Inequality and Social Mobility

Lord Walney Excerpts

Wednesday 12th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Amber Rudd]

The hon. Gentleman paints a very bleak picture, but the facts that came out on Tuesday demonstrated that monthly incomes are rising faster than inflation. There are jobs being made available and inequality has started falling since 2010.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

The Secretary of State is being generous in giving way. Does she agree that, if the Government are sincere in wanting to accelerate progress in reducing poverty, it would be madness to advocate a tax priority of cutting income tax for those earning more than £50,000 a year? She must oppose that.

[Amber Rudd]

The tax cuts by this Government that I am most proud of are those that have taken the lowest paid out of tax altogether. Thirty million people have received a tax cut under this Government. We brought forward the threshold, which is now at £12,500, a year early to make that point and so that people on the lowest incomes do not pay tax at all.

Employment and Support Allowance: Underpayments

Lord Walney Excerpts

Monday 25th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Newton]

I reassure the hon. Gentleman that people would have been on benefits, so it is not fair to say that—or to characterise the situation as one in which—people would not have had any benefits. Clearly, some people would have benefited from additional payments because we did not give them the right amount of money, but people did have those payments in the first place.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

The Minister is sorry and says lessons are being learnt, but where is the sense of accountability for this terrible error, which has had such a profound effect on many thousands of people’s lives? Where are the extra staff and resource coming from to sort out this problem? Which areas of the DWP’s work are being deprioritised to make this right?

[Sarah Newton]

On the question about accountability, of course the National Audit Office has undertaken an inquiry into this issue and so has the Public Accounts Committee. There has been a lot of scrutiny, and it is quite right that there has been so much. I do not hold back from saying that this should never have happened. It is a very serious situation that we do take very seriously and are working hard to rectify. Please be assured that that is the case, that we have made the resources available, and that we will complete this exercise this year.

Social Security

Lord Walney Excerpts

Wednesday 6th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Newton]

These two statutory instruments will increase the value of lump sum awards payable under the Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) Act 1979 and the diffuse mesothelioma scheme, which was set up by the Child Maintenance and Other Payments Act 2008. Those schemes stand apart from the main social security benefits uprating procedure, and there is no legislative requirement to review the level of payments each year. None the less, I am happy to increase the amounts payable from 1 April this year by September’s consumer prices index of 2.4%.

The Government recognise the very great suffering of individuals and their families caused by the serious and often fatal diseases resulting from exposure to asbestos, coal dust and other forms of dust. The individuals affected may be unable to bring a successful claim for damages, often owing to the long latency period of their condition, but they can still claim compensation through these schemes.

I will briefly summarise the specific purpose of the two compensation schemes. The Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) Act 1979, which for simplicity I will refer to as the 1979 Act scheme, provides a lump sum compensation payment to those who have one of five dust-related respiratory diseases covered by the scheme, who are unable to claim damages from employers because they have gone out of business and who have not brought any action against others for damages. The five diseases covered by the 1979 Act scheme are diffuse mesothelioma, bilateral diffuse pleural thickening, pneumoconiosis and byssinosis, as well as primary carcinoma of the lung if accompanied by asbestosis or bilateral diffuse pleural thickening. The 2008 mesothelioma lump sum payment scheme widens the criteria for compensation to those who have contracted diffuse mesothelioma but who are unable to claim compensation for that disease under the 1979 Act scheme—for example, those people who were self-employed or whose exposure to asbestos was not due to work.

Payments under the 1979 Act scheme are based on the age of the person with the disease and their level of disablement at the time of their diagnosis. All payments for diffuse mesothelioma are made at the 100% rate. All payments under the 2008 scheme are also made at the 100% disablement rate and based on age, with the highest payments going to the youngest people with the disease. In the last full year, from April 2017 to March 2018, 3,680 people received payments under both schemes, totalling £49.2 million.

