Draft Automatic Enrolment (Earnings Trigger and Qualifying Earnings Band) Order 2017

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Wednesday 8th March 2017 General Committees

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

I take issue with the tenor of the hon. Gentleman’s speech. Auto-enrolment and the need for reforms of pensions would not have been necessary if a previous Labour Government had not entirely and systematically destroyed the brilliant pension system that we used to have.

[Alex Cunningham]

I do not accept the second part of the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, and as for taking issue with the general tone of my speech, I thought I was being quite conciliatory and kind to the Government on this occasion, and the Minister seems to agree, even if the hon. Gentleman does not.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 20th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

2. What steps the Government are taking to ensure that people with mental health conditions are supported into work.

[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

8. What steps his Department is taking to support people with mental illness into work.

[The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Penny Mordaunt)]

We have been seeking views on this through the “Work, Health and Disability” Green Paper. We are also investing £100 million in trialling voluntary employment initiatives to consider what works for this group, including embedding employment advisers within the NHS talking therapy services.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I thank my hon. Friend for that reply. Does she agree that local voluntary groups, such as the Talk It Out mental health group in my constituency, do invaluable work to help people to be work-ready, and that we must do more to support them?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I agree that voluntary organisations have huge insight and expertise that we can tap into, and I commend the work of Talk It Out in my hon. Friend’s constituency. We are recruiting 200 community partners throughout the Jobcentre Plus network so that we can ensure we reach all those organisations and benefit from their huge experience and wisdom.

UK Poverty

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Wednesday 4th February 2015 Westminster Hall

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

What a delight it is to see you in the Chair this afternoon, Mr Crausby.

I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), who has secured an important debate. She made a passionate speech, in which she described eloquently the impact of poverty on her constituents. Because she has given us so many concrete stories about real people, I will give an overview and talk about the national picture. However, I remind the Minister that this is the second time in the space of a month that she has been asked about sanctions. We asked her to do a number of things about sanctions during a debate in the north-east, and to check what was going on. When she winds up the debate, I would like to know whether she has done those things.

During the previous Parliament, I was privileged to be the Minister who took the Child Poverty Act 2010 through Parliament. Because of the complexity of measuring child poverty, we had four measures: relative poverty, absolute poverty, persistent poverty, and combined low income and material deprivation. The Bill was passed with all-party agreement, and everybody agreed that we wanted to make progress on all those fronts. What has been the record? The record of the Labour Government between 1997 and 2010 was a reduction of 1.8 million in the number of children in absolute poverty. The record under this Government, according to the DWP’s own statistics, which the Minister published last summer—I hope that she is listening to this—is that the number of children living in absolute poverty has gone up by half a million.

The next measure is relative poverty. Between 1997 and 2010, the number of children living in relative poverty fell by 1.3 million. The number fell by 200,000 between 2009 and 2013, but the Institute for Fiscal Studies forecasts an increase of 400,000 by the time of the election in May. Government Members have to ask themselves why absolute poverty has increased and relative poverty has reduced. What is going on here? The explanation is this. The median income in this country has dropped by 8% under this Government, whereas the income of those in the poorest decile has dropped by 5%, so everybody is poorer; it is just that those at the bottom are not quite as much poorer as are those in the middle. The hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) can shake his head, but those are the figures that the Government published only in July, and the Government should think about that.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Labour’s crash.

[Mr David Crausby (in the Chair)]

Order. A Parliamentary Private Secretary should be seen and not heard, Mr Elphicke.

Universal Credit

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The plan does include that. As the hon. Gentleman may or may not know, we are working on that to make sure it is deliverable, but the key is that we absolutely plan to do that.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

May I urge the Secretary of State to reject the representations of Labour Members? When it comes to universal credit, all they have done throughout is seek to promote welfare over work at every turn. What will be the savings to the Exchequer and the benefits to the UK when it has been fully rolled out?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The NAO has come out with the figure of £35 billion, which I cited earlier, but the point is that I believe that universal credit is worth more than that. As well as the planning and implementation process, the work we are currently doing will also evaluate the net benefit to the Exchequer and taxpayers, which I believe will be even higher.

