Working People’s Finances: Government Policy

Caroline Johnson Excerpts

Tuesday 21st September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, who did so much in government to tackle issues of poverty and of child poverty in early years, in particular.

Conservative Members will have heard the same from their constituents as I have heard from mine, which is that life is getting tougher and they just cannot understand why, in the face of rising cost pressures, the Government are putting up their taxes, cutting the support that is available and making life harder. My constituents simply cannot understand why the Government are prepared to stand by and allow that to happen.

[Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Lady for giving way. You are making the case for why you do not agree with the Government’s position, but I have been listening very carefully to hear what your position is. You have criticised the removal of the uplift in universal, but no Labour politician on the news or interviewed by the press has committed to keep it if you were to be elected.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. The hon. Lady really must stop using the word “you”.

[Dr Johnson]

I did not mean to, of course, Madam Deputy Speaker. The point I am trying to make is that there is no plan from the Opposition. They are not giving any plan on what they would do instead; they simply criticise. They simply say we must spend more and tax less, but how does the hon. Lady propose to do such a thing?

[Bridget Phillipson]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her intervention. The single biggest difference that all of us could make right now would be to cancel the cut to universal credit. That would make the biggest difference to her constituents and to mine, who are facing the single biggest cut to social security since the inception of the welfare state. That is not a choice that a Labour Government would be taking in the aftermath of a pandemic.

[Dr Johnson]

The hon. Lady says that she would not wish to remove the temporary uplift, which we had always planned to be temporary throughout the pandemic. Does that mean that she is making the commitment that a Labour Government would reinstate that £20?

[Bridget Phillipson]

We would not be cutting it in the first place. We would replace universal credit with a better and fairer system that supports people into work. If the hon. Member wants to have a discussion about semantics, I suggest she has a chat with her constituents and sees how she gets on, arguing about the distinction between a temporary uplift and a cut. It is more than £1,000 a year from families’ budgets—that is what really matters.