I am aware that the prevalence of diffuse mesothelioma is a particular concern of Members, given the number of deaths from this disease in Great Britain. It is at a historically high level. The life expectancy of those diagnosed with diffuse mesothelioma is poor, with many people dying within 12 months of diagnosis. The disease has a strong association with exposure to asbestos, and current evidence suggests that around 85% of all mesotheliomas diagnosed in men are attributable to asbestos exposures that occurred through work. Our latest available information suggests that there will continue to be around 2,500 diffuse mesothelioma deaths per year before the number of cases begins to fall during the next decade, reflecting a reduction in asbestos exposures after 1980.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

The Minister will be aware that Barrow and Furness has the highest number of asbestos-related cancer deaths in the whole of England and Wales. Is she aware of how many sufferers who were previously compensated under the scheme covering pleural plaques are now falling victim to terminal asbestosis and finding themselves ineligible for any compensation under these schemes? Does she not feel that that is unjust? Will she meet me and representatives of my community to discuss that?

[Sarah Newton]

I am always happy to meet colleagues from across the House if they have particular constituency issues or if people who really need support are falling between the cracks. There are three different schemes available to support people, and we are talking about two of them today. I would be happy to meet the hon. Gentleman to explore those issues and to discuss the three compensation programmes to see whether there is more that we can do. We are absolutely committed to ensuring that people get the support to which they are entitled.

We expect to see a decline in the number of people being diagnosed with diffuse mesothelioma in the coming years, but many people will continue to develop the condition and the other respiratory diseases, based on their exposure, for some time to come. That is why the Government are committed to working in partnership with their arm’s length bodies and agencies to improve the lives of those with respiratory diseases. I want to give the House an example of that commitment.

Last summer, I hosted a lung health summit, bringing together the Union of Democratic Mineworkers, my hon. Friends the Members for Sherwood (Mark Spencer) and for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) and representatives from the British Lung Association and the NHS. This was an opportunity to discuss the important work that the Government and our partners are doing and to listen to the first-hand experiences and problems, brought to my attention by my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood, that miners are encountering today as they try to get an appropriate diagnosis and therefore the financial support that we want them to receive.

A huge amount of work has been done as a result of that lung health summit, and I was delighted—as I hope everyone will be—to see that the recently published NHS long-term plan recognises the objective of improving outcomes for people with respiratory disease. The long-term plan sets out how the NHS will take action in a number of areas. This includes expanding programmes that support earlier diagnosis of respiratory diseases—including the pioneering lung health checks trialled in Manchester and Liverpool—and increasing access to proven treatments such as pulmonary rehabilitation. As part of the engagement process for the Government’s long-term plan, an NHS England respiratory oversight group has been created, which includes membership of the British Lung Foundation. In addition, NHS England has been working closely with the taskforce for lung health, which has also recently published its own five-year plan to improve lung health.

I want to take a few moments to talk about the work of the Health and Safety Executive in this regard. It does excellent work, the length and breadth of the country, but we seldom have an opportunity to reflect on that in this House. As a nation, we should be really proud of our long history of trying to prevent illness and injury at work. The very first factory inspectors were appointed under the Factory Act 1833 to prevent injury and overworking among child textile workers, and we have come a long way since then. The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act came into force in October 1974 and the Health and Safety Executive was formed in January 1975. The HSE is now well established as a mature regulator with a mission to prevent work-related death, injury and ill health. This is borne out by the most recent published HSE statistics, which show a long-term downward trend in the rate of self-reported non-fatal accidents and fatal accidents to workers. Indeed, the UK consistently has one of the lowest standardised rates of fatal injury when compared with any other large economy.

Turning back to the importance of these regulations, I am sure we all agree that, while no amount of money can ever compensate individuals or their families for the suffering and loss caused by the diffuse mesothelioma and pneumoconiosis covered by the 1979 Act scheme, those who have those diseases rightly deserve some form of monetary compensation. Finally, I am required to confirm to the House that these provisions are compatible with the European convention on human rights, and I am happy so to do.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

I want to tell the Minister and the House a little about the life of Jack Hordon, who was until recently one of my constituents. Sadly, Mr Hordon died in December last year after a life in which he had worked in Barrow shipyard and in the merchant navy on behalf of the New Zealand Shipping Company. He was similar to many thousands of my constituents over the years, and similar to many people in shipbuilding areas and coalmining towns who served their families and their communities. They provided for themselves and their families, but in Barrow shipyard they also did a service for the nation by building vessels that went to war and the submarine fleets that have kept our nation safe for many years. Sometimes because of a lack of knowledge and often because of employers’ lack of care for their employees at the time, those people were exposed and unwittingly exposed their families—including their children, as the right hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning) rightly described—to this deadly killer that sometimes lay quiet for decades until it struck and took away their lives in the most cruel and painful circumstances.