DWP: Performance

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Of course I welcome the fact that unemployment, including youth unemployment, is now falling, but we have to face up to the fact that too many people in work are struggling to make ends meet. The hon. Gentleman will know from his constituency that some people who are in work have to rely on housing benefit and tax credits to make ends meet because they are not paid a wage they can afford to live on, they are on zero-hours contracts, or they are among the record numbers of people who are working part time but want to work full time. We need to address those challenges as well.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Can the hon. Lady explain why the hon. Member for Dagenham and Rainham (Jon Cruddas) says that Labour’s welfare policies are cynical and punitive?

[Rachel Reeves]

It is all about ensuring that more people are in work through the compulsory jobs guarantee, ensuring that people have the skills to hold down a job with a basic skills test and a youth allowance, and doing more to ensure that people in work can earn enough to live on—through, for example, an increase in the minimum wage and ensuring that more people are paid the living wage. Those policies will make a huge difference to the hon. Gentleman’s constituents in Dover and Deal, which will be a Labour constituency after the next election.

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[Rachel Reeves]

Government Members should listen rather than heckle, because my hon. Friend has made an incredibly important point. I recently went to Ringways garage in Farnley, in my constituency, to give someone the keys to a Motability car. That person talked about the difference that Motability made, in terms of independence and family. However, as my hon. Friend has said, we also know that, as a result of some of the Government’s reforms, many people who need to be helped to obtain the car that will give them the freedom that the rest of us take for granted have had that support taken away from them. The delays and the chaos is one thing, but there is also some of the substance of those decisions.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Rachel Reeves]

I have already given way to the hon. Gentleman, so, no, I will not.

I know that many hon. Members will have similar stories to tell today, and I hope the Secretary of State stays to listen, because when we write to the Department with our constituents’ problems we only ever get replies from the correspondence unit. I realise that the Secretary of State is probably deluged with letters raising problems.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mike Penning]

No Government of any description talk about leaked documents, but I can say that the information in that document was not new. I had released most of it earlier, and I believe that the BBC worked up the story for its own benefit.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

The Minister said that the WCA problems were long-standing. Is there a process whereby the last Government’s figures could be made available to the House? Who entered into the Atos contract?

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[Mr Duncan Smith]

Inequality is at its lowest since 1986. There are 500,000 fewer people in relative poverty than at the election; 300,000 fewer children in relative poverty than at the election; 200,000 fewer pensioners in relative poverty than at the election; and 450,000 fewer workless households than at the end of 2010. We have done more to help people who are hard up than the hon. Lady’s Government ever did.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

What impact has the Government’s long-term plan had on long-term unemployment, and what representations have the Government received on long-term unemployment from the Opposition?

Jobs and Work

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Wednesday 11th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Umunna]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

A few moments ago, the hon. Gentleman talked about a wage that people can live on. Will a future Labour Government commit to having a living wage in place of the minimum wage, or will his speech be more about rhetoric than firm commitments and pledges to the British people?

[Mr Umunna]

The hon. Gentleman raises a good point, because 22% of employees in his constituency under this Government are paid less than a living wage. I will come on to what we intend to do and what is so sorely lacking in the Queen’s Speech.

We do not want to wait until a Conservative Chancellor sees the light and matches our ambition in 2084. What we are hoping is that in the Queen’s Speech, and the Bills that follow, he will match our commitment and ensure that we have a better-waged economy. There are two parts to this challenge: first, action to tackle low pay and insecurity at work—I will come on to what the hon. Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke) talked about—and, secondly, the implementation across Government of an industrial strategy to nurture and grow the sectors that produce the better-paid jobs we want to see across the country.

On low pay, we make no apologies for reminding the House at every opportunity that it was this party, in the face of strong opposition, that introduced the national minimum wage. When we entered office, some people were earning as little as £1 an hour, a practice I am proud to say we outlawed. To give just one of the many examples of the opposition we faced, when we introduced the national minimum wage into this House 17 years ago, a member of the then shadow Cabinet said:

“If, as I and all my Conservative colleagues believe, the DTI’s minimum wage comes into effect, it will negatively affect, not hundreds of thousands but millions of people.”—[Official Report, 4 July 1997; Vol. 297, c. 526.]

That shadow Cabinet member is now the Work and Pensions Secretary. We had the good sense to ignore him.

