Welfare Reform Bill

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Skelmersdale]

No, my Lords. The reason I added my last sentence and prevented the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, from rising to interrupt me was for the simple reason that the claimant may well need guidance and help in order to get the extra hours or money that he requires. Therefore, I am asking the Minister to what extent this is going to be driven by the claimant, or by the job provider, education or Jobcentre Plus. I said that I hoped it would be claimant-driven, and nothing else.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

My Lords, I wonder whether I could add to the burden of questions that the Minister will be facing. This will appear somewhat on the tangent but, in my view, it is not, as it feeds into a lot of our other discussions and is related to work conditionality. At the moment, as I understand it, a lone parent is regarded as being in full-time work for the purposes of conditionality or eligibility for tax credits if she is working 16 hours a week, and is then topped up. With a child under, I think, 12—although coming down to 10, seven et cetera—that 16 hours kicks in at an earlier stage. As far as I am aware—and I stand to be corrected on this—there is no point at which the lone parent is expected to increase her hours beyond that as the child gets older. With a couple, the main claimant, as we know, may claim on behalf of both. I have no objections at all in principle with expecting either claimant in a couple relationship to be available for work; and, in certain circumstances, both.

What concerns me, and what I would like to ask the Minister about, is the impression that the support papers that I have read so far seem to give: that when a child is 12, whether you are a lone parent or in a relationship as a couple, all such people must work a full-time job, which is now defined as 35 hours a week. If I understand it correctly, it could mean that a lone parent with a 13 year-old could be expected to move from working for 16 hours to 35 instead, as part of work conditionality; and a couple—a husband and wife, or two partners—with children of 13 and 15 might each be expected to work 35 hours a week. If I have understood the proposals correctly, then I would like to come back on that because I find it antithetical to everything we know about the need for children to have support. I have no problem at all with couples and the second partner, or a lone parent, being asked to find work within school hours. However, if the Minister is saying that at the age of 12, both partners in a couple, as well as a lone parent, are expected to be in what we would traditionally regard as full-time work of 35 hours-plus, then this is certainly something that we would like to revisit. I would be grateful if the Minister could help us to be sure that we have the facts right, as this is part of a wider debate on conditionality.

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[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I would like briefly to follow up on that because this takes us into largely uncharted waters, so we have to be sure of what it is that we are doing. I was struck by the research report, Perceptions of Welfare Reform and Universal Credit, which states that:

“Many part-time workers were surprised that the Universal Credit proposition addresses them as they tended to perceive that they were already doing their bit and felt a strong sense of entitlement to tax credits”.

I think that they found the idea that conditionality was going to apply to them quite disturbing. There is a real danger here. The Government talk a lot about not wanting an overly oppressive state, but I fear that many workers will experience this as just that.

I have two questions for the Minister. First, my noble friend Lord McKenzie mentioned the equality impact assessment. I understand why the Government are using earnings rather than hours as the threshold—because they want to get away from the in-work/out-of-work distinction—but in doing that, as my noble friend said, someone who can earn more will find it much easier to meet the threshold. We know from all the evidence that men are more likely to be able to do this than women, non-disabled people are more likely to do it than disabled people, and white people are more likely to do it than minority-ethnic people.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

People without children.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

Yes. Is there not an issue here in terms of the equality implications? How does the department see those implications?

Secondly, I know that the Minister likes evidence-based policy-making and of course will be very aware of the research report UK Employment Retention and Advancement Demonstration, which has found that gains are made by providing support for people to advance in work through this programme. It states that,

“the evaluation found that for specific populations, gains can be achieved, even for some of the most disadvantaged job seekers, and that those gains can be sustained over a five-year period. These results suggest that the core elements of ERA offer something to build on in future post-employment interventions”.

In what way is the department building on this? To me, it seems that it is going down the in-work conditionality route instead of developing the support provided in this programme.

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[Lord Freud]

The first point I make to the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, is to assure her that full-time is not the default setting. The default setting is that we look at the circumstances of the claimant, particularly taking into account their caring responsibilities and available care, and reach a reasonable position. That is the position. On that basis, a lot of her concerns surrounding her point fall away. Of course we are not looking to have latch-key children.

