Affordable Homes Bill
Lord Harper Excerpts(11 years, 9 months ago)
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Andrew George
Will the hon. Lady allow me to make this point, if she does not mind?
In advancing the Bill in the form in which it now appears on Second Reading, I know that there have been a number of discussions between all parties. I ask the Minister whether he will confirm in responding to the debate that collective responsibility will be suspended on this private Member’s Bill.
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
indicated assent.
Andrew George
I notice that the Minister nods his assent to that question, so I am given to understand that collective responsibility will be suspended on the Bill. That is important, and I am very encouraged that we have an opportunity for a more open debate.
Mr Harper
The hon. Gentleman said that he wanted the House to make an informed decision, so I thought it would be helpful if I shared with hon. Members in all parts of the House the Government’s estimate of the costings of the Bill, whose drafting goes rather wider than the spare room subsidy. The Government estimate that the Bill would cost about £1 billion of public expenditure, so I would be grateful if he let the House know what spending cuts or tax increases he intends to put before it when it makes its decision.
Andrew George
That is most interesting because the Minister was not prepared to share that estimate—that speculative figure—with me before today’s debate. Looking at the consequences of the regulations, we see that if people had no other purpose in their life than simply to be the stimulus for the workings of the housing benefit system, and no say in how or where they lived, there would be no savings for the Government in any case. If the purpose of Government policy is to ensure the proper, efficient and effective use of the social housing resource with no under-occupation, so that every cubic centimetre of every social property is fully occupied, there will be no saving in housing benefit.
My point is that the policy is putting pressure on vulnerable people and they are expected to go into debt, and indeed the evidence shows that they are doing so as a consequence of the policy. That is the reasoning behind these modest and reasonable measures, which are based on the evidence. We can certainly debate the Minister’s speculative estimate of the cost. In any case, when the Government first proposed the measures, they said that they would make savings of £500 million, and they have had to revise that down again and again. We must take into account the number of tenants who have had to move into the private rented sector, where rents are higher, and the number of disabled people who have had to move, requiring adaptations to be made at taxpayers’ expense.
There are elements of the Government’s estimates that we have not seen properly, and I would like to scrutinise the evidence that the Minister believes he has for them. He simply stood up and spouted one figure without any evidence. Perhaps when he winds up the debate, we will hear more about that figure, and I hope that he will come and talk to me before the Bill goes into Committee.
Mr Raynsford
The hon. Gentleman has clearly not been listening to the debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries and Galloway (Mr Brown) very forcefully made the point that the policy introduced by the previous Labour Government was not retrospective and did not penalise people on the basis of their existing circumstances. Quite simply, given the higher cost—[Interruption.] Perhaps the hon. Gentleman who asked the question would like to listen. He will know that private rented housing is generally very much more expensive than social housing. Social housing is allocated by landlords on the basis of how many bedrooms people need. If people who take private rented housing—they are not subject to allocation, but can choose their property—were able to select much more expensive properties that are larger than they need, that in itself would be reasonable grounds for a restriction. However, that applies only when people move into such housing, not retrospectively. Finally, I put it to him that if he and the Government were really concerned to make better and more efficient use of under-occupied social housing, they would not have exempted elderly people because it is predominantly that group whose properties are under-occupied. That point absolutely goes to the heart of the process: this is not about better use of the social housing stock; this is about trying to make cuts in public expenditure, which has been the Government’s objective from the outset. I now want to make some progress.
This whole ghastly process, which has caused anxiety, misery and hardship on a very large scale to hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens, was based on a false premise, without any proper evidence to justify what was done. It was a truly dreadful example of the worst type of policy making. Ideally, the whole policy should be consigned to the dustbin immediately, and it will be if the Labour party forms the Government after the next general election.
In the meantime, the hon. Member for St Ives has given us an opportunity significantly to limit its negative impact by restricting its application in three specific ways. The first way is by excluding cases where significant adaptations have been made to a property to meet the needs of a disabled tenant or a close relative who lives in the house. Quite why the Government did not accept the need for such an amendment from the outset is difficult to understand. It is clearly wasteful of public expenditure to drive disabled people out of properties that have been adapted for their needs if, as a consequence, they move into unadapted properties that have to be adapted at considerable expense to make them fit for them to live in. That is yet another illustration of the perversity of the whole policy. The exemption is long overdue and will remedy one of the blatant injustices and endemic nonsenses that are inherent in the bedroom tax policy.
Secondly, an exemption is proposed for tenants and close relatives who are in receipt of disability living allowance or personal independence payments and who, because of their disability, are not able to share a bedroom with someone with whom, under the bedroom tax regulations, they would be expected to share a bedroom. Again, that is a sensible, humane exemption that ought to have been agreed from the outset. Instead, the Government argued that discretionary housing payment could be made in such cases, ignoring three principal objections.
First, not everyone who might qualify for discretionary housing payment will apply for it. The Government’s own review has demonstrated that that is the case. Secondly, not every local authority will approve DHP in all appropriate cases. Thirdly, the DHP regime is temporary. The Government have not confirmed that it will continue to be available beyond 2014-15, despite being pressed by the Work and Pensions Committee to give such a guarantee. It is far better to exempt those who are in receipt of DLA or PIP from the bedroom tax than to depend on the vagaries of DHP.
I do, however, have an anxiety about the precise wording of clause 2(1)(b). I have mentioned this point to the hon. Member for St Ives and I hope that, if necessary, the provision can be amended in Committee. As hon. Members will know, there are two levels of bedroom tax: it is 14% when the tenant is deemed to have one bedroom more than is strictly required and 25% when the tenant is deemed to be occupying two or more bedrooms more than they need. The exemption in the Bill is qualified by clause 2(1)(b)(v), so that it does not apply when the tenant has two or more bedrooms more than is strictly needed, even when the tenant has established that he or she cannot share a bedroom and so needs one bedroom more than their strict entitlement. The provision appears, therefore, to leave the tenant exposed to a 25% benefit reduction in such cases, rather than the more limited 14% reduction, which would appear to be fairer. I may be wrong in seeing that as a potential loophole that needs closing, and I would be delighted to hear from the hon. Gentleman if that is the case. If not, I hope that he will consider an amendment in Committee.
