are not paying a mortgage. However, does the hon. Gentleman agree that they often have other private housing costs that are not reflected in CPI, such as insurance costs and the depreciation of their properties?

[Hywel Williams]

That is a valid point. Of course, the variation across the country is quite substantial. I refer again to my own constituency, where there has traditionally always been a very high level of owner-occupation. There are older people who own their houses, but in other areas people are still paying off their mortgages. The figure of 7% has been mentioned—that is a lot of people who will be hit.

[Sheila Gilmore]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that figure might well grow in future? Given the level of borrowing that many people have made to buy properties, and that a lot of people are buying at a much later age, many more people are likely to move into retirement with a mortgage still to repay.

[Hywel Williams]

That is a very good point. Indeed, I think I might be one of those people. I understand that the average age of the first-time buyer is now 38. These are valid worries that people have.

The arguments on RPI and CPI have been well rehearsed this afternoon so I will not go further into them. I have a great deal of respect for the Minister and I think he would agree with me and many other people that what we need is a bit of calm and consensus on pensions policy—something that has been lacking for 25 or 30 years. I worry that this change will not lead to consensus and that he might have fallen in with a bad lot.

Oral Answers to Questions

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Monday 14th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

My hon. Friend is quite right that Labour Members’ answer to most questions is “More money,” but when we asked where the money had gone, we were told that there was none. Housing benefit is probably one of the most complicated benefits in the system; it is at the end of the line when everything else has been worked out. The sooner we can integrate it into universal credit, the better.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

On Friday, I met a group of residents at a hostel run by the North Wales Housing Association. Those people have very little prospect of employment in an area of such high unemployment, yet they might face a reduction in their benefits. Does the Minister accept that that sort of cut might threaten the viability of hostels such as the Pendinas hostel that I visited on Friday?

[Steve Webb]

The budget for discretionary housing payments across the country will be trebled over the coming years, so that additional funding will be available for particular difficult cases. One thing we want to do is enable people to get back to work, where jobs are available, and the universal credit process will increase the financial return and people who take low-paid jobs will have a greater ability to afford somewhere to rent.