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[Mr Umunna]

That is a perfect example of the egregious and exploitative use of such arrangements. We are told that the employment Bill will help hard-working people to have confidence in the terms of their contracts and that it will crack down on the abuse of zero-hours contracts, such as the example my hon. Friend mentions. However, the details that we know of suggest that the Government are simply not going far enough. On its own, banning exclusivity clauses in such arrangements will not do the job. We need, among other things, to give workers the right to a fixed-hours contract when they have regularly worked hours with the same employer for a period of time—such as the constituent of my hon. Friend the Member for Worsley and Eccles South—and to protect them from having their shifts cancelled at short notice without compensation. Above all, we must ensure that people know that they are on a zero-hours arrangement.

I have talked about jobs, wages and security at work. The other part of reforming the jobs market is the implementation across Government of a proper industrial strategy, both to create the right conditions for businesses to thrive in all regions of the country and to put the full weight of Government behind those sectors that can win gold medals in the global marketplace for the UK, creating more of the middle-income jobs we want to see.

[Charlie Elphicke]

rose—

[Mr Umunna]

I will just make a bit more progress.

Part of that involves ensuring the right environment across the country in all regions for our businesses to grow, and part of it involves a sector-led approach, looking at where we have a competitive edge and comparative advantage relative to our international competitors. I am very supportive of the sectoral approach. It was of course the Labour Government who led the way in that by setting up the Automotive Council.

When it comes to creating the right environment, ensuring that people have the skills our businesses need is crucial. Increasing the quantity and quality of apprenticeships is a must. We have a record to be proud of. In government, we rescued apprenticeships from the scrap heap. We more than quadrupled starts—[Interruption.] Government Members do not want to hear it, but let me give them the facts. We more than quadrupled apprenticeship starts, from a woeful 65,000 under the Major Government to 280,000 in our final year in office.

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[Vince Cable]

I will take two more interventions and then move on.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Opposition’s stance, which is to pick out any poor statistic or position, highlights that they are completely in denial about the recovery’s strength? It exposes their lack of any vision to secure economic growth for this country.

[Vince Cable]

I was going to go on shortly to what is underpinning labour market growth, which is strong and balanced economic growth. I will come back to that.

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[Vince Cable]

Obviously, I do not know all the details of that case, but it seems a very bad one. It is not clear to me whether it is to do with the employer or the way that the benefits system has impacted on people, but if the hon. Lady writes to me we will get it investigated.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I am a passionate believer in reform of zero-hours contracts, but does the Secretary of State agree that Opposition Members’ comments sit ill with the White Paper that the Labour Government issued that said that Labour

“wishes to retain the flexibility these contracts offer business”?

They then proceeded to do nothing about it for the rest of their time in office.

[Vince Cable]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for reminding us of that. Two of my Labour predecessors investigated this problem and neither of them felt there was sufficient cause to change the legislation.

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[Chloe Smith (Norwich North) (Con)]

Along with many hon. Members, I welcome the unemployment statistics released today. I note that in my own constituency unemployment has come down, both on the year and on the month, which is to be welcomed alongside the drops nationally in both the long-term unemployment rate and the youth unemployment rate.

I also welcome the national insurance cut of £2,000 for businesses, which has contributed to businesses taking people on. I note of course that the Opposition have refused to say whether they would rule out reversing that change if they were in government.

In the Gracious Address, I particularly welcome the child care Bill, which will continue to make it possible for women to go into the workplace, and for men and women to share their child care responsibilities between them as they think best for their own circumstances.

I also welcome the small business Bill, which the Secretary of State spoke about earlier today. I particularly welcome measures in that Bill that support entrepreneurs. In a discussion that I had only yesterday, I came across an extremely interesting statistic. I understand that by the 2025 general election, for the first time since the second world war, the self-employed will outnumber public sector employees. That is not only extremely interesting electorally speaking but is, of course, exactly why we need to use a Bill such as the small business Bill to back entrepreneurs and all that they wish to do for themselves, their families and the jobs that they may create in the future.

[Charlie Elphicke]

A policy that I have been setting out before now is to have a really light-touch regime for the taxation and regulation of start-up businesses, whereby it will basically cost nothing whatever to set up a business. What does my hon. Friend think of that idea to drive entrepreneurship?

[Chloe Smith]

I strongly welcome that point and the Government could do well to examine my hon. Friend’s idea.

