Alex Burghart
Main Page: Alex Burghart (Conservative - Brentwood and Ongar)Department Debates - View all Alex Burghart's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(6 years, 4 months ago)
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Ms McVey
Let me start from the top again. I did not fail to meet the Comptroller and Auditor General. As I have said, the letter came in on 27 June, which was last Wednesday; our office got back to him at the end of the week, and I am seeing him on Monday. So that was not correct.
As I have said, I came to the House and apologised for my interpretation of what was there and the words that I had used. My right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne), who is no longer in the Chamber, referred to how something could be interpreted.
As I also explained, we agreed on the factual information all the way through, but it is a question of how you interpret that information, with the judgments, the summaries and the context. It was on that basis that we said, “We do not agree. We do not agree on how the findings come out together.” As I said, the effects of the significant changes that the Government had introduced this year cannot have been fully taken into account, because they are still being rolled out.
Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con)
I thank the Secretary of State for her apology. Like a number of other Members, I was very disappointed that the NAO report did not take account of the changes that the Department brought in on the basis of the recommendations made by the Select Committee. Will the Secretary of State confirm that she will continue to adapt and improve universal credit as new ideas and new evidence emerge?
Ms McVey
My hon. Friend is right. That is one of the key points, because this is one of the biggest changes in benefits. We always said that the slow roll-out would reflect the changes needed. Even within the last couple of weeks, I have made significant changes yet again. Whether they involved kinship carers, 18 to 21-year-olds and housing benefit or severe disability premiums, I made those changes after listening to people. Again, the impacts will not have taken effect yet because they are still being rolled out.
I agree that sometimes we have to do a “mea culpa”, hands up, as I did yesterday. I had the wrong words, I apologised to the House, and the apology was accepted by the House. Equally, I am more than happy and prepared when colleagues on either side of the House say, “Could you look at this? Can we look at it a bit more? Could you change this?”, and have made significant changes to this policy since I became Secretary of State.