Universal Credit: Managed Migration

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating that Statement. We have had a lot of Statements from DWP in the last year, and there is beginning to be a rule of thumb that the gentler and blander they sound at the time, the more they contrast with the story behind them. I will try to unpack what I think has happened to get us to this point, and I invite the Minister to correct me when she responds if I make any mistakes.

I think this is now the fourth version of these regulations, and the plot has thickened with every turn. We have been awaiting a debate on them for months and suddenly, in the very last days of this Session, they have been snatched away and replaced with a negative version. These regs cover two things: the process of moving people en masse on to universal credit—known as managed migration—and the losses faced by people getting the severe disability premium in legacy benefits, who lose out a lot when they go on to universal credit because there is no equivalent in UC.

The Government originally published some draft regs in June last year. These prompted outrage because the process of managed migration turned out not to be managed at all, but meant that millions of people would simply get a letter saying, “Your benefits will stop on date X. It is up to you to apply for universal credit. If you do not apply for that date then you will not get any money, and if you do not apply within a month, even if you get money later, you will lose the right to make sure that you get transitional protection, which stops you being worse off”. That went down very badly. The Government had intended always to pilot these, but the regulations covered managed migration as a whole.

The same month, Esther McVey, then Secretary of State, had announced that nobody else who was getting the severe disability premium would be forced on to universal credit until the managed migration stopped, so they could not lose out on that transitional protection, and that the Government would compensate people who had already gone across for the money they had lost. That statement, as it happened, coincided with a successful legal challenge against the Government by two people who had moved house, had to go on to universal credit and lost out as a result. The Government were then required to pay them damages and ongoing payments of nearly £180 a month. I wonder whether the Government are still appealing the various decisions on this.

The Social Security Advisory Committee then consulted on the regulations, and eventually some slightly revised regulations were tabled on 3 November together with a very critical report by that committee. That version of the regs still covered the whole managed migration process, involving up to 3 million people, even though everybody had urged the Government to take powers only for the pilot and then to come back to Parliament. There was also strong criticism of this approach from voluntary organisations working with claimants, because they were worried that many vulnerable people getting benefits would struggle simply to take responsibility for making the transition to the new system alone. The SSAC report also flagged up that the payments being made to people who had been moved across under UC and had lost this disability benefit were actually only £80 a month, whereas their losses were £180 a month.

Then, Amber Rudd became Secretary of State. She admitted to the Work and Pensions Select Committee that the Government had thus far failed to obtain cross-party support for these regulations. In January, they withdrew the SI laid in November and brought in two new SIs: a negative one, which prevented anyone else getting this disability payment from transferring to UC before managed migration, which came into force in January; and an affirmative SI which was to provide for a year-long pilot for managed migration and set the level of transitional payments for those who had been moved on to UC loss of disability payment. With me so far? Excellent.

We have been waiting since then to debate this affirmative SI. The Secretary of State said in March that the pilot would begin in July, and said again on 1 July that the pilot would definitely begin this month, yet there was no debate on the regulations which would provide for the pilot to take place. That is possibly because the regulations contained provisions for payments to people on this disability benefit which have been found to be unlawful. However, Ministers had promised that the pilot would not start without Parliament having had a debate first. In fact, on 8 January, the Minister for Employment, Alok Sharma, told the House of Commons:

“We will also ensure that the start date for the July 2019 test phase involving 10,000 people is voted on”.—[Official Report, Commons, 8/1/19; col. 175.]


Well, it has not been.

There were serious questions about the pilot. Ministers needed to be clear about the aims and the success criteria and whether or not the nature of the pilot would satisfy people. Those were the questions that Parliament wanted to debate before the regulations were approved. Then, the final twist: yesterday those regulations were withdrawn and a new negative regulation was tabled instead, published in the last week of term to take effect in the same week. The Government are not even abiding by the convention that 21 days should elapse between tabling regulations and their taking effect. Moreover, although it is a wonderful thing that the eyes of the country are on the Palace of Westminster this week, they may not be looking at us primarily for the purpose of considering universal credit and the managed migration pilot regulations.

I am really worried about universal credit and how it is rolling out. The Government should stop rolling it out while they fix it. But that is for another day. These regulations affect two specific but important issues and Parliament has a right to consider them properly. There may be an urgency but it is entirely of the Government’s making; handling it in this way is disrespectful to Parliament.