On flexible working, I made the point earlier that we understand that when we look at the value of a job, the monetary implications are not the only measure; and that the gains of flexibility, in terms of how the employer behaves, and the relationship, are key and critical factors and have to be taken into account.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

I do apologise, as I know the Minister has taken care to answer my noble friend. Does that mean that conditionality would not apply where a lone parent or a partner in a couple with primary caring responsibilities was able to work—or felt they could or should work—only during school hours, given the suggestion from my noble friend of the situations families find themselves in? Most of us have been through that. Therefore the default position for a lone parent of a teenager or, to gender-stereotype, the mother in a couple would be that one of those two need be available for work within school hours only?

[Lord Freud]

No, my Lords. I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, knows how the legislation works. That legislation now goes up to that 12/13 point and the formal protection around school hours. However, as I explained, the default setting remains that it depends more generally on the caring requirements of that parent, whether lone or in a couple, and their particular circumstances.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

How then do you avoid the question posed by my noble friend of latch-key children if you cannot ensure that the homecoming of the parent with primary care for the children coincides pretty approximately with that of the teenaged children?

[Lord Freud]

As I say, that will depend on the particular circumstances of that family. That is the point I am endeavouring to make.

I would like to finish with the point about the cost to the claimant of being employed. That is an issue that we are going to pick up in later amendments so I will not go into it in great detail. However, we recognise the need to take account of those employment costs, and I will pick that up more generally later.

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[Lord Freud]

At the risk of the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, saying that we have not developed the whole system, I should say that it has not sprung, like Athena out of Zeus’s head, fully formed.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

It makes a change from Aphrodite.

[Lord Freud]

Aphrodite was in the seashell. I think Athena was the daughter of Metis, who was swallowed by Zeus, but there we are.

We are working really intensively now to get the customer interface with our IT system for the universal credit right. We are spending a lot of time on the support that we will be providing for that and the categories of people who cannot be expected to do it themselves but need other ways of being helped. In practice, we will wrap this up with the much bigger exercise.

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[Lord Freud]

My Lords, let me just—

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

Soothe fears.

[Lord Freud]

Yes, soothe fears but also put this matter into context. We are essentially importing the existing arrangements, subject to the work experience issue that the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, raised. We have drawn up an illustrative list. The noble Lord, Lord Wigley, referred to a draconian power. That is the structure that we have imported into this Bill. That structure has been debated thoroughly by many noble Lords in this Room over a number of Bills, so we are not trying to do anything dramatically new here, albeit with a nudge towards work experience. I said to the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, that I would make absolutely clear what the protections are and how we intend to run the system. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, is looking at the whole thing as if it was a dramatically new and draconian way of doing things, but it is not. We are importing the existing methodology into the context of the universal credit.

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[Lord McKenzie of Luton]

My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendments 51CEC and 51CEE in this group, which probe Clauses 17 and 18. These clauses cover claimants who are subject to all work-related requirements. Clause 17 deals with work search requirements, Clause 18 with work availability requirements. Clause 17 sets down actions which the Secretary of State can require of a claimant, and also limitations that can be placed on those actions. Such limitations can include restrictions to work in particular locations. Our amendment requires the limitations to specifically include,

“consideration of the length and expense of the claimant’s travel”.

A similar issue arises in respect of the work availability requirement.

As we discussed, the conditionality applies to those out of work and also to those in work. Our briefing note suggests that regulations will make the default position that claimants should look for work that is within one and a half hours’ travel time of their home. This makes a handy headline in the national press to show how tough the Government are on the growing numbers of unemployed. I understand also that it reflects arrangements under the existing JSA regime, after a period.

For a start, we contend that the limitations should have regard to cost as well as journey times and that this should be reflected in the regulations and spelled out in claimant commitments. One and a half hours each way is about the time of my journey to Westminster—oh, for the ministerial car—at a cost of more than £100 a week. Individuals on low pay with no long-term job security would not necessarily be in a position to get the cheapest tickets even if the best deals were readily discernible. Of course, the cost of travel from home to work has to be met out of taxed earnings. Journey times will not always be regular, especially in rural areas. They are not inevitably aligned with the hours of a job: five minutes extra at work can mean an hour’s wait for the next bus. It is understood that the Government recognise the need for flexibility in these matters but see the non-application of sanctions as the route to providing it. Is this correct and, thinking about it, is it an appropriate way to proceed?