Mr Harper
I want to correct for the record a factual point that the right hon. Gentleman made about future funding. In the autumn statement in 2013, the Chancellor announced that an extra £40 million would be made available in 2014-15 and 2015-16 to ensure that discretionary housing payment for those affected by the removal of the spare room subsidy would be maintained. The right hon. Gentleman said that no such commitment had been made. I just wanted to ensure that the facts were put on the record.
Mr Raynsford
I immediately withdraw my comment if that is the case. I was working from the Library briefing dated 3 September—so it is very recent—which indicates that no such commitment has been given. I apologise if that is not the case, but I was speaking in good faith on the basis of the latest available Library briefing.
Thirdly, we come to the last and most far-reaching exemption. Clause 2(1)(c) exempts tenants from liability to the bedroom tax when neither their landlord nor the local authority, in cases where they are not council tenants,
“has made a reasonable offer of alternative accommodation.”
That addresses the appalling unfairness by which tenants who cannot move into smaller accommodation because their landlord or the local authority does not have sufficient homes to provide that option still end up having their benefit cut.
The DWP’s own evaluation admits that in the first six months of the bedroom tax, only 4.5% of affected tenants were able to downsize. Even though the figure subsequently rose to 19%, the DWP still confirmed that social landlords
“had not yet been able to accommodate most of those who wanted to move to a smaller home”.
On those figures, we know that less than 10% of those who are affected and who want to move are able to do so because of a lack of alternative accommodation.
It is a common-sense amendment to stop penalising people who have no opportunity to move into smaller accommodation and so avoid the impact of the bedroom tax. It is a long overdue amendment and, once again, a far better safeguard than the hope of getting discretionary housing payment.
Sir Tony Baldry
My hon. Friend the Member for St Ives sought to lull us all into a sense of reasonableness by asserting that this was just a Bill to tidy up and amend the spare room subsidy. It is clear, however, from the comments of the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich, that the real intention of those who support this Bill is to remove the spare room subsidy completely, so the purpose of the Bill is not what my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives said; it has a completely different purpose.
My fundamental point is still valid. If this Bill costs £1 billion, then given the welfare cap—which the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and pretty much all Labour Members voted for earlier this year—the consequences of enacting it will mean that £1 billion must be saved from somewhere else in the welfare budget.
Mr Harper
I had not intended to intervene, but perhaps I can help to clear up the point. The cost of reversing the removal of the spare room subsidy is around £0.5 billion, as the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) confirmed. I spoke about the cost of the Bill because, whether the hon. Gentleman knows this or not, the Bill as drafted goes much wider than the removal of the spare room subsidy and fundamentally changes the way housing benefit is calculated—for example, it removes deductions for other people living in the household. That adds a further £500 million to the cost of the Bill. Members need to know that when they decide whether they will vote for it.
Sir Tony Baldry
May I invite my hon. Friend to intervene on me one more time to clarify and confirm this important point? Am I right in thinking that as a consequence of the welfare cap, whatever this Bill costs, whether it be £0.5 billion or £1 billion, that money must be saved and found somewhere else in the welfare budget?
Sir Tony Baldry
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The whole House must recognise that when we debate issues of welfare, we cannot pretend that we did not collectively, and by a very large majority, vote for the welfare cap.
Sir Tony Baldry
I am sure the whole House is grateful to my right hon. Friend for that clarification and confirmation.
I thought it would be interesting to go back and read the Committee proceedings of the Welfare Reform Bill in 2006. Hon. Members might not recall, but, interestingly, when the proposal for limiting housing benefit for those in the private rented sector was first mooted, the original consultation paper also consulted on a proposal to limit housing benefit for those in social housing on exactly the same basis. Nowhere on Second Reading or in Committee did the right hon. Member for Stirling (Mrs McGuire), the then Minister, ever explain to the House or the Committee why the then Labour Government decided only to focus the housing benefit changes on the private rented sector and not to include social housing.
In Committee, various hon. Members sought to make exactly the same proposals and changes as are being proposed today. For example, Members were keen to know whether alterations could be made for under-25s in the private rented sector, and the Minister said that the changes were
“part of a package that is intended to make housing benefit more transparent and more understandable to people….I hark back to our short debate on Tuesday evening: the new local housing allowance applies only to those in the private rented sector.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee A, 2 November 2006; c. 424-45.]
In other words, the changes were being introduced entirely because the last Government thought it necessary to save money.
Mr Harper
Perhaps I can help my right hon. Friend. In 2004, my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) asked the then Minister, the late Malcolm Wicks,
“for what reasons the local housing allowance applies only to the de-regulated private sector.”
The then Minister replied:
“We hope to implement a flat rate housing benefit system in the social sector, similar to that anticipated in the private rented sector…We aim to extend our reforms to the social rented sector as soon as rent restructuring and increased choice have created an improved market.”—[Official Report, 19 January 2004; Vol. 416, c. 1075W.]
It is clear, despite all we hear from the Opposition, that the last Labour Government intended to do exactly the same thing.
Sir Tony Baldry
It is clear they had exactly the same intentions.
In the final debate in Committee on the revisions of the local housing allowance, when asked to make amendments similar to those being invited in the Bill, the Minister said:
“I reassure the Committee that we already have powers to make different provisions for different classes of people…However… adding the qualification suggested by the amendment to the local housing allowance would undermine its main advantages of simplicity, transparency and fairness….As I said during a debate on a previous amendment, the discretionary housing payment scheme is also in place. That flexible system will enable the local authority to target help to those who most need it.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee A, 2 November 2006; c. 434-5.]
May I suggest that this Government’s discretionary payment scheme for tenants in the social housing sector is exactly the same? Indeed, those comments could have been made by a Minister in this Government in exactly the same way as suggested by the amendments and reforms proposed for changing housing benefit for tenants in the social housing sector.
I conclude by saying that this Parliament has to be grown up about the issues. If the House introduces a cap by an overwhelming majority, we cannot gaily come along, turn up on a Friday in September and seek to spend £1 billion of public money without making it clear to the House and to the country where the consequential savings are to be made elsewhere in the welfare budget. This will happen whether it be under this Government or any other Government. It behoves the Labour party, Labour Front-Bench Members and the shadow Minister when he gets to the Dispatch Box to tell us in terms where he intends those savings to be made. If he cannot do that, it would be irresponsible to support the Bill in the Lobby today. There is no justification for a Labour party and a Labour Government who introduced reforms and changes to housing benefit for those in the private rented sector to think that tenants in the social housing sector should be treated any differently.