I ask the Minister three questions. First, can she explain why, having promised that Parliament would debate the regulations before starting the pilot, Ministers have reneged on that commitment? It cannot surely be simply because Amber Rudd admitted that she did not know that she could get them passed in the other place. We surely cannot have come to the point where Parliament will no longer be asked questions unless Ministers are satisfied that the answers will be the ones they want.

Secondly, can she guarantee that everybody who was getting STP and has been moved across to universal credit will be no worse off than they would have been, and that the Government’s new plans satisfy the requirements of all the legal judgments against them?

Finally, will she promise that Ministers will return to Parliament with a full report of the results of the pilot and give us the chance to debate them before laying any further regulations for a full rollout of managed migration?

I do not blame this Minister, but it is the responsibility of her department. I urge her to answer those questions as fully as she can in order to start trying to rebuild some trust.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, I too am grateful to the Minister for repeating the Answer to the Urgent Question and would like to ask some questions about the pilot.

I am not completely familiar with processes of this kind and am grateful to the noble Baroness for raising a lot of issues that had occurred to me. I would be grateful if we could have more detail of the scope, approach and methodology of the pilot, when the findings are likely to be made public, when there will be an opportunity for external agencies to examine and question the report and, indeed, when there will be a debate here before the Minister comes back to Parliament for permission to carry out managed migration.

I hope that the pilot will look at some of the needs as expressed by the various groups and that they will be taken account of and reviewed: for example, bringing assessments back in-house for people with disabilities, following the whole record of the assessment process; providing split payments to protect vulnerable women; reviewing the work search process requirements, particularly for women with young children or caring responsibilities; and the piloting of different approaches to digital accessibility, particularly for disadvantaged groups and people with disabilities.

I welcome the proposed action on the judgment of the High Court and would like more detail as to how it will communicate to all people who are eligible, with a report back from the Minister on how that is being carried out. I very much hope that the pilot will provide us not only with insight and the chance to review some of the problems that I have been aware of since I have been covering the issue, but the opportunity for debate and external scrutiny before the managed migration process is carried out in full.

[Baroness Buscombe]

I thank both the noble Baronesses, Lady Sherlock and Lady Janke, for their questions. I have to agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, that it has been a journey. It has not been easy, but I am pleased to say that we are, we believe, now in a very good place. It has taken longer than we would have liked, but through that process, we have made some serious improvements not only to the whole system of universal credit, as people naturally migrate—we have now had the rollout into all job centres as of the end of last year—but to thinking through what we should do on managed migration. Indeed, I remind noble Lords—I am looking at the noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy, who is part of the House of Lords Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee—that that committee suggested that the department should legislate for a pilot phase. I remember that the suggestion was first made at a meeting of all Peers. I cannot remember the date—I apologise—but it was some time ago. We listened to that recommendation and suggestion and, as many noble Lords will know, are now and have been for some months working closely with key stakeholders. We invited more than 80 to talk to us about how they might like to be involved to help us. Noble Lords will agree that this is a huge enterprise, a huge reform that we are working through, and we need their support and understanding. We need to learn from and work with them and test our processes. Much of this—I turn to the noble Baroness, Lady Janke—is about ensuring that we get it right by introducing a pilot, which we will keep to no more than 10,000 people, before we move on to the fuller phase.

I will answer some of the key questions. Why has it taken so long to lay new regulations? Our previous draft regulations were subject to a judicial review. That judgment quashed parts of Schedule 2 but made it clear that it was up to the Secretary of State to decide how to respond. We have been considering options and are now in a position to re-lay the regulations.

Why did we change from an affirmative—where we thought we were in the right place to debate with noble Lords—to a negative procedure? The previous draft regulations included an appeal rights provision, which clarified that there were no appeal rights for procedural matters where claimants are issued migration notices, request an extension of the time to claim or request a cancellation of migration notice. These revised regulations now introduce only a pilot, rather than managed migration as a whole, and a provision has been removed, making them now subject to the negative procedure. However, I make it clear that the provision was a clarification of policy, so its removal does not represent a policy change. In relation to appeals, claimants will of course be able to appeal their universal credit benefit decision if they feel that it is incorrect.