We get an insight into how the Government are dealing with this by looking at the illustrative claimant commitment that has been provided to us. Jack Smith’s job goal is to be secure in work as a plumber, earning at least £8 an hour, full-time, within one and a half hours of his home. It also says that if he does not find this kind of work within eight weeks, his job goal will be reviewed and he may be required to widen it, and presumably widen his travel times as well. There is no recognition that cost could be an issue, but the prospects of widening the job goal are included in this illustrative claimant commitment.

Perhaps we may ask what the Government intend on this. It brings us to a wider point. The Government have argued the case for universal credit in terms of simplicity and demonstrably ensuring that people are better off in work. We recognise that it is difficult to have a system that inevitably has some national parameters, so our amendment is an individual underpin that ensures that no one can be made worse off under these provisions by taking up any particular paid work. Clearly, regulations would have to flesh out some definitions of “worse off”, but the calculation would have to encompass costs as well as income, particularly costs around childcare and caring. I beg to move.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

My Lords, I support my noble friend in particular on Amendment 51CEC, which is about the cost of travel. Too often and too easily we assume a London model, with the Tube, regular bus services and so on; although even there, lone parents may find it difficult to access work in the way that they would like. However, in a county like Norfolk, where many villages have a bus service twice a day, you have a very different story. In Norfolk you have some of the lowest wage rates and some of the highest car ownership rates in the country; but those cars are battered, second-hand jalopies, which are taken by him to get to work, leaving her—usually—with the children and finding it very difficult to do anything except use a bicycle. The result is that it is very difficult for the second earner in a family, or—even more pertinently—a lone parent, to cope with travel to work if there is no job available for her in the local village.

We are expecting a lone parent to work 20 to 25 hours per week. She has two children, one of whom has to be delivered to a childminder and the other to the local school, but she has no transport apart from her feet. Finally, after that, she has somehow to get to a job of her own, and she has to do that again at 3 pm or 3.30 pm. It is almost impossible to find a job between those two hours in the locality, let alone further afield, given that she has to allow for her travel time. I remember one lone parent telling me that she calculated that the school bus picked up the children of the next-door village 40 minutes earlier than it picked up the children of her village; so she used to walk her child about two miles to the next-door village in order to put the child on the school bus, which would act as a form of childminder. That lone parent, with a great deal of ingenuity, managed to get to her job for its 9 am start. She was able to do so because the two villages were within walking distance of each other, but there is a real problem here. I think those of us who live in London or cities have no sense of just how isolated those villages can be.

However, the work requirement will apply to women, both lone parents and second earners, in a situation where there is no public transport, no private transport, a bicycle that you cannot actually take a small child on—let alone two children—except with some degree of difficulty and therefore there is only feet. I suggest to the Minister that it requires enormous juggling skill even to hold down a part-time job. Sometimes the jobcentre that the person has to travel to is not even in the whole of a rural district but may be 20, 30 or 40 miles away. I hope that jobcentre advisers will take all that into account when deciding what is reasonable for that lone parent or woman—and it is usually the woman who is the main child carer—in that situation. I ask the noble Lord to be sensitive to those issues, not because there is any lack of commitment but because of the sheer, simple, practical, logistical difficulties such women may face.

[Lord Wigley]

Perhaps I may add briefly that I identify totally with the rural dimension that the noble Baroness has just described. A bus twice a day would be a luxury in many villages in rural Powys and other parts of rural Wales. If a person has been lucky enough to have a job and a lift to work from a colleague, but the job comes to an end and they have no independent transport of their own and are required to go some distance to fulfil their obligations under the Act, that would be totally unreasonable. I would be glad to know what guidance the Minister will give to people who are trying to implement the Act on how to deal with circumstances such as those.

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Given the variety of factors that need to be taken into account in assessing whether the costs of employment are reasonable, we think it more appropriate to consider these on a case-by-case and job-by-job basis. Where a job is identified within 90 minutes of a claimant’s home but the costs are a concern to the claimant, they will be able to discuss that with an adviser, but they must push ahead with an application or accept the job offer. Our aim is to put in place a system that allows a balanced view to be reached, weighing the costs of moving into work against all the benefits of work for the claimant. This is broadly the process in jobseeker’s allowance now. JSA regulations require advisers to consider whether the costs of travel are disproportionate when assessing whether a claimant has good reason for refusing a job offer. We are considering carefully the regulatory framework that we want to put around that under universal credit, but we recognise that it is an important issue and we hope to provide further information shortly. I urge the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

