Oral Answers to Questions

Bill Grant Excerpts

Monday 13th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

The position that we have made clear for a long time is that we want to ensure that universal credit works. This is a test-and-learn system, and we are always looking at ways in which we can improve it, particularly for that first period. I would say to the right hon. Gentleman and to the House as a whole that universal credit is helping us to address the best way to deal with poverty, which is to ensure that people can get into work. That is the argument that I and my right hon. and hon. Friends will continue to make.

[Bill Grant (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Con)]

I, too, have visited jobcentres, and I know that work coaches are an integral part of the universal credit system. Will my right hon. Friend tell me how the new work coaches will assist jobseekers in my constituency in their eager quest to find employment?

[Mr Gauke]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This is why we are recruiting work coaches up and down the United Kingdom to provide the personalised support that people need to help them get into work. I come back to my experience of meeting work coaches in jobcentres up and down the country. They believe that they have a system in place that is helping them to do more to transform lives, and that is hugely important.