It is important to say that because only pilot regulations are being introduced, the department must return to Parliament for approval to continue managed migration activity after the pilot has been evaluated. We will bring forward such legislation only when the process works in the best possible way for everyone. While I appreciate that this means there is no automatic debate and vote on these regulations, Parliament will still have the opportunity to consider them.

We have broken the 21-day rule, as alluded to by the noble Baroness. It is there to allow people to prepare for the changes that legislation will introduce, but claimants have been expecting these changes in this legislation for over a year and they are positive changes. Therefore, after careful deliberation—and particularly considering the delay engendered by the judicial review and responding to the judgment—we have decided that our primary concern should be to pay former severe disability premium claimants the transitional payment as quickly as possible. Bringing into force the managed migration provisions will allow DWP to issue a migration notice—then claimants will have three months to claim.

We were asked why we are not laying the SDP transitional payments separately. SDP transitional payments are a fundamental part of the wider transitional protection framework. As the transitional payments are inextricably linked with the wider rules for transitional protection, it is essential that provisions for former SDP claimants form part of the regulations that introduce transitional protection as part of managed migration.

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, that the Government are still appealing the TP and AR judicial review.

For those noble Lords who are not familiar with it, I will now give more detail about the managed migration pilot. We have chosen to commence the pilot at one jobcentre—Harrogate—where we will seek to learn from many cases with complex needs. It has a case load with a mixture of urban and rural claimants, which will further aid our learning, and is supported by a local service centre under the same management. It is important that we test an approach that is based on using existing relationships that the DWP or trusted partners, our stakeholders, have with claimants. Through these relationships we will establish whether someone is ready to move and how to get them ready.

We will initially select claimants for the pilot from those who currently attend the jobcentre for meetings with their work coaches. The work coaches will then build on these existing relationships to prepare claimants to move and support them through the process. We will start with small numbers and grow the pilot safely, only increasing it when we feel it is right to do so. We have thought through the process. We have been working closely and continually with stakeholders to make sure that we work with the evidence and that we make necessary changes as we develop the process.

It is also important to make it clear that there will be a considerable number of gainers in this process. Some £2.4 billion-worth of unclaimed benefits is not going to the people who need them because they do not know about them. By supporting claimants who may have been on universal credit for many years, without any change of circumstance, and who have not been in touch to re-engage with us, universal credit will make sure that this money will reach those who need it most. There are some amazing stories of where this has happened to date. When migration is complete, because of UC, 700,000 more people will be paid their full entitlement, worth an average of £285 a month.

More disabled people will receive higher payments under UC. The rate in UC for these claimants is higher at £336 per month—up from £169 per month on the equivalent ESA support group. This means that around 1 million disabled households will gain on average around £100 more a month on universal credit.

It is a continuing journey but we are in a good place to do the right thing by going forward in a measured way, working with claimants—particularly vulnerable claimants— and making sure that we look after those who need our support.

[Baroness Janke]

Did the Minister say there would be a report on the pilot? I specifically asked whether there would be a report which could be scrutinised and, if necessary, debated.

[Baroness Buscombe]

I am glad that the noble Baroness has prompted me. We will publish an assessment of the impacts prior to scaling of managed migration. As we said in our response to SSAC, we are conducting detailed equality assessments of migration plans as part of our public sector equality duty. We will report on the impacts of the testing, which will be evaluated, and we will respond through a report on the learning and adaptations.

Child Support (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2019

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2019 Lords Chamber

These regulations are designed to build on the continuing success of the child maintenance reforms. They improve collection measures and information-gathering powers further, and help make child maintenance fairer for all separated parents. In short, these amendments to the regulations ensure that the commitments in the compliance and arrears strategy are fully realised. I commend this instrument to the House.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, clearly, we are in favour of all measures to ensure that children are getting the financial support they need. A large part of this is making sure that both parents contribute to the raising of a child, through official child support or otherwise. According to the charity Gingerbread, child maintenance alone lifts a fifth of low-income single parents out of poverty. Where parents are unequal in income, as is often the case after a separation, it is right that suitable payments for child maintenance are made. It is good to hear of the proposed changes to the Child Maintenance Service scheme, which has been a long, infamous project, causing disastrous circumstances for children and families and costing a great deal in time and resources for all involved, including the Government.

