Welfare Reform

Baroness Thomas of Winchester Excerpts

Thursday 11th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Young, for that question. We have an integrated strategy. Measures in the CSR will ensure that mentoring takes place; there is also the new enterprise allowance and so on. We are building those packages and will announce details in due course. Our main change to Access to Work is to make sure that when someone goes for a job they have the funding required. No one will take someone if they do not know whether they will receive Access to Work. That is the main way in which we are refocusing Access to Work, which we think is a good programme.

[Baroness Thomas of Winchester]

My Lords, I, too, warmly welcome my noble friend’s repeated Statement today. I have one very simple, fundamental question to which I do not know the answer. How much discretion will decision-makers at Jobcentre Plus have about the sorts of work that jobseekers will be compelled to take? We hear that the conditionality rules will be tougher than those set by the previous Government. Let us suppose that a graduate or a highly qualified person can find only a cleaning job. Will they be compelled to take it and does the decision-maker have any discretion about that?

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, who has been incredibly involved and interested in the development of the universal credit. Jobcentre Plus is structured in such a way that there is a very light touch in the early months which becomes gradually firmer and starts being a heavy hand on the shoulder after six months. There is a reality period. Most people look after themselves and find a job, but some need to have the reality of their position in the marketplace brought home to them, so that they match what work they can realistically expect to do with what is out there. You are much better off being in work and looking for a better job from an in-work position than from an ever longer period of inactivity.