I raise Mr Hordon’s case partly because his life is representative of so many, but also because of the particular gap and injustice exposed by his recent experience. I am very proud to be the successor of Lord Hutton of Furness. He now sits in the other place but was the previous Member of Parliament for Barrow and Furness. He was the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in the previous Labour Government, when I was privileged to serve as his special adviser, and he was determined to speed up access to justice for mesothelioma sufferers and to stop the terrible situation in which there were delays in many sufferers getting their compensation payments, as previous speakers have described.

While Lord Hutton was serving in government, there was also a debate about pleural plaques. After he left the post, he privately lobbied his successor in the Department not to close the scheme and to remain alive to the potential pitfalls of the Government’s approach to pleural plaques. The window for claiming pleural plaques compensation was closed in 2007, and there was a debate about that at the time. Mr Hordon fell ill in 2017 and was diagnosed in August that year as a sufferer of malignant mesothelioma. For 20 years, he had been the full-time carer of his wife of 65 years. Throughout their life—all the time that she suffered from severely debilitating disabilities—they had never claimed. He had always worked assiduously to provide for the family so that they could stand on their own feet. When he fell ill, there was severe distress in the family at his no longer being able to perform that role. Mrs Hordon was forced to go into emergency care, which became permanent, at great distress to her and to the family.

The financial burden and the uncertainty meant there was a real imperative to seek mesothelioma compensation. The initial contact with solicitors was positive. As was the experience of many Members’ constituents, the solicitors said that the case could be taken forward at the greatest possible speed. However, they soon came back with the discovery that Mr Hordon had previously made a claim for pleural plaques, and it turned out that he had signed that, on the strong advice of his solicitors at the time, as a full and final settlement. The family were left unable to claim. They went back over their experience, and Mr Hordon could remember that the advice he was given was that there was only a 1% chance of the pleural plaques worsening into a terminal condition. The solicitors advised him, in the words of the family, “to bite off the hand” of those offering it.

I am grateful to the Minister for agreeing to a meeting because, clearly, this will not be an isolated case. Two issues arise from Mr Hordon’s tragic death and the circumstances around it: one is the injustice of him being denied the compensation that he needed every bit as much as anyone else who falls victim to such a condition; and secondly, there is a case for an inquiry into the practices around pleural plaques at the time. Mr Hordon’s family is clear that he cannot have been given proper advice by the solicitors and by those who were estimating the chances of his condition developing into something that was terminal. The fact is there was a financial incentive for some firms to use sharp practices: they wanted to seize the chance of cash without proper analysis of what the real risks were to people and what their circumstances might be in the future.

Mr Hordon and his family were clear that the risks were not properly spelled out to him. He cannot be alone in that. I speak on behalf of my own constituent and, as I said in my intervention on the Minister, of a constituency that has the highest number of asbestosis-related lung cancer deaths in the whole of England and Wales. I am sure that, potentially, the condition will affect many thousands more people across the country. Will the Government please agree to examine this issue so that there is the prospect of justice for people who find themselves in this situation?

Universal Credit

Lord Walney Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Alok Sharma]

My hon. Friend is right. Regular wages are up 3.1% this year, and I agree that we now have a system in place whereby work pays. The analysis that we have published shows that people get paid more under universal credit.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Ind)]

Universal credit is due to be rolled out in Barrow just three weeks before Christmas this year—the worst possible time—and there is currently no certainty that debt relief will be provided for the area. Will the Minister rethink and postpone the roll-out?

[Alok Sharma]

The roll-out in Reading, which I represent, took place prior to Christmas last year. There were no issues, and I very much hope that things will be the same in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, but I am happy to have a discussion to ensure that he is talking to his jobcentre and that he gets the comfort he needs.