I have just a query for the Minister. What he is saying is wise. He understands that we fully support both the principle of UC and the continuum between not being in work and being in work. There is no dispute between us. However, I worry about the huge area of responsibility and effectively discretion that will fall on first level Jobcentre Plus staff. As my noble friend said, no one doubts their goodwill or that they will do the best they can. However, given the centralisation of Jobcentre Plus offices, the fact that staff are often young and that the office may be in a town or city with a substantial choice of jobs compared to rural areas, from my experience they will often have very little understanding of the difficulties experienced in a rural village where the only jobs may be part-time cleaning, childminding if you are lucky, picking mushrooms or cleaning caravans. Those are the options, and none of them would fulfil the work conditionality without serious travel that would impede people’s capacity to look after their children and meet school hours.

I say to the Minister, in capital letters, that so much of the effective delivery of what we all want will rest on the shoulders of junior staff: AOs, with luck supervised by an experienced EO, working in local offices and living some 40 or 60 miles away from the circumstances of an individual in a rural village of which they will have no knowledge. I do not know how far the Minister can go in giving assurances. Of course he will want the best possible training, but I am worried about this. Perhaps the answer will involve intensifying supervision and scrutiny by more experienced senior officers at the review level—the EO level—to make it more possible, so that this does not migrate upwards into the tribunal system that my noble friend identified. We have picked up this problem in the past, and it will become more acute as more people are brought into the conditionality realm. So much will hang on the experience of the staff handling their applications.

[Baroness Sherlock]

Perhaps I may clarify something. I may have misheard the noble Lord and I apologise for delaying the Committee. Did he say in his response that there might be circumstances in which somebody would not be better off, but that they should take a job anyway? I see that he did. I will quote from the right honourable Iain Duncan Smith, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. In his introduction to the Green Paper he referred to people of working age and stated:

“We will help them to find work and make sure work pays when they do. They in return will be expected to seek work and take work when it is available”.

Was that not the contract he laid before the British people? What the Minister said appears to contradict it.

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[Lord McKenzie of Luton]

It is a good move, because it is important. However, I do not think I can let the noble Lord get away with the constant assertion that the current system that they are seeking to replace by universal credit does not reflect the fact that work can pay. Overwhelmingly, is it not the case that it does? It may be that a very complicated calculation has to be gone through in order to prove it. I accept entirely that simplification of how to deal with the in-work, out-work issue is to be welcomed and is something we support. However, I do not think it is right to say that, overwhelmingly, work under the current system does not pay.

I would hang on to the point that if there is to be discretion in the system, then why is there not protection at the individual level so that someone cannot be forced to undertake work that would make them worse off? Is there going to be some reassurance at the individual level? There can be regulations which have appropriate caveats around timing issues; it is not beyond the wit of the Government to do that. In all of this change and uncertainty which still has to be resolved in many areas, would it not be reassuring to individuals that if it was clear that they would be worse off, they could not be forced down a path? That seems entirely reasonable to me.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

I wonder if I could come in on this. I absolutely see the dilemma and I can quite understand why you may want someone to start in on something in the hope and expectation that a year down the line, that entry into low-paid work will have paid off. I put it to the noble Lord—I think he might be horrified by the possible complexity of it, but I have been looking at the additional material and trying to get my head around how disregards work—that the disregard is relatively modest for a single young person. I wonder, following the point made by my noble friend—I can see already that there may be too much downside to this and the arguments against it—whether the Minister could look at the issue of whether in such circumstances you could adjust the disregard to ensure that, even where it does not appear to pay, you could construct it so that at least someone is not worse off through working until the point at which the hoped-for job progression that we all want to see has taken them into the pathway. I would ask the Minister to take this away. It may be that this is too complicated, but making someone worse off is going to be hard to defend, is it not?

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, the best answer I can give on the whole area is to encourage us to wait until we get to the piloting powers before we have this debate. Let me explain it. We want to test every aspect of this system on a continuing basis. Rather than having a debate about whether we should make this little change, make that little change, do this or do that—we all like to design a system—I think the way to develop this system, which will not and cannot be perfect on day one because it is just too tough, is to have a process of constant improvement. That is my real answer. We should have the constructive debate on these issues when we get to the clause—I forget which one it is, but it is not very far away. I do not think that we will arrive there today—

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

Clause 42.