Chris Bryant
Of course we voted for the overall benefits cap. I want to cut the cost of welfare in this country, but the best way of doing that is to ensure that the minimum wage and wages in general catch up with inflation. However, we have had inflation ahead of wages for every month except one since this Government came to power in 2010, which is making that a darn sight more difficult to achieve.
Mr Harper
As usual, the hon. Gentleman is making a speech that is very rhetorical but rather short on facts. The rate for overall rent collection by housing associations is 98%. Rent arrears for housing associations have actually fallen, rather than gone up, for two quarters in a row between September last year and March this year. On the latest data, they are still lower than they were last September. They have not gone up, as was suggested. Homelessness is down, arrears are down and rent collection is at 98%, so what he is saying is simply not true.
Chris Bryant
To be honest, I am always a bit dubious about this particular Minister’s use of statistics. I remember the days when he boldly stood at the Dispatch Box as Immigration Minister and told us that we did not have to worry about net migration because it was falling dramatically, and that we would be able to see that when the figures were placed in the public domain. I think it was last Thursday when we were shown that net migration had risen by 38%. Admittedly, he had stopped being Immigration Minister by then, but—[Interruption.] The truth is that, according to the Government’s own evaluation, one in five people affected are in arrears because they have not yet been able to pay any of their bedroom tax, and that another 29% have not been able to pay all of it. So the honest truth is that one in four of the people in social housing are in arrears. That is a long-term problem that will undermine the whole of the social housing sector.
Chris Bryant
I am glad that I gave way to the hon. Lady, because she made a very fair point. In all honesty, if I were to take any single one of the Conservative Members of the House who will vote against this Bill today to meet any of the kind of constituents that we are talking about, their hearts would be changed. That is why I hope that, in the end, we will be able to get rid of the bedroom tax in its entirety. We will support the Bill today. I congratulate the hon. Member for St Ives on bringing it forward, but in the end I want to scrap the bedroom tax, and that is what a Labour Government will do if we are elected. If this Bill is allowed to go to Committee, I hope that the hon. Lady and others will support amendments that strengthen the move in that direction, rather than amendments that might pull us in a different direction.
Chris Bryant
I have already said that I will not give way again. The hon. Gentleman will get a whole speech—[Interruption.] The Secretary of State has made many allegations in his life. I have hardly ever heard him substantiate a single one. If there was ever an example of someone who is involved in policy-based evidence making, that person is sitting right there now. He is a man who has invented evidence to back up a policy without any facts to back it up, so I will not give way.
Chris Bryant
No, I will not give way. The hon. Gentleman gets to make a speech later.
In an e-mail to me, and I suspect to many others as well, the hon. Member for St Ives said:
“This is a compromise on what I had hoped to bring forward at this stage, which would have been to abolish the Bedroom Tax altogether.”
I am not sure with whom he is compromising. Obviously, it is not with the Conservatives: they are on a three-line Whip to vote him down. I suppose it must be with those on the Liberal Democrat Front Bench. Perhaps it is with the Deputy Prime Minister, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury or the Pensions Minister, who was one of the stoutest defenders of the bedroom tax and saw off all amendments in Committee, including the amendments that will now be brought forward today.
Chris Bryant
And so do I, but I think the hon. Gentleman also wants to scrap the tax as well. Or has he reneged on the position in his e-mail? He sent me an e-mail, and I thought that it was a personal one, so I am taking him at his word.
Chris Bryant
I am being very soft, because the Minister is smiling at me in a cheeky little way. Go on, then.
Mr Harper
Given that the shadow Minister took an intervention from the hon. Member for St Ives, he should take one from me. I thank him for giving way. The shadow Minister made a serious allegation that somehow we cooked up the allocation of discretionary housing payments on some sort of party political basis—based on the control of local authorities. I just want to make it clear that the allocations in 2014-15 were based on local housing allowance, removal of the spare room subsidy, the benefit cap and the underlying £20 million a year that is not related to welfare reform. Each element is based on the affected caseload in each local authority area and on the average loss. The reason why there may be higher amounts in London is that London borough rents for social housing are higher on average, and the benefit cap losses are greater. That is the reason. It is nothing to do with the party political control of the local authority, and I hope that he withdraws that appalling allegation.
Chris Bryant
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have heard it all before.
Let us go back to the Liberal Democrats. There is of course more rejoicing in heaven when one sinner, or one party, repenteth—[Interruption.] I am not talking about the hon. Members for St Ives or for Westmorland and Lonsdale because they are slightly saintly in this regard. I hope that we will see an act of mass repentance led by the Liberal Democrat Chief Whip today, including the Pensions Minister, who declared in Committee that all the exemptions we are considering today were “absurd”, the hon. Member for Cardiff Central (Jenny Willott), who is now a Whip, the hon. Member for Redcar (Ian Swales) who, despite making charming speeches in Committee, voted against the exemptions, and the whole bang shoot of them who voted for the tax, voted against amendments and voted against our Opposition day motions on 13 November 2013 in this House and in the Lords. I love them all and I am delighted to hope that they will all vote with us—or rather that we will vote with them—en masse later.
The bedroom tax has pushed the poor further into poverty. I believe that it is at the heart of the malaise of Tory Britain, with millions in arrears, millions relying on food banks, millions having to choose between heating and eating, millions on low wages that have never caught up with inflation and millions on zero-hours contracts desperate to work more hours—two nations if ever there was such a thing. That is why we should scrap the bedroom tax. We will vote for this Bill today and we will try to amend it in Committee. If that fails, we, the Labour Government, next year, in May 2015, will scrap the tax.
Oral Answers to Questions
Lord Harper Excerpts(11 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Andrew Griffiths (Burton) (Con)
1. What assessment he has made of the level of charges levied by doctors for completing benefit assessment information.
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
The Department is able to request medical information from doctors as part of the process of assessing an individual’s entitlement to benefit; for example, doctors have to complete the fit note and the ESA113 forms and they have also to complete, where we pay them, forms related to the application for the personal independence payment.