Universal Credit Project Assessment Reviews

Lord Walney Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to follow that speech, which at least had the merit of sounding less like a combative deaf cat than some Conservative Members’ speeches.

The debate has been depressing, partly because of the heart-rending stories that some colleagues have told. In Barrow and Furness, too, there has been increasing poverty and desperation in recent years. Our referrals to food banks are up by around two thirds on this time last year. People are trying to do their best, but they are struggling and they are frightened. I shall say more about scaremongering shortly.

The debate has also been depressing because some of the speeches made by Government Members bear little resemblance to their constituents’ reality. I do not think that that is because most of them are intrinsically bad people, but something happens when we get into this Chamber, and people feel an obligation to parrot the lines they are given by their Whip or Department.

I was a special adviser in the last Labour Government in the Department for Work and Pensions and we considered universal credit—it was our long-term goal, too. There were good reasons for choosing not to go ahead with it at the time, and they are writ large in what is happening now. It is not that universal credit is a bad thing. In principle, we think it is a good thing, but to call the changes transformative—I mean, come on, look at it! The system does not even come close to the level of investment needed, both in terms of the payments made to families and of the support offered to get people back to work, to call it transformative.

[Stephen Lloyd]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Woodcock]

I will not, I am afraid, because we are so short of time.

The previous Labour Government were guilty of this rhetoric to an extent. I gently remind some Conservative Members, who may not have been here then, that we pursued a path of welfare reform. It was seen as dangerous at the time, although in fact it should have gone further and faster. There was a significant period when the shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, who is now the Chancellor of the Exchequer, said that we should not have made some of those changes. We were sometimes guilty of claiming that the reforms would transform people’s lives, but enough changes were never made to be able to make that so.

On the way in which the reforms are being implemented, “scaremongering” is a term that is bandied around a lot, but if Members want, with justification, to accuse people of scaremongering, they have to be confident about what the future will be for this benefit. The case studies my right hon. and hon. Friends have outlined today show the huge problems with the roll-out of universal credit. The recent history of benefit delivery by the Department for Work and Pensions and the people it has contracted makes it impossible to get to a place where we could think that this is all going to be fine, no matter the good intentions behind the changes, which are welcome in so far as they correct some of the glaring injustices of the system as it stood.

For the people of Barrow and Furness, the full transition to universal credit has been delayed until 18 July. There has, rightly, been much passionate talk about the dangers of a transition over the Christmas period. I fear for my constituents. I signed the Bill on holiday hunger introduced by my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field). I fear for families who struggle to feed their children over the holidays in the best of times. We need much less complacency from the Government and a sense that they are prepared to grip this problem. The problems are clearly already stacking up. That will continue and they need to be dealt with by the time my constituents go on fully to universal credit.

State Pension Age: Women

Lord Walney Excerpts

Wednesday 29th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)]

It is a great honour to speak in the debate on this important issue on behalf of the many WASPI women of Chelmsford who have been to visit me, especially the lovely Cheryl Lucas, who speaks with great calm and compassion on the issue. I have deep respect for them and for the situation they find themselves in. Many of these women have worked for many years and paid their taxes and national insurance contributions. They have told me how they had made plans based on the expectation that they would retire on a certain date, only for that date to be changed. Some of them genuinely feel that they were not consulted or made aware of the change of date. Others had retired early in anticipation—

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

The hon. Lady is putting her case very well. Is this not why it is such an insult to suggest to older women that things will be fine if they go out and get an apprenticeship?

[Vicky Ford]

Let me carry on with my point, because I would dearly love to help the WASPI women in my constituency who find themselves in this situation.

I look at the statistics, and as a mathematician, I remember looking at life expectancy a few years ago. My mother is 30 years older than I am, and my daughter is 30 years younger than I am. Of my mother’s age group—those born in 1937—6% will live to 100. For my age group, 16% will live to 100. In my daughter’s age group, it is 26%. We are all living longer, and we all therefore need to work longer. That is why successive Labour and Conservative Governments have been right to take measures to change the pension age.