Although we are generally wary over giving powers of enforcement, we are in favour of the proposed changes to inspection. Requesting information from mortgage lenders will cut down on the number and intrusiveness of current inspections. It is important that both parents support their children; the cost of bringing up a child is considerable and generally falls on the mother, who is more likely to be in low-paid, insecure employment. Some 90% of single parents are women, and they are twice as likely to be in poverty as any other group.

However, in recognising and enforcing payments for child support, the Government need to recognise and act on the issues that drive child poverty. For example, the two-child limit, which restricts support to a family’s first two children, is one of the key factors of child poverty, as demonstrated by many recent reports. The benefit cap also hurts families and households with multiple children, or those who live in expensive areas.

I draw the Minister’s attention to the report published last week, All Kids Count: The Impact of the Two-Child Limit After Two Years, produced jointly by the Church of England and the Child Poverty Action Group. This presents detailed and disturbing evidence of this policy’s impact after two years. It is based on interviews with more than 430 families. I urge the Minister and all Members of your Lordships’ House to give the report careful consideration, and the Government to take action on its findings.

I would welcome a new approach by the Government towards child poverty, which is widely acknowledged to be growing. Having said that, I broadly support this statutory instrument.

[Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)]

My Lords, I have just two quick questions. First, where the recipient who is due to make payment is subject to a benefit sanction, what impact does that have on the amounts that are collectable, as proposed in this order? Secondly, the £8.40 can be an amalgam of the collection fee and the maintenance payment. So far as the government accounts are concerned, how is that split and dealt with?

Benefit Changes: Vulnerable People

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Thursday 27th June 2019 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Janke]

That this House takes note of the impact of recent benefit changes on vulnerable people.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity to lead the debate today. Over recent months, I and others have been shocked by the experiences of people who have been in touch either about their own circumstances or those of others, and the huge difficulties they face in their daily lives. Colleagues, friends, local councillors and members of the public have drawn my attention to the plight of people who are not only suffering extreme poverty but are enduring worsening situations. I know that there are many noble Lords across the House who are deeply concerned and would like to see action taken to address this injustice and misery.

A host of reports provide evidence of a situation that is getting steadily worse, including those by the UN rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights and by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. The Children’s Commissioner has published a report on the impact of recent benefit changes on children. The National Education Union reported in May that teachers are buying food, clothing and equipment out of their own pockets for children who are too ashamed to come to school because their families cannot afford clothes and basic needs. Many schools face choices about how much of their scarce cash they should spent on things such as breakfast clubs.

Food banks have faced a huge increase in demand: a 13% increase year on year. King’s Food Bank in Kendal has seen a rise of 18% in a year. It wrote:

“Once again our monthly figures sadden us! So far this year we have seen an increase of 19% on the same period last year. Last year there was an increase of 18% on the previous year and so it seems to continue. It is especially concerning to see the number of children being provided for has more than doubled from March and April 2018 to March and April 2019”.


In the same newsletter, a young boy, Harry, who is featured, asked for items for the food bank as presents for his sixth birthday.

There is record low unemployment, yet 60% of people in poverty live in a household where at least one parent works. Worse still, the support services that used to be the lifeline for those in poverty, such as youth services, community services and debt counselling, have been almost completely removed. Funding for social care has been reduced, dependent older people have found themselves in desperate situations, and libraries have been closed in record numbers.

Again, the most pressing needs are faced by the poorest, the hardest to reach and the people who are simply unable to access the relief they need. There are 4.1 million children—that is, 30%—in poverty, and 70% of children in poverty live in a family where at least one parent works. The reasons, according to the Child Poverty Action Group, include delays in the system; sanctions, as parents looking for work find that the sanctions system punishes them and makes things worse; unrealistic job-seeking conditions; inflexible rules, which stop good causes or reasons being considered; and poor communications, which often leave sanctioned parents unaware that hardship payments could prevent their children suffering severe hardship.

There has been a major increase in homelessness. In November 2018 the figure stood at 320,000. There has also been an increase in the number of rough sleepers, which went up by 15% in 2017 to 4,751. As the housing benefit element has been pared back, there is now a yawning gap between actual rent, often paid to private landlords, and the level of financial support. There has been a four-year freeze on the local housing allowance, and the benefit cap sets a ceiling on rent benefits. The result is rent arrears, debt and homelessness.