Andrew Griffiths
I thank the Minister for that answer, but East Staffordshire citizens advice bureau has raised with me concerns that GPs are charging vulnerable constituents of mine up to £135 to provide information requested as part of the work capability assessment. Although his Department is not responsible for those charges, does he share my concern that vulnerable people on benefits are being charged this amount of money and may actually not be able to access benefits to which they are entitled?
Mr Harper
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point. Certainly as far as the WCA for the employment and support allowance is concerned, GPs are contractually required to provide a fit note and to provide the ESA113 form, so perhaps if he and I speak afterwards I can get further details of the specific case he mentions, because it may raise some issues that need to be drawn to my attention.
Mr Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Lab)
Might the Minister extend that invitation to other Members of the House who are equally concerned about the charges made on our poorer constituents so that they can make benefits appeals? I am talking about ESA. Can he justify a group who are among the top 1% of salary earners in this country charging our constituents these extraordinary rates, in order that our constituents may try to establish their right, for example, to ESA?
Mr Harper
As I said in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Andrew Griffiths), when people are applying for ESA in the first place the Department obviously asks them to provide any medical information they think will be helpful, and as part of that process GPs are required contractually to fill in a specific form. Constituents should not be charged for extra information provided on top of that as part of their application. If the right hon. Gentleman wants to give me the information, I will be very happy to look into the specific case he mentions.
Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con)
Does the Minister share my concern that one major reason for inappropriate decisions is a complete lack of evidence submitted by general practitioners and hospital doctors, without whom no appropriate decision can be made? What views does he have on trying to encourage hospital doctors also to provide this information, to allow the right decision to be made first time around?
Mr Harper
Again, the rules are very clear: under a long-standing agreement, NHS hospitals and trusts are obliged to provide the relevant information free of charge and within 10 working days. However, from listening to my hon. Friend’s question it sounds as if he may have encountered at least one case where that has not happened. I will speak to him afterwards to see whether that raises any issues about whether this policy, which is clear, is actually being implemented by NHS organisations.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
When people in my office were chasing up Atos the other day, they were told that it is still dealing with ESA claims from the beginning of 2013, and that one reason for not being able to process claims more quickly was a difficulty in recruiting doctors to submit the medical information. Will the Minister examine this situation urgently, because it is obviously causing huge distress to people who are having to wait well over a year for their claims to be looked at?
David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)
2. What steps he is taking to ensure that employees will not be auto-enrolled into high-cost pension schemes.
Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)
13. How long the average wait for an assessment for a personal independence payment was on the latest date for which figures are available.
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
The straightforward answer is that claimants have to wait for too long. We are committed to putting that right by clearing backlogs and improving processing time. Analysts in the Department are currently considering what information we should publish in future. We will pre-announce that publication in due course, in line with the UK Statistics Authority’s code of practice.
Nick Smith
How much has the Department for Work and Pensions returned to the Treasury because of the delayed implementation of the PIP?
Mr Harper
The Department has not returned any money to the Treasury as a result of the delays. There have been delays in processing these payments. I know they cause issues for constituents, which is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made a clear commitment to reduce the waiting times by the autumn and then again by the end of the year. One of my top priorities, having started this job in July, is to get that reform process under way so that we can deliver that improved performance to benefit all our constituents.
Heidi Alexander
One of my constituents, a single mum who has been undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer, waited over nine months for her PIP claim to be processed. It was sorted out only after my intervention. When will the Minister admit that it is not just how long the claims are taking to process but the fact that the system is utterly shambolic that is causing untold hardship to many people who are already living in very difficult circumstances?
Mr Harper
I would say two things. Clearly, I am disappointed to hear about the circumstances that the hon. Lady’s constituent has faced, which is why we are focusing on improving the system. My predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), put a lot of work into improving the position for constituents who have terminal illnesses. We have made significant strides there, reducing processing times almost to the level we would expect, which is a matter of days. We are now focusing on other claims, so that constituents such as those of the hon. Lady will not have to wait for that length of time in the future.
Bridget Phillipson
In his earlier response, the Minister said that claimants are having to wait too long, but is it not the case, as Atos acknowledged in an e-mail to me, that that is on average 26 weeks? Surely it is wholly unacceptable to leave people in hardship and distress while they wait. What will the Minister do to sort out that chaos?
Mr Harper
First, I agree that the wait is too long. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has made it clear that no one should be waiting longer than 26 weeks by the autumn, and 16 weeks by the end of the year, and we will make sure that that happens. As regards hardship, PIP is not an income-replacement benefit for those out of work. It is paid in work and out of work. There are other benefits available such as employment and support allowance, which can help those people who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
What scope is there for increasing the number of people who can get PIP without having to go through the medical assessment? If written evidence is clear that they are entitled to it, why waste everyone’s time by going through an assessment?
Mr Harper
I agree with my hon. Friend. It is a relatively new benefit, and what we are trying to ensure is that in cases where there is clear medical evidence for the impact of someone’s disability, the decision can be made without their having to come in for a face-to-face assessment. That was not happening enough in the earlier stages; it is one of the improvements that we are making.
Charles Hendry (Wealden) (Con)
A constituent has contacted me to tell me that when he turned up for his assessment he was told that it had been cancelled because there were too many people waiting, so he was sent home. He then missed two further appointments, arguably through no fault of his own, and has now been refused a further assessment. Will the Minister intervene to ensure that, as the first one was cancelled through no fault of his own and was a result of a mistake by the assessors, a new assessment can be booked for him as soon as possible?
Stephen Mosley (City of Chester) (Con)
May I first welcome the Minister’s refreshingly clear and straightforward response to the initial question? To get things right, we must first admit that things are not working perfectly. To that end, has he been able to assess how different assessment centres compare against one another and whether any good practice from one can be carried over to the others?
Mr Harper
My hon. Friend makes a very good point. He will know that we have committed to two independent reviews of the PIP assessment, the first of which will report to Parliament at the end of this year. Last week I had the opportunity to meet Paul Gray, who is carrying out that review, and I am confident that his report will give us lots of useful things that we can do to improve matters on top of the things that we already do.