I have thought about what more we could do to help the women who have been affected. If we give them additional financial or tax benefits, what then do I say to women like me who were born in the 1960s? Why should a woman born in 1959 get an additional benefit, but not the woman born in 1960? I have championed equality all my life, so what do I say to the men when the women get an additional benefit? What do I say to my daughter’s generation, who are struggling with student debt and struggling to get on the housing ladder? They can see that they may never have anything like the workplace pensions that we have had.

The jobs that the WASPI women have been doing in the past may often not be jobs that they want to continue doing into their 60s and may not suit them, which is why it is so important that we champion opportunities for some of our older workers—people in their 50s, like myself, and people in their 60s. We should go out and tell employers that these women are fantastic and can really add value. For those who have genuine problems, we must be faster in getting support to them. I was contacted by a WASPI woman just this week who has cancer and needs support, so we need to be quicker. I understand why the Government cannot write a blank cheque, but please let us find some support.

Backbench Business

Lord Walney Excerpts

Thursday 16th March 2017 Westminster Hall

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Walker. I congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) and thank him for securing this debate. I want to speak against the impending closure of Phoenix House in Barrow, which is not a jobcentre but a back-office benefits processing centre. As I will outline, the 80 people in that centre perform an important service to people throughout the United Kingdom. As I said to the Minister, who was good enough to make himself available in the days immediately after the shock announcement, closing the centre could have damaging consequences for the people whom we as a country, the state and his Department are supposed to be serving.

In contrast with some of the tone of the debate so far, I am not questioning the Minister’s integrity. Everything that I saw of him in the time before he became a Minister suggests that he is genuinely committed to the field, in which he spent a considerable amount of time before being promoted to a ministerial role. However, he is presiding over a process that is simply not acceptable, for many reasons that have been outlined in this debate. This is an important opportunity for him to listen and make amends.

I imagine that the Minister will recall our brief meeting. Having worked as an adviser in the Department where he now serves, I have some experience of how it can sometimes drive forward with a programme while treating ministerial direction—which, frankly, it sometimes seems to take as advice—as wholly unwelcome, although I do not expect him to confirm that in his remarks. I have spoken with his Department. Mentioning the conduct of civil servants is not something I do lightly, but I was genuinely taken aback when I went to see the Minister and the civil servant who was there to support him did not even know what benefit was processed in Barrow. That is lacking in and of itself when we are talking about 80 people in my constituency who are losing their jobs. As the Minister for Employment, he will have some understanding that when skilled office jobs are eliminated in a geographically remote constituency such as Barrow, they have little prospect of being replaced by something else, and people cannot realistically travel to another place two or more hours away. I expected that civil servant to know what those people did, at least.

Due to the nature of the benefit, closing Phoenix House and taking the facilities somewhere else in the country, inevitably employing new people, will do damage to the service provided. The centre processes industrial injuries disablement benefit. The team say proudly that they have more than 100 years’ experience between them of processing that benefit. Due to that build-up of expertise, the Barrow team has taken part in a process that has reduced the processing time for that benefit from 175 days to 33 days. That is an achievement and welcome in itself, but we must also take into account who receives the benefit. It goes to people who have developed terrible conditions. Many of them, such as those suffering from the likes of asbestosis, are terminally ill due to negligence in past decades. That is why they have been given compensation in the form of the benefit. The whole point of focusing on driving down the time that it takes for them to get it is that it makes the difference between them receiving it while they are still alive and receiving it after they have died.

When I made the case to the Minister, he told me that he and the Government were not in the business of reversing that progress and going back to the days when, unfortunately, many people died before they were given the benefit, which is itself inadequate compensation for having their lives taken away but is nevertheless important both financially and as recognition that they were wronged in their employment. I put it to him again that reversing progress is exactly what will happen if that function is taken away from Phoenix House and put elsewhere in the country.

