Oral Answers to Questions
Amber Rudd Excerpts(13 years, 3 months ago)
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Maria Miller
Again, I reiterate that we are looking to remove overlaps, not mobility. The local authority contracts contain clearly articulated requirements for care homes to cover activities involved in daily living, which include providing access to doctors, dentists and local services, such as libraries and banks. In addition, in order to become registered, a care home provider has to undertake to promote the independence of the disabled people living in the homes that it is providing. We know, as do care home providers, that mobility is an important part of that independence.
Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
This morning I met the BBC—the business breakfast club—in Hastings, which is a group of local employers. It raised with me its concern that when offering additional work to part-time employees of 16 hours, those employees often do not want to take it up because they find themselves worse off. Will the Secretary of State advise what will be done to even that out and make sure that work does pay after 16 hours?
Mr Duncan Smith
The objective of the universal credit is that, all the way up the part-time process, whatever the number of hours worked, work should pay. That is particularly so for those who take jobs with low hours and low pay, paying them extra. They will be the greatest beneficiaries of the system. It is invidious that there are only two points in the cycle at which people are able to take up work and make any money. In future, work should pay: that is the incentive and we should get people back to work by enduring that it does.
Housing Benefit
Amber Rudd Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
Fairness is a constantly recurring theme today, and fairness has been the dominant feature of this reforming Government’s coalition agenda. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (James Wharton) that we must also be fair to the people who pay the taxes that pay for the housing benefit and local housing allowance.
I know what I am talking about, because my constituents earn extremely low wages. In the past 10 years the average wage in Hastings, which used to be £30 below the average United Kingdom rent, has fallen to £100 below that figure. I know about low wages. The hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Bain) spoke of people who were vulnerable. People on low wages are also vulnerable, and I feel strongly that they should not be charged with paying the housing benefit of people who live in houses and in areas where those on low wages could not begin to live themselves.
Caroline Flint (Don Valley) (Lab)
Does the hon. Lady agree with councillors in Hastings who have expressed concern about the additional pressures that the Government’s policies will impose on their local community, including additional costs for education and children’s services?
Amber Rudd
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for making that point, because it is exactly the one with which I am about to deal. Earlier in the debate, we heard about sensational articles in newspapers and unrealistic reporting. I am afraid that Hastings has been on the receiving end of quite a lot of that. I have spoken to the councillors who made those comments and to our director of housing, Andrew Palmer, who has done excellent work. I asked him how many London councils had made inquiries of him, and he said none. I asked him whether he had had an opportunity to speak to the people who run the bed-and-breakfast establishments that he very rarely uses—although he has had to do so occasionally—and to the landlords whom he uses for the purposes of the local housing allowance. He said that he had spoken to all of them, and that not one of them had received such an inquiry.
I strongly believe that we have been reading sensationalist reports in the newspapers. There is an apocalyptic vision of a group of Londoners arriving on the south coast, but it simply is not happening. I think it important to repeat that so that people do not become fearful. They do not have to believe what is said by the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) about extra pressure on education establishments, because that is not happening at the moment.
We hope that rents will fall. Members will not be surprised to hear that I agree with much that has been said by Conservative Members about reducing rents. The right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford) spoke of the unrealistic aspect of falling house rents, and referred to an article in the Evening Standard that focused mainly on larger houses. In my constituency at least, between 80% and 90% of people who receive local housing allowance live in homes with one to two bedrooms. The larger house element does not feature so much, although it represents a large cost. I am told by Westminster council, whose representatives I have consulted, that house prices in its area are falling rather than rising.
Mr Raynsford
When the hon. Lady reads the record of the debate, she will see that among the quotations that I gave from the article in the Evening Standard was one from an agent who said that properties of all sizes were affected, from the largest to the smallest, and that all areas of London were affected.
Amber Rudd
I am interested to hear that London is affected. We will see the consequences, but at present I am receiving different answers and people are reaching different conclusions. It is not entirely clear how the private sector will respond, but one thing is entirely clear: we cannot continue with the cost as it is now.
Amber Rudd
The 40% figure is totemic in this debate. As we know, 40% of private rented properties are used by the Department for Work and Pensions.
Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)
Like me, the hon. Lady represents a seaside town. If Kosovo-style clear-outs do take place in the inner cities—[Interruption.] It was Boris Johnson who used that phrase. If that does happen, it is logical to assume that people will go where there is cheap available accommodation: houses in multiple occupation in seaside towns such as the hon. Lady’s and mine.
Amber Rudd
The hon. Gentleman obviously does not want to let the facts interfere with a good story. Some of the newspapers have taken the same view. However, he too should try to look at the facts. He should establish whether London councils are making such inquiries, and whether B-and-Bs are being booked up. There is absolutely no evidence of that. Rents are expected to fall, which will make things less costly for us all.