Dame Anne Begg (Aberdeen South) (Lab)
Delays in getting a decision are causing other problems which I hope the Minister will look into. First, people are waiting so long that the sum they eventually get from the DWP puts them above the capital limits, which can affect their income-related benefits and cause problems with their housing benefit. Secondly, there seems to be some sort of computer glitch that means that when somebody is on ESA and is then awarded PIP the ESA stops and it takes some time for them to get that payment. Will the Minister consider both problems?
Mr Harper
I will certainly consider the points that the hon. Lady makes. I am due before her Select Committee a week Thursday for an extensive session on the personal independence payment. I am sure that she will ask me that question then and I hope that I will have a detailed answer prepared for her in advance.
Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)
6. How many people were awaiting a work capability assessment on the latest date for which figures are available.
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
Between April and the end of July, the number of people awaiting an employment and support allowance work capability assessment fell by 75,000 to 637,000. It is worth saying, as I have said in answer to the hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy), that claimants will normally be in receipt of benefit while they wait for an assessment, and that any arrears due are paid once a decision is made.
Nia Griffith
The Work and Pensions Committee said in its recent report that the flaws in the system were so grave that simply rebranding the work capability assessment for eligibility for employment and support allowance by giving it a new contractor would simply not solve the problem. Does the Minister agree, and what changes will he make to the new contract?
Mr Harper
I am not going to prejudge at the Dispatch Box the detailed response I shall give to the Work and Pensions Committee’s detailed look at the work capability assessment, but clearly one of our key priorities is to continue Atos’s work to the end of its contract, get the new provider in place and ensure that the process is working. The Select Committee made some thoughtful remarks about steps for the future. We shall respond to them in due course, when I respond to its report.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
I am delighted to congratulate the Minister on his new appointment.
Last month, it emerged that some people have been waiting a year and more for a work capability assessment—we heard that again from my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) this afternoon. The Minister is right that many of those people will receive some benefit while waiting for their claim to be processed, but they may also be subject to inappropriate conditionality and a deep sense of uncertainty and insecurity. What action is he taking to ensure that assessments and claims are finalised within 13 weeks, as the Government intended?
Mr Harper
I thank the hon. Lady for welcoming me to my post. I agree with her. She is absolutely right—I have said that we want to drive down the length of time that people are waiting. My priority is, first, to ensure that Atos performs against its commitments to the end of its contract in February, that we get a new contract awarded to a new provider, and that the new provider picks up the reins smoothly from Atos and continues to drive down the backlog, so that our constituents wait as little time as possible. Those are the things I shall be focused on between now and the election.
Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)
7. What progress he has made on the introduction of face-to-face pensions advice.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
10. What recent discussions he has had with representatives of local authorities on transition plans relating to the closure of the independent living fund.
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
The Department continues to work closely with the independent living fund, and just last week I met the chief executive and chairman of the board of trustees. The independent living fund continues to work closely with all local authorities in England and the devolved Administrations in Scotland and Wales.
Nic Dakin
North Lincolnshire council tells me that it has insufficient information about the transfer to engage properly with recipients of the ILF to give them a better sense of their future. The Government have consistently failed to give assurances that the changes will not mean that recipients lose their independence. Will the Minister give that assurance today?
Mr Harper
I am surprised by the hon. Gentleman’s comments about his local authority, because the information provided to me is that local authorities actively engage with the ILF: they have attended more than 90% of the meetings with users. The hon. Gentleman will also know that the Government are fully funding local authorities and the Scottish and Welsh Administrations for the amount of money that would be provided to people under the ILF. If he has specific concerns, he and I should have a conversation.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
As the Government are fully funding local authorities for this obligation, can there be any possible justification for councils removing support from current recipients of the independent living fund?
Mr Harper
My hon. Friend will know that local authorities have a statutory duty to make sure that they properly support those who require social care. A third of the 1.3 million people who already get social care—444,000 people—are of working age, compared with 17,000 who are beneficiaries of the ILF, so I think local authorities are well practised at this and should have no excuse for not doing the job properly.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
May I remind the Minister that while local authorities may be well practised, they are certainly used to the fact that more and more aspects of social care are heaped on them without their having the ability to pay? He is bankrupting local authorities up and down the country and should not make the excuse that this particular benefit is being funded.
Mr Harper
I agree that local authorities have had some funding challenges due to the appalling budget deficit we inherited from the Labour party. Local authorities can set priorities. When my own local authority in Gloucestershire was making its difficult spending decisions, it rightly put adult social care and child protection at the top of that list of priorities and I am very grateful that it did so.
Mr Nicholas Brown (Newcastle upon Tyne East) (Lab)
11. When he expects the business case for universal credit to be fully signed off.
Sarah Newton (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)
14. What progress his Department has made on its Disability Confident campaign.
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
In July last year, the Prime Minister launched the Disability Confident campaign, which sought to encourage employers to become more confident about employing disabled people. We have reached over 1,100 local and national employers throughout Great Britain, and have received more than 200 pledges from companies in their quest to have better employment outcomes for disabled people. My predecessor wrote to colleagues and I encourage them to hold Disability Confident events in their constituencies.
Sarah Newton
I thank the Minister for his response. May I convey to him how positive the Disability Confident events are, having joined one in my constituency this summer? Will he congratulate Pluss, a great social enterprise in my constituency that has worked with more than 500 Cornish businesses to enable more than 800 people to get into work?
Mr Harper
I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s question and for the work that she is doing. I am pleased to be able to congratulate Pluss. I think that I am right in remembering that I visited it when I shadowed this brief in opposition. The work that it does and the success of the event are testimony to its efforts to get more disabled people into work.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
The outcomes for people on the Work programme who are unemployed on health grounds are simply abysmal. What will the Minister do about that?
Mr Harper
The important thing is to see whether people who have health conditions are able to work. If we put people through a work capability assessment and they are clearly not able to work at all, we want to ensure that they get the appropriate help, but if people can work, we want to ensure that they do. That is why we have the Work programme and other schemes that give people proper support to get them into work.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
15. What assessment he has made of recent trends in employment in (a) North Lincolnshire and (b) North East Lincolnshire local authority areas.
Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)
T2. A number of my constituents have experienced lengthy delays while waiting for a decision on a review of their personal independence payment application. That is a time of great uncertainty and stress for all concerned. In addition to the efforts that the Minister has already outlined, will he tell us what steps he will take to speed up the application, review and appeal processes?
