Welfare Reform Bill

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

My Lords, I strongly support the amendment moved by my noble friend. Throughout Committee and Report, the Minister has regularly made clear that he is concerned to make work pay and attractive, and to get behavioural change. I do not think that we on this side disagree with him at all on this. However, it subverts the value, virtue and continuity of behavioural change if sanctions that were applied before that behavioural change had taken place continue. Therefore, he is effectively defeating his own policy.

I was trying to think of an example. On page 33 of the Bill, proposed new Section 6J, “Higher-level sanctions”, which my noble friend referred to, says in subsection (2)(a) that a failure is sanctionable if a claimant,

“fails for no good reason to comply with a requirement imposed by the Secretary of State under a work preparation requirement to undertake a work placement of a prescribed description”.

A couple of weeks ago we had the story of a young woman, a graduate, who had been doing voluntary work in a local museum and was hoping that this would count as appropriate work experience to lead her to a job in that field. The work requirement placement that the local office came up with was that she should do a fortnight in Poundland, filling shelves, even though she had substantive previous retail experience; in other words, it was a very misguided imposition by the decision-makers in the local benefit office—from the outside, it looked as if she was much better off where she was. If she had refused that placement in Poundland, she would have fallen foul of 6J(2)(a) and she could have had three years’ worth of sanctions imposed on her, even if she had subsequently accepted a further placement, which would have been—in her view, and most people’s views—more realistic.

The Minister is stuck with the position that she would have been pulled out of something appropriate to do something less appropriate on the decision of a local decision-maker, and had she resisted that she could have been subjected to sanctions that would have continued for three years, even if she had made it clear that she was willing to accept further and more appropriate work placements that would help her with her career. It must be sensible for the Government to have a way back for people who have resisted—for good reason or bad—an original work placement offer but then go on to respect that imposition, whether appropriate or not. If there is no way back, how can the Minister expect people to respect that law?

[Lord Skelmersdale]

Perhaps the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, could turn over to page 34 of the Bill. New Section 6J(7)(c) talks about,

“the termination or suspension of a reduction under this section”.

That sounds like exactly the sort of principle that the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, has enunciated in moving this amendment. I that hope my noble friend will be able to confirm that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, before I say a few words of my own, I have to admit that the very last question from the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, was a tribute to him. It is quite difficult to answer; it is in a tricky area. We are pretty confident that we can maintain the position whereby it is only EU jobseekers whom we have to support and not others. As the noble Lord will know, we are moving from providing particular support in JSA to providing general support. That is where the protection is. We are hopeful that, by and large, we can maintain it, but there may be some shadowing of that position.

It is a shame that the crowds trying to get out of our deliberations earlier on slowed down the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan. I can clarify that we had a useful conversation on monitoring cancer patients and I said that the statistics which come out quarterly would become national statistics. I committed to look at what they would show in order to assess how the face-to-face process and other issues were dealt with. She very kindly said that she would help me with that after the consultation. Although we did not debate it, the position is now sufficiently clear on the record.

I do not think that we have seen the last of this Bill, but we have passed a significant point at Third Reading. Perhaps I may use this opportunity to place on record my thanks to noble Lords right around the House for the way in which they have been so constructive, have thought through the issues and been absolutely on the point. I have seen in other Bills a lot of grabbing of the wrong end of the stick and waving it about vigorously, but we have not had that here. Our deliberations have been outstanding. I shall not name all the contributors because it would take all evening—and I would forget someone, which would be invidious.

I was going to say how pleased I was that we had got universal credit through unchanged, but I cannot say that any more. Had it not been for today, we would have had it through. I know that what we are trying to do with universal credit has been understood. The complexity of universal credit is such that, if noble Lords had not appreciated it, it could have been cut to shreds and rendered completely unworkable and basically a disaster. I really appreciate the fact that it has not happened, except on one occasion.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

It has not happened.

[Lord Freud]

This is my speech.

I need to thank my noble friend Lady Garden for her support on the Front Bench, and my noble friend Lord De Mauley for his proficiency in covering a number of clauses. He drew one of the short straws, but he did it manfully.

I need to thank also the Bill team—a few of them are in the Box—who have been absolutely stunning in supporting me all the way through. As some of your Lordships have said, they have supported a lot of noble Lords in this process. The access and one-to-one contact that they offered were probably why the wrong end of the stick was not waggled quite so vigorously as it could have been. I hope that the whole House will join me in thanking them for their phenomenal support.