Scottish Welfare Powers

Andrew Rosindell Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Westminster Hall

[Bill Grant]

I respect the hon. Lady’s intervention, but for clarity, I never indicated or suggested—sorry if you have interpreted it as such—

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind Members that the word “you” refers to the Chair.

[Bill Grant]

My apologies. I checked with the office. Cumnock jobcentre went live on 25 October last year, and in February this year the two other jobcentres in my constituency, Ayr and Girvan, went live. I think we have had six inquiries in total in that time. By the time my office staff got back to them, I think two or three of them had self-resolved and the system had resolved the others. The dark side of universal credit in terms of the changes is not self-evident.

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Order. There will not be time for everyone to speak in the debate unless everyone keeps their remarks down to just over a minute. We have only eight minutes before we have to move on to the SNP spokesman. We will have to be very strict with that timing, because there is very little time left. I call Luke Graham.

[Luke Graham (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Con)]

I will try to keep my remarks as close to one minute as I possibly can. Welfare is one of the key elements of the modern British state. We launched the NHS together and we built the welfare state together. It started at the turn of the 20th century and was built throughout the last 100 years. Beveridge was the son of a Scottish civil servant and helped lay the infrastructure in which we operate today.

Welfare is also one of the biggest issues that I have experienced as an MP. Constituents regularly come to me with a whole range of welfare issues and my staff and I work incredibly hard to make sure that we resolve them. We have been able to successfully resolve 94% of the universal credit inquiries we have had in just a few days. The greatest concern when we get into the politics of the devolution of welfare powers is the impact on constituents. I have already had constituents coming to me in a state of confusion because they do not know whether to go to the local authority, the MSP or the MP, and that is just with the current system, before we create a whole other agency with a whole other bureaucracy and the costs that go with that.

The Smith commission put the powers in—

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Order. I apologise. I call Patricia Gibson.

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I will try to be brief. I am bewildered about what this debate is supposed to achieve. The hon. Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Bill Grant) agreed with many of the points we put to him—for example, that social security is a human right. I wonder what the Minister will think of that.

We will take no lessons from the Labour party. It does not matter what the hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Sweeney) says, £12 billion-worth of cuts on welfare went through in 2015 and 184 Labour MPs abstained. That is why we need to have people in here protecting Scotland’s interests.

The hon. Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock talked of the need for mitigation. By definition, if we need to mitigate Tory cuts in Scotland, that suggests that the Tory cuts should not be taking place.

In setting up the new welfare system in Scotland, there has been widespread consultation. For the hon. Gentleman to suggest that it is some dark secret and nobody knows what is happening is clearly nonsense. His colleague, Adam Tomkins MSP, talked about the welfare legislation in Scotland as being landmark legislation and the great consensus around it. It is a pity that the hon. Gentleman cannot agree with his Tory colleagues in the Scottish Parliament. Adam Tomkins MSP congratulated the Scottish Government on bringing the legislation forward in the form that they did. It is very clear that the only people who are standing up for the people who find themselves relying on benefits—

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Stephen Kerr.

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[Chris Stephens]

It is not a handout; it is a human right. Language is important. The hon. Member for Stirling can shout all he likes—it is social security we should be talking about, not welfare. That is a big difference between my party and his in terms of how we view the issues. We need to ensure—

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Drew Hendry.

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[Neil Gray]

To paraphrase Mike Russell, I am afraid I have too few minutes and too much to contradict the Tories on. I am very sorry, but I do not have enough time. I have taken other interventions.

We will establish an independent scrutiny body—the Scottish commission on social security—and we have a legal duty to scrutinise proposals for regulations and have regard to human rights. The new agency will seek medical information at the outset of an application—applicants will not be required to collect it at appeal stage—so face-to-face assessments will be reduced. The legislative process required to deal with the successful transition of 11 benefits is still going on in Holyrood, so there may be more detail to come.

Those who contradict the hon. Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock are not restricted to SNP Members. I am keen to quote a couple of his colleagues in the Scottish Parliament. On 19 December, the Tory spokes- person on social security, Adam Tomkins, described the Scottish Government’s Bill as “landmark legislation” and said that

“the general principles of the bill should be supported.”

His colleague, Michelle Ballantyne MSP, went even further on the same day, and said that our Bill

“has the potential to revolutionise social security in this country.”

It is interesting that the hon. Gentleman has chosen this topic for debate, given that his colleagues up the road are not quite so keen to denigrate the Scottish Government’s actions. That is one of the reasons why I asked whether he had written to the Scottish Government at any stage about any of his concerns. You will be shocked to learn that he has not, Mr Rosindell. Call me cynical, but I think motives other than just inquiring about the progress in this area might have been at play when he called this debate.

The Scottish Tories were supposed to be coming to Westminster to vote as a bloc to protect Scottish interests and advocate for Scotland. Instead, they have used Westminster as a platform to try to denigrate the Scottish Government to the point of farce. Perhaps if the Scottish Tories had spent less time trying to do the job of MSPs, which many of them left, and more time watching what their own Government are doing, they would not be in the fisheries mess they currently find themselves in.

That leads me to my main questions for the Minister. How are the UK Government’s plans for the new Scottish social security agency going? What work has the Minister commissioned to ensure there is no delay to the smooth progress, which is currently on track to be delivered by the Scottish Government? What work have the UK been doing to keep up with—

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Order. You are out of time, I’m afraid.