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
My hon. Friend will know from earlier answers the priority that we attach to this. As well as ensuring that the assessment can take place faster, we are also ensuring that the DWP decision makers will be able to cope with the increased number of cases as those cases move through the system, so that, once we have got the assessment process sorted out, those decisions will be made in a timely way which will benefit her constituents and mine.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
T4. Ministers have talked about bedroom tax exemptions, but in reality these do not protect unpaid family carers. In fact, 60,000 carers are hit by the tax, and Carers UK has found that 75% of the carers it surveyed were cutting back on food and heating to make up the shortfall. Will the Minister now accept how cruel and unfair it is to make unpaid family carers pay the bedroom tax?
Mr Harper
The hon. Lady will know that the spare room subsidy is about making sure that people have the size of home that they are entitled to, and that if people regularly need carers to stay overnight, that is considered an acceptable reason for having an extra bedroom. She will also know that we have made considerable funds available to local authorities through the discretionary housing payments, many of which have not even been spent.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
T3. I welcome the Minister’s commitment to reducing the waiting times for processing benefit applications. At a recent meeting that I organised for Atos, the DWP, citizens advice bureaux and MPs’ caseworkers in Gloucestershire, representatives of the CABs expressed their suspicion that DWP contractors were paid according to how many people they could take off benefits. Will my hon. Friend confirm that that is absolutely not the case? Will he also encourage CABs to work closely with MPs’ offices so that we can intervene sooner to help our constituents who have problems?
Mr Harper
I can confirm to my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour that contractors are not paid based on any sort of incentive arrangement to get people off benefits. They are paid to make an accurate assessment, which they then provide to departmental decision makers. Citizens advice bureaux should continue their work with MPs’ offices, which is incredibly helpful.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
T5. Despite the Minister’s earlier optimism, is it not clear that it has all gone badly wrong when the Government can organise to pay disability benefits to an on-the-run convicted killer such as David Richards, who as I understand it just walked out of jail, but cannot organise for some of the poorest disabled people in my constituency even to have their applications assessed within six months?
Mr Rob Wilson (Reading East) (Con)
T7. In a few weeks, I will hold my eighth Reading jobs fair. At the previous seven, 20,000 jobseekers and 300 local businesses have already been welcomed. Will my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State join me in thanking all the businesses and partner organisations that have made that possible, and in welcoming the impact that it has had on reducing unemployment in the Reading area?
John Robertson (Glasgow North West) (Lab)
T8. My hon. Friend the Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley) mentioned the carers caught up in the bedroom tax. How many of them are still caught up in it?
Mr Harper
The hon. Gentleman knows that, as I have just said, if someone has an overnight carer, that is a perfectly acceptable reason for having a room. He will also know that local authorities have been given significant sums in discretionary housing payments to deal with difficult cases that do not clearly fit the rules. Most local authorities are not spending the money that the Government have allocated to them.
Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)
On 11 March last year, I asked the Secretary of State about under-occupancy. I said:
“Does the Secretary of State agree that no benefit reduction should take place until people have at least been offered somewhere appropriately sized and located?”—[Official Report, 11 March 2013; Vol. 560, c. 22.]
The Secretary of State said, “I agree”. What has he done to deliver that?
Disabled People's Right to Control
Lord Harper Excerpts(11 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)
The right to control pilot operated in seven areas of England between 12 December 2010 and 12 December 2013. The aims of the pilot were to bring together a number of different funding streams into a streamlined process that allowed disabled people choice and control over how funding for them was used to provide the care, support (including employment support) and equipment they needed; and to test the costs and benefits to public authorities.
The Government remain committed to the principles of personalisation and of providing disabled people with greater choice and control over how the funding they are entitled to is used by them or on their behalf. While the evaluation of this pilot may not have resulted in any measurable impact on outcomes, it was popular with those individuals who exercised their right to control and they valued the greater flexibilities it gave them. It also acted as a catalyst to developing local relationships and partnerships.
Since the right to control pilot began in 2010, developments in Government policy have increasingly recognised the importance of personalisation in the delivery of services. The Care Act 2014 enables greater choice and control for the individual in adult social care and also provides co-operation duties to support partnership working and the flexibility needed to maintain right to control style approaches at local level. We are in the process of introducing personalisation within the context of the disability and health employment strategy, to develop a more personalised approach to delivering employment support for disabled people.
Taking these changes into consideration together with the evaluation findings of the right to control pilot the Government have decided not to roll out the right to control nationally.
As required by the Welfare Reform Act 2009, a report on the operation of the pilot has been prepared, and I will place a copy of the report in the House Library.
DWP: Performance
Lord Harper Excerpts(11 years, 11 months ago)
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Rachel Reeves
If the Secretary of State now claims that he signs his letters “The correspondence unit”, perhaps he has replied, but I would have expected the Secretary of State to sign the letters and I will be very happy to forward all the letters to him. [Interruption.] He carries on chuntering from a sedentary position; I have not had a single letter about my casework from him. I will send them all to him, and perhaps he can write to me and my constituents explaining why they have been treated so abysmally by him and his Government.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
All I can say is that my experience when raising cases from my excellent local citizens advice bureau is that they have been answered very well, in full and thoroughly by the Minister for disabled people, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), who has listened to my concerns and answered them, largely dealing with the appalling performance of Atos, hired by the Labour party and dealt with successfully by my right hon. Friend.
Rachel Reeves
Well, maybe there is one rule for Tory Back Benchers and another rule for Labour party MPs, because I have not had a single letter signed by the Secretary of State.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
In the short time available, I want to make a few brief points. The first is that from listening to Labour Members one would never have thought that they had a record. In rolling out universal credit, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is taking the right approach. It is slower than we would originally have liked, but taking a careful approach has a lot to recommend it. When we were in opposition and the Labour party rolled out tax credits in a big bang, constituents of mine who needed the money were given the wrong amount and had to pay it back, so they were getting to the point at which they were pleading for the tax credits to be taken away. Taking a careful approach is very sensible. If she has not already done so, I hope that the shadow Secretary of State takes up my right hon. Friend’s offer to go to a jobcentre that is rolling out universal credit to see how the system is operating in practice. That would be very welcome.