[Lord Freud]

We will get there soon.

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The Prime Minister has expressed his desire, which we absolutely agree with, to make this the most family-friendly Government ever. It is an aim we applaud and we are here to help, so these amendments will help the Government to fulfil the Prime Minister’s pledge. I beg to move.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

I add a couple of lines to my noble friend’s eloquent introduction to this issue. What we know from all our research about getting lone parents into work is that those lone parents stay in work if they have childcare they trust. Trust is key. As one lone parent told me when I visted, “I would never leave my child with strangers”. Childcare they trust tends to be associated with schools and extended hours. That is highly trusted. If they live in an urban area, it may be the availability of a nursery which is acceptable to them and which is trusted because of scrutiny. They may have neighbours or friends, and so on, who are childminders.

The biggest resource in my experience has always been grandmothers, particularly the maternal grandmother. The reason the maternal grandmother could do the childcare and often would do so once or twice a week, particularly over holiday periods, allowing a lone parent to hold down a job, was because she was herself not caught by conditionality. Can the Minister assure us that he has taken into account that, as we see the retirement age rising to 66 from 60 and that she as well as he in the 60s bracket are expected themselves to be available for work if otherwise they would be claimants on UC, that that unpaid resource will be taken out of the caring economy which has made it possible for that grandmother to permit her daughter to work? In other words, there is interaction going on here with other fields of government policy.

I am sure that the Minister has taken this into account, but one thing that I was most pleased that the right honourable James Purnell was able to introduce was the substitution: where a lone mother did not need her HRP because she was in the labour market and getting her own NI, a grandparent did not lose her entitlement to a state pension by virtue of not being in the labour market for wages, but was in the unwaged labour market, allowing her daughter to remain in full-time paid work.

That resource will come out of the system, if I understand the double interaction, of the raising of the retirement state pension age for women and the conditionality that the Minister will expose her to while she waits in that twilight decade to draw her pension, while she is perhaps not an attractive option for many employers. Can he reassure us that this has been taken into account and that there is lateral thinking here because 40 per cent of lone parents have relied on grandparents to provide informal care? We have never recognised this, except in so far as we have been assured that she does not lose out in terms of a pension. Can the Minister advise us on how this will be handled in future?

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, before I speak to my amendment in this group, Amendment 51FZA, I thank the Minister for asking his officials to provide me with information in this area. I also apologise for being absent from the discussion of the first grouping today which was relevant to this debate now. I apologise if I repeat information raised then. I also remind your Lordships of Article 3 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child:

“In all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions, courts of law, administrative authorities or legislative bodies, the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration”.

I should be grateful if the Minister could make his best endeavours to demonstrate how the Bill is considering the best interests of the child in relation to this debate.

My Amendment 51CED states:

“It is not a failure sanctionable under this section if a claimant falling within section 22 does not have guaranteed and predictable access to high quality, flexible and affordable child care acceptable to the parent and child or children”.

The lack of widely available, affordable and acceptable childcare has been referred to. The purpose of this amendment is to ensure that claimants with a dependent child will not face sanctions if they are unable to work or participate in work-related activity due to a lack of suitable high-quality, flexible and affordable childcare appropriate to the parents’ and children’s needs. As we have heard, most lone parents want to have the opportunity to combine paid work with the vital job of being a parent. However, so far the Bill seems to fail to recognise that the required childcare infrastructure is lacking in many parts of the UK, including Scotland. There also continues to be a serious lack of childcare settings that are properly equipped and which have staff who are properly trained to deal effectively and positively with children with disabilities, learning, communication or behavioural challenges or who have a wide range of additional support needs.

To make a slight aside, I know how important it is to the Minister and to all your Lordships that we encourage a culture of independence and attack a culture of dependency. The kinswoman of the noble Lord, Anna Freud, whom I believe was a child psychotherapist and an early-years teacher, established in her work dating from the 1940s the absolute importance of the relationship between the child and parent in making the move from infant dependency—absolute dependence—on the parent to adult independent emotional maturity. The danger is that if we do not do all we can in this Bill to strengthen the relationship between parents and children we might inadvertently build in the problem of dependency in the next generation. For adults to be independent they need to have had strong relationships in their early childhood. That is what gives them the strength to be independent in their adulthood. The nature of the relationship between parents and children also colours the relationships that those children will have as adults with other adults. Therefore, the strength of parental bonds between partners is coloured very much by their early experiences in childhood.