The Minister will know by now, I hope, that it takes 12 to 18 months to train people in even a basic level of competence, and the people at Phoenix House have much more than that due to the experience that they have built up. I am coming to the end of my time; I am pleased that we are giving him ample time to address all the diverse issues. I hope that he can address the plight of the staff members at Phoenix House, who are campaigning hard. They have set up a petition, and I supported their march in Barrow on Saturday. They are fighting for their jobs, but they are also fighting for the service that they give to the rest of the nation, and I hope that he takes it seriously in his response.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Hinds]

The hon. Lady will understand that I am not going to stand up in Westminster Hall—nor should I—and talk about detailed proposals and plans for sites that she or others may put forward, but we are always open to talking about the range of opportunities. I am happy to follow up with her on the specific points she raises.

In every case where change is proposed, we have sought to minimise disruption and listen carefully to those who might be affected, but as a result of modernisation, the Department’s services are demanding fewer people to deliver. It is only right that we consider our options going forward. Delivering a modern and dynamic service to claimants requires modern and dynamic working environments, and that is what we are striving towards as part of our vision for DWP in 2020. Our aim is to maintain and improve the services offered across the country.

We recognise, of course, how important the DWP’s staff are to achieving that aim. They are our most valuable resource. It is as a result of their immense effort that the Department is able to provide such a high level of service to our customers. My colleagues and I have been clear that the proposals for the DWP’s redesigned estate do not mean a reduction in the number of frontline staff. In fact, we are recruiting and we expect to have more work coaches in every nation and region of the United Kingdom at the end of this process in March 2018 than we do today.

For staff across the DWP network who may be affected by the estate changes, we are currently working through options with each individual, identifying relocation opportunities in the event of closure, but most of all we are listening carefully to understand fully the impact on staff.

[John Woodcock]

rose—

[Damian Hinds]

I am happy to give way, but I was coming to the hon Gentleman’s point.

[John Woodcock]

If the Minister is going to answer this, great, but does he recognise the particular issue of the unfeasibility of Barrow staff relocating, and has he had a chance to examine the proposal that I made when we met to find a cheaper lease on a smaller property in Barrow than Phoenix House?

[Damian Hinds]

I recognise, of course, the difficult position that staff in Barrow are in and I join the hon. Gentleman in the tribute that he paid to the immensely valuable work that they do. I fully recognise, as he does, the accumulated experience that that group of dedicated staff has. One-to-one conversations will be going on in Barrow and, indeed, in all other locations where there are affected staff. There will be some limited opportunities for staff in Barrow jobcentre, but I am not suggesting that that covers everybody.

The industrial injuries work rightly raised by the hon. Gentleman is moving to Barnsley, which is an existing centre with experience and expertise. Overall for that work, reducing volume demand is projected over the next five years, and we do not expect an impact on service to the customer.

The Department has already made a commitment to support anyone who chooses to relocate in the event of a site closure. That would include the payment of additional travel expenses for up to three years. However, the fact remains that the Department has significantly more capacity across its network than is needed to serve the needs of our customers, even allowing, of course, for a sensible margin. It is imperative that we strive towards more modern and dynamic delivery methods.

Although there is no statutory requirement for consultation on the estate changes to jobcentres, we are conducting consultation on all proposed closures of jobcentres that fall outside what are known as the ministerial criteria. It is not unreasonable to expect claimants to travel to an office that is within 3 miles, or 20 minutes by public transport, of their existing jobcentre. Where a proposed move is outside those criteria, we have chosen to consult publicly both stakeholders and claimants to ensure that the full implications of the closure are considered before we make a final decision. To enhance the profile of such consultations, we have written to local stakeholders and have distributed leaflets and put up posters at affected sites. We have undertaken public consultation where we think the proposals may have a significant effect on claimants. The objective is to ensure that the effects of our proposals are fully considered before any final decisions are made, and I welcome the engagement and responses that we have had from local stakeholders.

We have had a total of 290 responses from across the three sites in Glasgow. Those include responses from claimants, Members of Parliament, including some present here, interested third-party organisations and the wider public. Alongside taking into account the views of a range of stakeholders via consultation, I have met a number of fellow Members of Parliament to discuss how proposed changes to the estate will impact at local level. I will be considering the feedback to all the public consultations and I reiterate to hon. Members that these are genuinely proposals at this stage. When we make final decisions on the design of our estate, we will do so with all the feedback that we have had in mind. That may include considering additional options for outreach or indeed something wider—nothing is off the table at this stage.