It is worth saying that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has been right to allow my right hon. Friend to be the Secretary of State for a significant period so that he can see the reforms through. I looked at what happened under the Labour party: in the nine years that the Department for Work and Pensions existed, there were eight Secretaries of State. To be fair, one or two Secretaries of State tried some reforms, but they were barely in the job long enough to think about them or to design policies before they were moved on. It is to this Government’s credit that we have allowed Cabinet Ministers to be in an office, come up with policies, implement them, deal with the difficulties—there will inevitably be some in making the largest welfare reform programme for decades—and see them through. My hon. Friend the Secretary of State discussed and was passionate about the issues before we entered government, and it is very welcome that he has had the chance to see the reforms through.
To turn to my constituency, I want to draw the House’s attention to the benefit cap, which the Labour party opposed. I must say that the only feedback I have ever had in my constituency is that we set the benefit cap too high. In a constituency where the average individual salary is only £24,000 to £25,000, my constituents think that £26,000 net income, which is equivalent to £35,000 gross, is quite generous. Families who work hard for many hours to support themselves do not see why other people should take away more money from hard-working taxpayers than they get for working. The cap is the right policy, and it is to the Labour party’s discredit that it opposed it instead of supporting us in doing what is right. I suspect that many Labour voters support the benefit cap, and think that we are right and that the Labour party is wrong about the policy.
On the difficulties of assessments, I have checked with my office to make sure that I can speak with the facts. On the employment and support allowance, that difficult welfare reform was started by the Labour party with, to be fair, our support. When the Labour Government tried to do the right thing, we supported them, but Labour Members have been sorely lacking in such a cross-party approach. I am afraid that the instant they were on the Opposition Benches, any pretence of being interested in welfare reform fell away. I do not know what the reason was—whether it was their union paymasters or just opportunism—but they have never supported anything that we have done, despite our more cross-party approach.
The main issues about assessments are related to the performance of Atos. As I said in an intervention, the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), who has responsibility for disabled people, looked into the issues I raised, and wrote thoughtful and considered replies, which I shared with local citizens advice bureaux, and we have managed to speed up the assessments for my constituents. However, I must say that the problem was inherited from the Labour party. The contract was very poor. I know that Ministers took action—
Dame Anne Begg
If the hon. Gentleman is right that the Atos contract for the delivery of the work capability assessment was a mess, why is he not criticising his Government for using the same company on a new contract for a very different benefit called personal independence payment?
Mr Harper
That is partly because she did not give me a chance. I was talking about the employment and support allowance and the work capability assessment. Atos has not performed well on the work capability assessment, and I am very pleased that that has been terminated, but it had to be done thoughtfully so that compensation was due from the company to the taxpayer, not the other way round.
The Secretary of State set out very carefully the Government’s approach to rolling out personal independence payment. It is the right policy to deliver more support for disabled people, and to help them to get into work and to live independent lives. I am not pretending that it is easy—it is a difficult thing to do—and I am pleased that the Secretary of State has had the courage to continue.
On employment, we must recognise that there are 2 million more jobs in the private sector. I forget which Opposition Member tried to suggest that all these new jobs are simply schemes. The fact that there are 2 million more jobs in the private sector means that, even with the difficult decisions we have had to take in reducing jobs in the public sector, there has been an overall net increase of 1.7 million jobs.
What I am proudest of—as a combination of our immigration policy, employment and welfare policies and skills agenda—is the fact that three quarters of the jobs created since the election have gone to British citizens. In the five years up to the crash, the Labour party’s policies meant that less than 10% of the jobs that were created benefited British citizens. That was a disastrous failure and a policy mistake that I am glad this Government have put right. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State can be proud of his record, and this party can be proud to support him in the Division Lobby this evening.
amendment of the law
Lord Harper Excerpts(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
I listened carefully to what my right hon. Friend said about incentives to work. Will he say a little about the 450,000 fewer workless households, and the 290,000 fewer children living in such households? Perhaps that has something to do with his welfare reforms.
Mr Duncan Smith
I am going to come on to that, but one of the great success stories is the fact that the number of workless households has fallen for the first time in 30 years. My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I shall give a few more details about that in a second.
Rachel Reeves
My hon. Friend makes an important point: women are disproportionately hit by the changes introduced by this Government and are struggling with the rising cost of living more than anybody in this country. Moreover, the increasing costs of child care under this Government are making it harder for working parents, particularly working mums, to go back to work and make the contribution we need to the economy.
Four years ago, this Government said that debt would fall and that living standards would rise, yet the reverse has happened. They have broken their promise to balance the books by 2015 and they are set to borrow £190 billion more than they had planned. National debt is rising this year and it will rise next year and the year after that. There is more borrowing, more debt and more welfare spending under this Government.
Mr Harper
On the subject of debt and future spending—the hon. Lady will probably get to this later in her speech—will she answer the question asked by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State about her remarks at a meeting last week? She is reported to have said that it would be better if she could reverse all of the changes and make benefits universal. That is a spending commitment of hundreds of billions of pounds. She needs to say whether she said it or not; otherwise no one will believe a word the Opposition say.
Rachel Reeves
We are the party who have said that we will cut the winter fuel allowance for the richest pensioners and means-test that benefit to save money, but Government Members do not support that. The reality is that we are the party who are willing to take tough decisions to get the welfare bill down, whereas it is rising, not falling, under this Government.
The truth is that social security spending is £13 billion more than this Government had planned. In last week’s Budget, the Chancellor had to revise up spending on social security by £1 billion more this year and £1 billion more next year than the Government had planned just six months ago. Was that what the Prime Minister meant when he said that he was cutting the cost of welfare? It is going up, not down.
The problem is that without addressing the cost of living crisis, it is not possible to control the costs of social security. Long-term youth unemployment has doubled since 2010, costing taxpayers £330 million a year. The number of people working part-time who want a full-time job is up to 1.4 million, costing £4.6 billion in extra social security. One in five workers are paid less than a living wage—up from 3.9 million in 2009—costing the Treasury an estimated £3.2 billion a year. Housing benefit is increasing and has been revised up again because house building is at a record low. The Secretary of State has also played his part, with his shambolic welfare reforms. Just one in five people who have been on the Work programme for two years have secured a job; £1 billion has been paid out, yet more people are ending up back in the jobcentre than getting a job through the Secretary of State’s failed Work programme.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
I will start by drawing attention to the question that I asked the shadow Secretary of State. I notice that she did not deny saying that she wanted to reverse all the changes that the Government have made—[Interruption.] Well, according to the well-known Guido Fawkes website, with which I believe one or two Members are familiar—[Laughter.] If she did not say it, then she should deny it. At a meeting of Christians on the Left, she said:
“It will be much better if we can say that all of the changes that the Government have introduced we can reverse and all benefits can be universal.”
