Underoccupancy Charge: Carers Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Work and Pensions
Lord Cormack
Main Page: Lord Cormack (Conservative - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Cormack's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(9 years, 12 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Freud
The courts have gone through this in some detail now and found that it is reasonable for the Secretary of State to take the view that it is not practicable to provide a further exemption for an imprecise class of persons, and that the flexibility of the DHP scheme can be relied upon to provide the additional help.
Lord Cormack (Con)
Does my noble friend not accept that this policy, which appears to be insensitively applied, does not sit happily with Conservative philosophy?
Lord Freud
We have aimed to get rid of some of the areas where people are just not taking part in the economic life of the country. One of the things that has been happening is that the proportion of people who have been outside the labour market and in social housing has dropped dramatically from a peak of 49% at the beginning of this Parliament to 41% now—the lowest-ever level. We need to look to help all people that we possibly can to take a full part in the economic life of this country.