Jobcentre Plus Offices: Closure

Lord Walney Excerpts

Monday 30th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

The industrial injuries team in Barrow has accumulated many years of experience, and that expertise has enabled the team to take the claimant handling time for one of the nation’s most complex benefits down from 175 days to 33 days. That reduction has meant that some of the most vulnerable people in the country, with terminal conditions such as asbestosis, have been able to receive their benefit before they died. Will she listen to the concern that if that expertise is dissipated when a new team comes in, the waiting times will go back up and many people will die before they receive their benefit?

[Caroline Nokes]

The hon. Gentleman makes a really important point. It is crucial that we do not lose expertise, which is why we will be listening to all DWP staff to see how we can best use that resource in future.

Social Security (Statutory Instruments)

Lord Walney Excerpts

Monday 9th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I, too, apologise for missing the start of the debate? I was taken by surprise by the starting time.

I wholeheartedly endorse what has been said by Members on both sides of the Chamber. This is an important step forward, but it is not the last word on the matter. Mesothelioma victims and those who represent them have struggled for years to get justice. They were disappointed when this Government chose to cap payouts at 80%. Nevertheless, it is progress. We have seen an all too slow but steady improvement from the days of the last Labour Government, when I was pleased to play a small part in setting up the 2008 scheme at the Department for Work and Pensions.

Progress has been made since then, but let us not forget that this House and this country owe a debt of gratitude and responsibility to those people and their families, because they gave their lives to national service in shipyards across our country to build the ships that kept us safe. Through no fault of their own, they put themselves in the care of employers who exposed them to this lethal, horrific disease from which they are still suffering. The country still has a duty of care to those sufferers, and their struggle for overall justice will go on.

Mesothelioma Bill [Lords]

Lord Walney Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Brown]

I care about this issue and I know my hon. Friend cares about it, too, and it is true that many Members of Parliament on both sides of the House, but especially those who represent communities that suffer disproportionately from this, know that their constituents face a desperate injustice. The burden of this condition is not shared evenly across the country. It affects our population by class; working-class constituents are far more likely to suffer from it than middle or upper-class ones. It affects our constituencies by region, too; there are regional hot spots, historically found in areas of heavy industry where people were very likely to be exposed to the dust, whether because they sprayed it on railway carriages or worked with it in the shipyards or as thermal insulation engineers and were not properly protected.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Mr Brown]

I give way to my hon. Friend who represents a similar constituency to mine with a similar history.

[John Woodcock]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right in what he says. I, too, want briefly to add my tribute to our right hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Paul Goggins). I know many other Members have done so, but this is a fitting time to do so.

Does my right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) agree that the people we are discussing served their country for many years? Barrow and Furness has the highest incidence of mesothelioma in this country. They served their country in making what they did and they deserve justice now, and this is our opportunity to give it to them.

[Mr Brown]

I wholly agree with my hon. Friend. We as a House should find a way of doing more. If we cannot do it within the parameters of the scheme, we should find a way of doing more outside the parameters of the scheme.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sammy Wilson]

I will happily give way to the Minister if he can provide an explanation. However, I should point out to him that even if we did incur an additional £80 million—and I suspect that it will be nowhere near £80 million, because £80 million does not seem logical—according to the Minister’s own figures, that would add 0.53% to the premiums that the companies would have to provide, while also encompassing, as we have heard, 700 people who are currently not covered by the scheme.

I realise that much of what I have said has been negative. I understand the pressures that the Minister is under, and I believe that the attitude that he has taken today shows that he genuinely wants to help those who suffer from this disease and will die as a result of it. However, I also believe that more can be done. I believe that logic is on the side of those who have tabled the amendments, and I trust that the House will support them when they are put to a vote.

[John Woodcock]

I shall speak only briefly.

I support all Members on both sides of the House who are pushing for more in this deal. As I said in an intervention earlier, Barrow contains the largest number of mesothelioma victims in the country. In most of those cases, the employer can be traced, because it was the Vickers shipyard. However, the families of the victims—wives who have seen their husbands die, children who have seen their fathers, and in some instances their mothers, experience that horrible, horrible death—are standing in solidarity with other families throughout the country, just as they have throughout the struggle for appropriate compensation that has continued for far too long.