Nearly half of those in poverty—6.9 million—are from a family in which someone has a disability. They have also been some of the hardest hit by austerity measures. Changes to taxes and benefits will mean that some families are projected to lose £11,000 by 2021-22—more than 30% of their income. With cuts to local government funding, particularly in social care, many families with a person with a disability have been driven to breaking point. I know that my noble friend Lady Thomas will speak more about the specifics of that.

Single-parent families, of whom 90% are women, are more than twice as likely to experience poverty as any other group. Half of the total number of children in one-parent families are in poverty. Policies such as the benefit cap and freeze, the two-child limit and the introduction of full job-seeking requirements for single parents of children as young as three have had a stark impact. In August 2018, two-thirds of those who had benefits capped were single parents. Single parents in the bottom 20% of income will have lost 25% of their 2010 income by 2021-22.

As universal credit has been introduced, I am sure that we have all been aware of the acute problems that have occurred. Any new system will cause problems, but it seems that these problems have been unfairly and unjustly concentrated on the least well-off. There is little of the social security safety net that served in the past to prevent people becoming destitute, yet there is no shortage of suggestions from think tanks and charities about reviewing problem areas in the benefit system—for example, the five-week waiting period and the impact on indebtedness and destitution. I received a report from the Guildford Borough Council scrutiny committee on food poverty in the borough which found,

“much evidence to support the contention that changes to the system of benefits for people of working age are a major driver of food poverty”.

Research by academics, charities and food providers shows a clear link between welfare reform, austerity and increasing charity food aid provision. The failure of benefit levels to cover essential living costs and issues with payments are common reasons for referral to a food bank.

I hope that as a result of this debate and other material, the Government will look at the evidence and review their policies—for example, the two-child limit. The Minister has already said that the Government intend to end the benefit freeze, but the results of the benefit cap continue. We have also seen the loss of emergency payments. As a former councillor, I am well aware that councils’ emergency payments system and the Social Fund prevented destitution in the past and provided a source of funding that did not leave people absolutely dependent on charity and the good will of volunteers. This has been particularly noticeable in terms of sanctions. We believe that this is an area that needs to be looked at again, along with the evidence of the damage caused to people in terms of destitution and debt. It has been particularly damaging to people with disabilities or long-term health conditions.

Another issue is the treatment of young people, because £250 a month is not enough to live on. That amount seems to assume that all young people have supportive homes and parents and families who can help them. The youth obligation scheme has a 40% drop-out rate, and I hope that the Government will produce a review of its effectiveness.

Many noble Lords have raised the issue of payments to one household and have asked for split payments to be made, so that abused women cannot be kept under the control of their abuser. The whole issue of insecure work and its effect on the payment of benefits is something that we believe needs to be looked at again. With the complications caused by erratic or insecure work, there is a disincentive because of the effect on benefits.

There is ample evidence of the worsening lives of the poor and deprived resulting from changes in the benefits regime, and I am sure that other noble Lords will want to bring other issues to our attention. Therefore, it seems that the Government need to look again at some of the changes. The priorities must be to rebuild an effective social safety net, to restore services in the community so that needs can be assessed locally and support can be provided where and when it is needed, and to address the issues that lead to low pay and insecure employment, so that already disadvantaged and vulnerable people are not driven into deepening despair, humiliation and the desperation of poverty.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Janke]

I thank all noble Lords for their contributions to the debate. Many new issues have arisen, but so have many old ones. I thank the Minister for her energetic summing up and information on the wide range of things that the Government are doing. However, there is a great deal of evidence of flaws and problems in the system. I hope the Government will listen and look at the evidence. I hope they will review it and recognise through the comprehensive spending review that these difficulties need to be addressed, recognise that people are suffering as a result of them, and listen to some of the suggestions they make. Having said that, I thank everyone for the debate today. I beg to move.

Motion agreed.