Ms Buck
My local authority, Westminster council, has written to me and to Ministers in the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Communities and Local Government, asking for changes in the homelessness legislation because of the potential impact of the cuts, and stating that it will expect substantial out-of-borough bookings for temporary accommodation if the proposals go ahead unamended.
Amber Rudd
That is an interesting comment, but I can tell the hon. Lady that I have spoken to the cabinet member in charge of Westminster council—which has the largest supply of houses at the top level above the cap—and she told me unequivocally that the council was not doing that.
Amber Rudd
I also have a letter. Perhaps we can exchange letters later, and see what the conclusion is.
It is impossible not to see these reforms of housing benefit outside the context of the overall attempt to carry out the reforms of the welfare system to which the Government are so committed. I commend to all Members a fascinating article in today’s The Times by a former Labour Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, in which he draws strong parallels between our efforts to reform the welfare system and the proposals on which he had been working for the past few years, until the last two years or so, when he was unable to obtain any traction and had to resign. He spoke of the line that Government must tread between the poverty trap and the welfare trap. That is exactly what this Government are trying to do, but let me add that there is not just a welfare trap or a poverty trap. The welfare trap is a poverty trap in its own right. It is not a good place in which to be, but our efforts to reduce housing benefit and introduce a universal credit will start to change the present position and make a fairer society for us all.
Oral Answers to Questions
Amber Rudd Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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Mr Duncan Smith
I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman was listening to the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Steve Webb), when he pointed out that the last Government left plans to slash that support. It is we who have actually brought it to the average, which means that people will do better under us than they ever would have done under the last Government—so an apology would do very nicely thank you.
Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
T2. I know that the Secretary of State is aware of conversations I have been having in my constituency with youth leaders about how we can communicate changes in the welfare programme to young people who do not watch the Parliament Channel and sometimes do not read the papers. Do we have a campaign plan to try to communicate the changes to them, perhaps through texting or facebooking and the internet?
Mr Duncan Smith
We do indeed. My hon. Friend is right to draw the matter to the House’s attention. Using new media, it is important that we ensure that young people are brought fully into the net, particularly through voluntary sector organisations, which are much better at using the new media. However, I must also draw her attention to the Department’s commitment—a commitment that I have made—to ensure that older people approaching retirement should not retire without the ability to use the net and the web. That is a big commitment but one that we will stand by.
Jobs and the Unemployed
Amber Rudd Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Amber Rudd (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
I have noticed this afternoon that there has been a lot of talk about young people in unemployment. Both my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey) and the hon. Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) were talking about that, and it is a common theme. It is one area that, I know, we all care about so much.
I was talking in Hastings, where we have very high levels of youth unemployment, to a young lady from Tressell training, which is a NEET—not in employment, education or training—college. I asked her what she was doing and she said that she was doing a training course, making a film about BMX bikes. I said, “That’s great. Do you do BMX biking yourself?” and she said, “No, I couldn’t possibly, because it’s dangerous and I’m pregnant.” My face fell, reflecting slightly what I thought about that, and she said, “No, don’t worry. I know what you’re thinking—you’re thinking I’m too young but I’m not, because I’m 16 next week.” She was reflecting something that we see a lot, and I do not think that it is a problem just in Hastings. A lot of young people are making a choice, because they look at the potential for jobs and do not see that it has anything to do with them.
In Hastings, 43% of the work force are in the public sector. To get into the public sector, people need qualifications. I welcome the comments made by the Secretary of State for Education today about the changes to education and the changes to our schools, which, I hope, will start to work with the lowest achievers and with the people who are struggling most. At the moment, I feel that we have a real problem with the young unemployed looking at the work force—they have no qualifications—and thinking, “That’s not for me.”
I have a radical proposal that I would like the Secretary of State and the Minister to consider. Instead of people going on to unemployment benefit—instead of their going on to the circuit of jobseeker’s allowance, then the flexible new deal and then, sometimes, back again—why not consider putting them on something new, which we could call “Vision for Jobs”, to give them purpose, work and training? In the example I am thinking of, people could start at 9 o’clock in the morning and be given two to three days of community service, one day of learning skills and one day of job search. They could be given pride in what they are trying to do by being given a weekly wage. In my vision, this weekly piece of paper would have on the right hand side “35 hours of meaningful work”, which would be set out, and—
Amber Rudd
Yes—actually, no, I will not give way.
On the left hand side, that slip would show what they had received—not just the jobseeker’s allowance but the council benefit and any credits that they might receive. Many young people do not know the full extent of the benefits they receive.
I know that such a scheme will be hard to deliver and that it is not straightforward, but I think that the current unemployment benefit system leaves young people to fend for themselves. It does not look after them. We need a new system. I ask those on the Front Bench and the Secretary of State to consider piloting such a scheme in Hastings. I know that he has had conversations with Tomorrow’s People and Debbie Scott, and she would be delighted to do that. We could make a change, and start it in Hastings.