Let us be clear about the fact that there can be no total fairness in this regard. If there were total fairness, people who went to work to do an honest job, to earn a living, to build ships and to work in industry would not have caught this disease and died in terrible ways, or caught a disease which is a ticking time bomb and which hangs over their lives now. Do we want to see premiums go up for current payers of insurance cover? No of course we do not, but it is absolutely clear that the victims who have waited so long for compensation should not be the ones who continue to bear the financial cost and penalty of this.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Rotheram]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point, but does he agree that premiums should not be increased, because premiums have already been paid to insurance companies who made huge profits and distributed them to shareholders? They have had the money and they should pay out, as that is what happens with an insurance scheme.

[John Woodcock]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Insurance companies now have an opportunity to do the right thing and to be seen to be doing the right thing, and I hope they take it.

I said the Minister deserved some credit but I think he has blinked too early in this negotiation. We have all said we recognise the pressures he is under, but there are a lot of Members of this House who know a bit more about negotiations than I do and they will all tell him, just as I am about to do, that people do not tend to go into a negotiation saying, “Well, we’re going to offer this now, but, to be honest, there’s a bit further we could go so just push us a bit more and we’ll be prepared to give you a bit more.” They always say, “This is the last offer and we are not going to go further.”

[Mike Penning]

If that was what happened I would agree with the hon. Gentleman, but that is not what happened. The figure started at 70% and now we are at 75%. I have never blinked early in my life, and nor did Lord Freud.

[John Woodcock]

The Minister is absolutely right; it has gone up from 70% to 75%, but the case has been made powerfully and strongly today that he can go further, to 80% at least.

[Mr McKenzie]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the deal that has been struck is allowing the insurance companies to renege on their commitment to these victims, and, not only that, but perhaps we are seeing a precedent being set for industries who are yet to leave their legacy of industrial victims?

[John Woodcock]

My hon. Friend is right and that does not leave the insurance companies doing sufficient.

Of course time is a factor, and we do not live in an ideal world. Today we will probably not achieve giving these people everything that ought to be given to them, and God knows they have waited far too long already, but we should all thank the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) for her tenacity. She has brought her considerable expertise to bear on this. I am sure her former friends and colleagues in the insurance industry think of her as a poacher turned gamekeeper—[Interruption.] Perhaps it is the other way round in this instance. Her expertise and inside knowledge have enabled the way in which the insurance companies work to be exposed in the House today. Some of us will struggle to see the logic of the 3% cut-off. If we stretch this and have a longer period for making the pay-outs over the next decade, even by the parameters the insurance industry has set itself, the figure will still come in at 3%.

We have shown today that we can go further and I really hope that, even at this late stage, the Minister will listen to the arguments made in this House and improve what is on offer for the victims of this awful, horrible disease.

[Mr Anderson]

I will try to keep my voice going if I can. I appreciate the work the Minister has done but this debate saddens me. We have got a situation where employer liability was paid to these insurance companies. They have had their money and they have run with it. People have died, and that was not a surprise. We have known for a century that asbestos kills people, so the fact that people would need compensation was not a surprise. The whole argument about the cut-off date, and that we cannot just spring this on the insurance companies, is nonsense. Looking back over the last decade, at the Fairchild rules, the Barker rules and the Rothwell rules, we can see that those were all cases in which the industry tried to get out of its responsibilities.

I raised this point with the Prime Minister on 18 December. I asked him to intervene to try to resolve the issue and he said:

“I will obviously look at what he has to say”.—[Official Report, 18 December 2013; Vol. 572, c. 732.]

I understand the time constraints that he has been under since then, but will the Minister tell us whether the Prime Minister has had a chance to look at the Bill? Where has the Prime Minister been to take that look? Has he been to the TUC? The trade unions have supported people through this morass for decades. Has he been to the asbestos victim support groups, including those who have been here today, who have real-life experience of these matters? Has he been to the employment lawyers who have sat with the people while they have died, and with their families?