Extreme Poverty and Human Rights: United Nations Report

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Wednesday 19th June 2019 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Janke]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to address the findings of the report of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, published on 22 May.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Buscombe) (Con)]

My Lords, we have responded fully to the special rapporteur’s recommendations. A sustainable solution to poverty needs a strong economy and a benefits system that works with the tax system and the labour market to support employment and higher pay. Under this Government, employment is at its highest level since the 1970s. Wages are rising at their fastest in a decade. Income inequality has fallen. The number of children in workless households is at a record low.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

The evidence in the report is from widely respected sources: one-third of children are in poverty—the Social Metrics Commission; 50% of children in one-parent families are in poverty—the Joseph Rowntree Foundation; the bottom 20% of earners will have lost 10% of their income by 2021—the Equality and Human Rights Commission. Is it not time that the Government listened to the poor and their charities and restored a social safety net worthy of the UK in the 21st century?

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, nobody wants to see poverty rising and we treat the issues raised by the special rapporteur seriously. However, we seriously regret the inflammatory and overtly political tone of his report and strongly refute the suggestion that we have failed to listen to stakeholders. As set out in our published response, we have taken action in a number of areas, including the recently announced reduction in the maximum duration for a single sanction from three years to six months.

Children Living in Poverty

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Monday 17th June 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, the statistics expressed by the noble Baroness do not reflect the £1.7 billion a year cash boost to our welfare system announced in the Budget, which will enable 2.4 million households to keep more of what they earn. We have taken strong action to support working families. The latest rise in the national living wage will increase a full-time worker’s annual pay by over £2,750 since 2016. No one wants to see poverty increase. That is why we are doing more to help parents into work and to stay in work through multiple avenues of support from across government.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, the Social Metrics Commission found that in 2018 almost a third of children were in poverty. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that child poverty has been rising almost entirely in working families. What action will the Government take to ensure that children are not disadvantaged? Will they consider in the comprehensive spending review ending the benefits freeze and the two-child limit?

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, I have already made it clear at this Dispatch Box that we intend to end the benefit freeze next year. Again, the stats produced by the Social Metrics Commission last year predate much of the additional support that we have invested in the system since the last Autumn Budget.

We have done a huge amount to help families through transforming the welfare system so that people are not just helped into work. We are working hard on in-work progression, so that people preferably do not just have a full-time job—three-quarters of all jobs since 2010 are full time—because we want people to have good jobs, and are piloting new ways of supporting that. We are also boosting our capability to work with local businesses and working with jobcentre specialists to encourage local employers to support progression and good-quality flexible working which will support the children of those families in work.

Child Poverty

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2019 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Janke]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to address the concerns raised by teachers in, and the findings of, the survey on child poverty published by the National Education Union on 14 April.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Buscombe) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are committed to a sustainable solution to poverty so that we can improve children’s long-term outcomes. This means a strong economy and a benefits system that supports employment and higher pay. Children in households where all the adults are working are around five times less likely to be in poverty than those in workless households. However, 13.9% of all UK working-age households are still entirely workless and we are working hard to reduce that figure.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

Perhaps I may ask the Minister to give her response to the experiences of teachers reported in the survey: “Children are attending school not only hungry but with no coats and holes in their shoes”, and “Children are just not ready to learn. They are embarrassed and ashamed”. There are many more quotes along these lines. Does she endorse the recent findings of the Social Mobility Commission that inequality will remain entrenched in the UK “from birth to work” unless the Government take urgent action?

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, of course we take the issue of poverty very seriously, although inequality has fallen. Tackling disadvantage will always be a priority for this Government. We have already taken steps to tackle food inequality by providing free school meals and our Healthy Start vouchers. We are also investing up to £26 million in school breakfast clubs along with £9 million to provide meals and activities for thousands of disadvantaged children during the summer holidays, which is something that has not been done before. We continue to spend more than £95 billion a year on working-age welfare benefits.

Food Banks

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Wednesday 1st May 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe]

I agree with the noble Baroness: everyone should have access to decent, healthy food. Tackling disadvantage will always be a priority for this Government. We welcome the new report from the Children’s Future Food Inquiry. Employment is at a record high and wages are outstripping inflation, but we know that there is more to do to ensure that everyone has access to nutritious, healthy food. We have already taken steps to tackle food inequality by providing free school meals and our Healthy Start vouchers. We are also investing up to £26 million in school breakfast clubs and £9 million to provide meals and activities for thousands of disadvantaged children during the summer holidays.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, is the Minister aware of recent reports of schools and teachers buying food, clothes and basic essentials to enable children to come to school, and that children feel ashamed because they cannot afford them? Many people, including charities, attribute this to the benefits cap. What plans do the Government have to address this and to ensure that children’s education is not put at risk through poverty?