If she did not say that, she should just say so. I will take her intervention. She should deny that she said it. Given that she has not taken the opportunity to deny it, we will know when she leads her party into the Lobby to support our benefit cap that it is a mirage to fool the voters. If Labour ever gets its hands on the tiller, it will increase welfare spending and it will not help people into work.
Let me take the hon. Lady squarely on to the cost of living agenda and her allegation that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor said nothing about it. That is complete and utter nonsense. This morning, the rate of inflation fell according to the consumer prices index and the retail prices index. CPI inflation is at its lowest level for four years.
On jobs, unemployment is continuing to fall. When Labour was in power between 2003 and 2008, when the economy was creating jobs, 90% of those jobs were going to foreign nationals. That provoked the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), to say that there should be
“British jobs for British workers”,
but he had no idea what to do about it. I am very proud, as should be the Secretary of State and the Home Secretary, that since this Government have been in power, because of our welfare, immigration and skills reforms, more than 75% of the 1.3 million net new jobs have gone to British citizens. The British public will be very supportive of that. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) keeps chuntering, but he should listen. More than three quarters of the 1.3 million net new jobs have gone to British citizens. That is a record of which I am very proud.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
When the hon. Gentleman was Immigration Minister, he said at the Dispatch Box time and again that net migration was falling. Actually, it rose by a third in the year in which he was Minister.
Mr Harper
I have been very clear that net migration from outside the EU is falling, but that it is going up from inside the EU. That is why we will renegotiate and put the terms to a referendum. We trust the British people with that decision—something that the hon. Gentleman’s party is not prepared to do.
One of the most important things that we have done on the cost of living is to enable interest rates to stay low. That means that one of the largest costs for any family—their mortgage—has stayed at a very low rate. That has been incredibly important and the Labour party would put it at risk.
Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)
Is it not a bit galling to take lessons from the Labour party on equity and fairness when, under this Government since 2010 there are 400,000 fewer workless households and 290,000 children who are no longer in workless households? That is a record that I will be proud to stand on at the general election next year.
Mr Harper
My hon. Friend is absolutely right.
Also on the cost of living, I am very proud that Conservative councillors in Gloucestershire, working in partnership with the Government, have delivered a council tax freeze. Council tax is one of the most significant costs for families, after their mortgage. Gloucestershire county council has delivered a council tax freeze in every year since 2011-12; Forest of Dean district council has delivered a freeze since the 2011 local election; and Tewkesbury borough council has frozen council tax for four years running. I am looking at my council tax bill. The Conservative-controlled bits of the bill are frozen. The only bits that have gone up are those that are controlled by the independent police and crime commissioner who, for the second year running, has broken his promise and put up council tax for hard-working families across my constituency. That is an unacceptable breach of his manifesto promises. I am pleased that Conservative councils, working in partnership with the Government, have kept council tax low.
In constituencies like mine, having a car is not a luxury but a necessity, so I am pleased that we have frozen fuel duty. That means that for my constituents petrol is 20p a litre cheaper at the pumps than it would have been if the fuel escalator put in place by Labour had continued. That is not a trivial matter for my constituents. It saves them £11 or so every time they fill up and it is very much welcomed.
The hon. Lady spoke about our pension reforms. I know why there is some confusion, to which the Secretary of State drew attention. I raised in the House last week at Business questions the interesting response from one of the Opposition’s key policy advisers, a man who used to advise their Social Security Secretary, the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman). He said—and I think this is what many on the Labour Benches believe—that
“you cannot trust people to spend their own money sensibly planning for their retirement”.
He was not a lone voice. He was supported by the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson), who said that the Labour party must oppose our policies, and there are a number of other Labour MPs such as the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Austin Mitchell), and the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg), who is in the Chamber, who sounded a little confused. She was sort of welcoming—[Interruption.] She sounded a little confused about our policy. I have great respect for the hon. Lady, with whom I worked when I was in opposition as the shadow Minister for disabled people.
Dame Anne Begg (Aberdeen South) (Lab)
If the hon. Gentleman waits, he will hear that I will be asking the Government Front-Bench team rather a lot of questions. Perhaps at the end of today’s debate, Ministers will be able to answer them.
Mr Harper
All I said is that the hon. Lady is not as enthusiastic about our changes as the hon. Member for Leeds West suggested. It is clear that we on the Government Benches, as the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Steve Webb) set out clearly, trust people to save their own money and we trust them to make sensible decisions in retirement about how to spend it. The idea that somebody who has spent their entire lifetime working hard and building up a pension pot is going to throw the money away when they reach retirement age is nonsense.
Mr Harper
I will not give way; I will make progress. Our pension reforms are very valuable and will be well supported.
Finally, I draw the attention of the House to the use of the phrase “middle income”. I noticed that a story I was reading in The Guardian referred to 40p taxpayers as being on a middle income. For example, according to the latest figures that are available by parliamentary constituency, the median income in 2011-12—not the mean income—in my constituency is only £18,800. We on the Government Benches are right to keep our tax changes focused on the least well paid and those genuinely on a middle income.
There is not a single constituency in our country where the median taxpayer—the middle taxpayer—is paying the higher rate of tax, not even in the Cities of London and Westminster, Chelsea and Fulham or some of the wealthiest parts of London. In those constituencies, the median income earner is paying the basic rate of tax. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor’s focus on helping those middle income payers was absolutely right. It is right for our party. The Conservative party should be focused on helping the great majority of taxpayers.
It is worth bearing in mind that a higher rate taxpayer—again, I am using the 2011-12 figures—is in the top 14% of income earners. That does not mean that those people are not important, but it is right that we focused our help on those at the middle and lower end. This Budget was one for hard-working people at all levels of the income scale. It was for people who want to save and for people who want to get on in life. I am proud to support it this evening and will continue doing so.