I wish to cite a couple of case histories of lone parents in Scotland. I should say that this amendment is supported by 20 charities working in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Judy says:

“All very well and good expecting lone parents to work once their children are in fulltime education, personally I don’t have an issue with it. For me personally, voluntary work & eventually paid work turned my life around albeit not financially. However, where is the childcare to go along with this? Where is the flexible working? Where is the long term thinking? It’s all very well providing ‘some’ funding for childcare, what use is it if there is none? We now face a new generation of children who are ‘forced’ by the Government to be latchkey kids … These same children are often (not always) the ones who require the most emotional support and stability, in particular during difficult times (separation/divorce) … who is going to be around to support them at the times where parents have to be working?”.

I took part in the proceedings on the Childcare Act 2006. What was noteworthy about that was the recognition of how far behind our continental neighbours we were in developing an effective childcare strategy. We were 30 years behind Sweden in having our first childcare strategy. We start from a very low base in terms of thinking and providing for early-years and other childcare.

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[Lord Newton of Braintree]

May I come in from my sedentary position? I ought to start by saying that, having been in another part of the United Kingdom for most of the day, I only strayed in here to demonstrate continuing interest and to check that the Minister was still being reasonable. I felt driven to contribute, as all too often both upstairs and downstairs, by the subject matter that was being discussed.

If I may say so, the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, need make no apology for the length of a speech from a noble Lord who has taken greater interest in these matters than almost anyone else in the House over all the time I have been here. His genuine knowledge and concern comes through, and we all benefit from it.

That said, I shall now incur the wrath of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, or both, or indeed of everyone. I had better admit immediately that if I were the Minister I would not touch this amendment, in its present terms, with a bargepole. It is all very well for noble Lords to talk about guarantees, but what does all that mean? Does it mean predictable? The number of hurdles here is unbelievable. The amendment speaks of “guaranteed”, “predictable”, “high quality”, “flexible” and “affordable” childcare. Who will be the judge of all those? It also talks about the care being,

“acceptable to the parents and the children”.

Frankly, that is not on, as a workable concept. I will just put that on the record in the interests of being helpful to the Minister.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

Which one of those would the noble Lord suggest we junk?

[Lord Newton of Braintree]

There are too many hurdles in the amendment. In legal terms, although I am not a lawyer, it would be impossible to have guaranteed and predictable access to,

“high quality flexible and affordable childcare”,

because the parents could say that it was not acceptable. Indeed, the child could say that it was not acceptable. It is not a sensible construct, as I am sure any legal mind would advise. The noble Baroness may not agree, but that is certainly the view I would take if I was advising the Minister.

However, coming back to the noble Earl, the childcare issue is an important one, as we have recognised throughout the proceedings on this Bill. It could be crucial to whether it is sensible or reasonable to expect some people, be they single parents or others, to take up work. So we need a clear policy on this, even if in my view this amendment does not give it to us. I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some encouragement on that front.

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[Lord Newton of Braintree]

What if they disagree?

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

If they have good reason, we should listen to them.

[Lord Freud]

I am laughing at the memory of my own children’s disapproval of their minders. Jobcentre Plus does not dictate to parents the type of childcare or which provider they should use, or make any presumption that a childcare provider is suitable for the parent and child in question. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, asked whether childcare costs would be taken as good reason. This goes back to my previous response: there is no blanket rule. We will consider each case and look at all the benefits of work. Clearly, we will elaborate the detail on that in due course.

Advisers will continue to have an important role in both challenging and supporting parents who may have preconceived ideas about childcare, who may have had previous experiences or who have not used the services before. The circumstances of all parents and the needs of their children vary, and advisers will continue to take this into account.

Several noble Lords raised the question of the availability of childcare. We should bear in mind that local authorities have a duty under the Childcare Act 2006 to secure, as far as is reasonably practicable, sufficient childcare for working parents of children aged from birth to 14, and from birth to 18 in the case of disabled children. They must formally assess sufficiency in their area every three years. Local authority decisions on what they regard as “reasonably practicable” should be documented and published to allow scrutiny and challenge. Parents who feel that their needs have not been met can complain to the local authority. In the event that they are not satisfied with the way that their complaint has been dealt with, they may make a complaint to the Local Government Ombudsman. I will borrow the claim of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, about the perfection of all things under the previous Government. This is after all the system that they put in place, so I am sure that she is absolutely satisfied with the arrangements.