[Baroness Buscombe]

I think it is fair to say that I answered that question to some degree in a previous answer. We are working hard with schools and injecting significant funds to ensure that children are properly fed, if not at home then by breakfast clubs, and through the school holidays. There is much more that we have been doing to ensure that families are not worse off; indeed, we have the most generous benefits for families of all the G7 countries. We recognise that there is more we can do but I have to keep saying: remember, we have made significant changes and increases in people’s income through increasing work allowances and so on. However, some of this will not yet have come through to be felt on the ground. We are still rolling out some of the big changes to universal credit.

Financial Guidance and Claims Act 2018 (Naming and Consequential Amendments) Regulations 2019

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Wednesday 1st May 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, I did not participate in this Bill but I share the sentiments expressed so far about the need for financial guidance, advice and education to help people come to better decisions. I support the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, about the importance of including this as a regular part of the curriculum. As a teacher, I have spent some time trying to teach basic financial skills as part of personal and social education, but it is very difficult when there is not proper time allowed for this in the curriculum. I agree that it needs to be given much greater importance. That is even truer now when so many young people have easy access to the internet and easily become fair game to scams, complex bogus schemes and systems of advice which are really there to deceive and take their money. Therefore, I broadly welcome the scheme.

I was interested to hear the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, about debt and debt management and the importance of the latter not just to the economy but to individuals who may be going through a particularly dreadful period in their lives.

As I said, I did not work on the Bill, but I wanted to ask a few things about the Act’s progress. Section 3(7)(b)(i) commits the Minister to publishing,

“an assessment of whether unsolicited direct marketing is, or may be, having a detrimental effect on consumers”.

Has any analysis of that been done yet? If not, could something to do with the quality of advice and the qualification of some of the advisers be included in that? I do not know whether there was debate on that during the passage of the Bill. Section 4(1) says that the single financial guidance body must provide advice to a member of a pension scheme or an inheritor on what to do with the flexible benefits. Are there any early thoughts or a timetable on that?

I know that with regard to Section 22 there was an issue about whether the Government would limit or control the direct marketing of financial services. Again, has any progress been made on that? If not, is there a timeframe in view? My observation—I speak as a counsellor who has given advice on debt and other topics—is that the question of resources is very important. As part of the programme of austerity, financial and legal advice were two of the areas that were severely cut back. I would welcome assurance that the finance for this will be protected, as has previously been mentioned.

I also wonder about declarations of interest and vested interests. How can customers know whether their advisers have these, and what they are? We talked about lists online about people taking advice. There may be a provision already about who is registered to give advice.

There is also the issue of redress. The legislation talks about the FCA, but my experience is that redress can be very difficult for people who are not knowledgeable about these things. It can be very long and very inaccessible. I hope the Minister can enlighten me on that. Having said that, this seems a very good measure and I look forward to hearing more as the measures in the Act are introduced.

[The Archbishop of York]

My Lords, I want to support the main thrust of the speech from the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, about debt. Julia Unwin, who was chief executive of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, did a big research project on why people were going to Wonga. They went to Wonga because it asked no questions; people knew they could get their payday loan. Other lenders asked more questions and were far more intrusive and credit was not readily available. Noble Lords know that my archiepiscopal colleague, the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury, said that he intended not only to reform Wonga but to do away with it, and we know what has happened to Wonga.

Credit unions have been set up, which the most reverend Primate and I support. However, people still find it hard to get credit easily and the organisations responsible have caused a lot of people to go deeper and deeper into debt. When he was Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple suggested that interest rates should be set only by the Bank of England, and not by credit companies, because the Bank of England is accountable to Parliament, which can ask it questions. Noble Lords know what happened with subprime mortgages, with debt being put into little parcels and sent all over the globe until eventually there was no money anywhere. We all know what happened in 2008 with the credit crunch, which was caused purely by excessive debt.

I welcome the Financial Guidance and Claims Act 2018. The noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, is right that education about the dangers of debt should start at a young age. Nevertheless, in the meantime, is there a way for those who genuinely find themselves in real trouble to get support and help in a similar way to how food banks work? A lot of people have found that their money is sometimes not enough to meet their needs and so they have gone to food banks. The good thing about food banks is that they do not give food all the time. People know when to collect it and when they last collected it. This has become a marvellous way of taking people out of great debt.

Will the issues raised in the Financial Guidance and Claims Act 2018 and by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, be taken seriously by all of us and particularly by the Government? It is their responsibility to provide the guidance required to ensure that Wonga—this payday lending stuff—will not be resurrected and that the people who genuinely need credit can get it in a sensible way. I am very glad that the Government are trying to say that we should be responsible citizens, not only for pensions but for the whole question of social care, with people beginning to put a little money aside for their social care.

It sounds a bit simplistic, but could we not create some sort of food bank-type arrangement? This would help ensure that people on low incomes do not find themselves borrowing from places that will demand more and more money. Noble Lords know what happened with people being given interest; banks also behaved very badly. In a wonderful economy such as this, could some thought be given to ensure that those who are really up against it do not get into greater and greater debt? They may find that their houses are repossessed or their goods taken away and this again throws them back to bad lenders. They find themselves in a cycle of bad debt, which goes through the family for years. If I took your Lordships around Middlesbrough, you would realise that unless you actually tackle debt, some children are condemned to it and, even if we educate them properly, this will not bite.

Universal Credit and Child Tax Credit: Two-child Limit

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe]

There is no doubt that a cross-governmental strategy is incredibly important, and that is why we are working across government with our colleagues in the Department of Health and the Department for Education. We of course want to see child poverty fall and child development improve, and we remain determined to tackle this. We will look at what more can be done to help the most vulnerable and improve their life chances by tackling the root causes of poverty, ensuring that children have the best possible start in life.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, nearly half of children from lone-parent families are in poverty, due not to worklessness but to disproportionately high housing costs and low wages. What are the Government doing to ensure that these children, already suffering disadvantage, are not doubly disadvantaged by the continuation of the benefits freeze?

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, a very important point in relation to universal credit is that when somebody is homeless, the first thing our work coaches do—through support, understanding and signposting as necessary—is ensure that that person and their children are properly housed. We then go to the next stage, to see how we can support them to ensure they can manage both in work and in looking after their children.

Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2019

Baroness Janke Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2019 Lords Chamber

I know that to do so would require legislation because, against the advice of your Lordships’ House—in particular, I think, the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, who is not in his place—the Government tied their legislative hands. But I cannot imagine that anyone would object to an emergency two-clause Bill to end the freeze immediately. Indeed, the shadow Work and Pensions Secretary in the Commons yesterday offered to facilitate such a Bill if the Government were to bring it forward. Where there is a will, there is a way. I call on the Government in the Spring Statement to show they have the will and end the freeze, which is causing so much hardship.

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, I too thank the Minister for her announcement today. It is always a privilege to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, who knows so much about this subject. I too feel struck by the benefits that are not in this order. I suspect we will all today mention the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, which described this as “the biggest policy driver” of poverty. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation is the organisation that established the concept of the minimum income standard. The statistics for that are breathtaking. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, has given us important figures and shocking facts but we should look at the minimum income standard.

A single person has to earn £18,400 to reach the minimum income standard. Each parent in a working family must earn £20,000. The minimum wage is too low to reach the minimum income standard. A lone parent with two children, working full-time, had disposable income 4% below the minimum income standard in 2008; today it is 20% below it. The freeze is set to cost working-age families £4.4 billion a year in 2019-20, and the average single parent will be £710 worse off—that is 3% to 7% of their income.

We have talked about removing the freeze a year early and we would support that. As the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said, where there is a will there is a way. If we removed the freeze for the last year, the result would be to reduce the number of people in poverty by 200,000 in 2020-21; 27.5 million people would gain, at a cost of £1.4 billion to the Treasury; and a proposed cut of £250 to single parents’ budgets would be prevented.

In the last Budget, the OBR found £13 billion in extra headroom, £1.3 billion of which went to cut tax for higher earners. Commentators today are saying that they expect the forecast for public finances to improve, so will the Government consider using the £1.4 billion to end the benefits freeze a year early? Can the Minister explain the freezing of bereavement support payments for the coming year, even though the widowed parent allowance it replaces has been raised in line with inflation?

I support and associate myself with the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Lister. I hope the Government will listen and look at this issue again. It is getting to alarming proportions and should shock us about the state of our country.