A parent who considers that childcare is not available will need to demonstrate to the adviser that they have taken reasonable steps to secure such care. If childcare is available but the parent considers that it is not appropriate, he or she will need to provide information indicating that they have discussed their concerns with the service provider and give reasons why they do not consider the provision to be appropriate. Parents will need to demonstrate that there are no alternative arrangements that it would be reasonable for them to make. Where the adviser considers that the parent has not taken reasonable steps to identify or access appropriate childcare they will refer the question to a decision-maker. The sanction will only be imposed if the claimant does not have a good reason. In considering whether there is good reason, we will consider all relevant matters raised by the claimant, which would include the individual circumstances of the parent and children, and the availability of suitable childcare. Of course, any sanction decision can be appealed to an independent appeals tribunal for review.

Ultimately, we believe that in the vast majority of cases it is best for children if their parents are in work. Research into child poverty and workless households highlighted that:

“Parental employment is the key route out of poverty and disadvantage. Growing up in a workless household and/or in poverty can have a significant negative effect on a child’s development.”

That is from the 2004 Treasury document, Choice for Parents, The Best Start for Children.

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We believe that these provisions strike a fair balance. They allow parents to find the childcare that is right for them and to meet their work-related requirements. I also add my thanks to the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, for raising this important issue. He made a powerful speech which reminded us of the importance of this area. I hope that I have reassured him that the position is actually improving and that we have the protections in place. On that basis, I urge him and other noble Lords to withdraw their amendments.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

My Lords, can the Minister give us an assurance that one possibility he could explore again is that great source of unpaid childcare: grandparents. I tried to get payment, but the deadweight costs would have been too huge. I hope that he will take the issue of her—and it is usually a her—responsibility into account in assessing her conditionality. We have already moved down this path, as my noble friend mentioned, in terms of credits for her pension and so on. It would not be difficult to do and it would ease the pressure on two or even three generations if her contribution to childcare was set against the conditionality on her in her late 50s—certainly in her 60s—and thus make it possible to keep all three generations afloat.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, sorry—

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[Lord Freud]

My Lords, there are two questions here. The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, asked whether our provision could be improved and integrated more closely. Clearly we do have links with the family service that I was describing. What we are doing in Jobcentre Plus is trying to co-locate services, so there may be something there to look at very closely.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, made a point about unpaid childcare by grandparents and others, which I was able to think about in the break. It is deceptively easy to say, “Oh, yes”, but actually it is very complicated. There is a whole load of things happening: increasing longevity; much later childbirth; and in some cases much earlier childbirth, especially in some of the groups we are discussing here. There is a lot of social change going on, including the pension provision, so this is pretty difficult to do much about. I could say consolingly that we will look at it—and I will look at it, I am quite interested in this area—but solutions here are very difficult and would be hard to find. I will look at it but I am not expecting huge things to come out of that look.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

It is very interesting that the noble Lord should say that, because it was exactly the advice I had from civil servants at the time. None the less, it did not stop us introducing NI credits for grandparents who did more than 20 hours’ care a week for their daughter, releasing her to work. If you can do it for national insurance and pensions, you can certainly do it for childcare, and it would be much easier to do it with conditionality.

[Baroness Sherlock]

My Lords, perhaps I could suggest to the Minister that Jobcentre Plus could encourage the grandparent to train as a childminder. The daughter could then claim help through universal credit to pay the grandparent for childcare. You could simply cycle the money round that way—it might be a better way to do it.

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, I am really grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, for her imaginative way of manipulating the system. I am sure that it is something we should look at very closely. No, come on; I will look at this. This is very difficult so I am not promising anything, but I will look at it.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

It is already the case that grandparents can mind a grandchild if they are a registered childminder, with the childcare taking place in their own home, and look after at least one other child. That is already done.

[Baroness Sherlock]

My Lords, I am aware that irony plays rather poorly in Hansard. Just to clarify for the record, I am not actually recommending this scheme to the Government. I simply want to raise the fact that one has to be careful not to build perverse incentives into the system and overformalise relationships that might otherwise find a way of working out on their own.