A subject that my hon. Friend and I have spoken about in the past is the other phenomenon that will happen by the 2025 general election. It is that generation Y —to talk in generational terms—will become a competitive part of the electorate compared with the baby boomers. Of course, I am talking about generation Y and all those who come behind them; I think that hon. Members will understand that concept.

I am not seeking to stir up any form of strife between generations; I do not think that would be productive. I mentioned jobs news and I wish to hail the work in my own constituency of the Norwich for Jobs campaign, which has brought about impressive results for young workers. However, I also wish to refer to the needs of older workers who will no doubt remain in the work force. I have met several 50-somethings in my constituency surgery to talk about exactly that issue.

In passing, I will say that I welcome the pensions Bill laid out in the Queen’s Speech, which will allow pensioners to have far more control and freedom over what they choose to do with their savings.

I will take a moment or two to talk about the way in which our politics and indeed our economy need to change, so as to adapt to generation Y and its needs in the coming years. The Queen’s Speech sets out a basis for that change.

Benjamin Disraeli spoke about there being two different planets and we might ask whether there are still two different planets. He spoke about rich and poor, but in fact the figures suggest that there is a gap between older voters and younger non-voters. That gap is an important one and it should concern us all.

I hear some people say that generation Y—younger voters—will simply bounce into the same habits that previous younger generations may have had. However, three things have changed: when asked, this generation reports having less interest in traditional politics than others; it has less belief that voting is a civic duty; and it has less affiliation with parties. That all adds up to an existential change for British democracy. The UK is worse than other countries in this regard; it is indeed the sick man of Europe and it does not compare well with the US either. Young people vote less than their elders elsewhere, but Britain’s problem in this respect has got worse.

That should concern us, but it also gives us an opportunity. We can look at research by Demos, which shows that these younger people look to themselves to take action, and to businesses, charities and action groups to achieve things in their chosen community. Indeed, the state comes a long way down that list. Generation Y, like any other group, backs its own values and aspirations. I want politics in Britain to work for the members of that generation and I want the principles of the small state, responsible economics, freedom, enterprise and social liberalism to come through for them.

First-time voters in 2015 may have an aversion to formal, professional politics, but they are interested in community affairs and they are doing great things in their communities. What are the right things that the Government should do to respond? They should focus on the economy, on education and indeed on those major intergenerational issues that I have mentioned. The Conservatives in government have a good record in that regard: honesty in public finances; more jobs, and a plan to go further with the tax cut in April 2015 for businesses employing under-21s; house building; reform of welfare; and the ambitious work at the Cabinet Office to make public services work for people. We have this record that we can be proud of; we should aspire to do more; and the Conservative party can be this party for the future. The Queen’s Speech delivers results. People should judge us on those results and young people can do the same.

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[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

I support the Queen’s Speech and, in particular, the work of the Department for Work and Pensions, which is engaged in nothing less than a moral crusade, a war on unemployment, a war for work and a war to defeat poverty. We all know that the best way to cure deprivation is a job and the best way to reduce poverty is work. Today, I have heard so much from the Labour party about how the Government do not care enough about the least well-off. As Labour Members talk about the ills of everything, they remind me of Jack Frost denying the coming of spring, yet each day the sun rises that bit higher and shadows are thrown back that bit further as the economy and employment continue to improve and as unemployment continues to fall.

The numbers on poverty are encouraging, too. Let us be honest. In the previous Parliament, under the last Labour Government, poverty rose. It is falling under the Conservatives. Under Labour, child poverty rose. It is falling under the Conservatives. Under Labour, inequality rose and it has been falling under the Conservatives. Before the crash, under Labour, 9.8% of people were reporting that they did not have enough money to buy food, according to OECD figures. Today, the figure is 8.1%. That is still too high but it is moving in the right direction. I hope that food poverty will continue to fall under this Government, who are engaged in a crusade against poverty, want and need because they believe in the power, importance and value of work, and the poverty-fighting aspects and dignity that work can bring.

Under Labour, youth unemployment rose and it has been falling under the Conservatives. Under Labour, economic inactivity—people doing nothing—rose and it has been falling under the Conservatives. Under Labour, long-term unemployment rose and it has been falling under the Conservatives. However, it is not enough. I have a vision of the future that we can build under a Conservative Government after 2015: a Britain moving further towards economic success and a work revolution, particularly through the promotion and fostering of small businesses, and through making it easier to have a light-touch regulatory system where one can set up an enterprise at no cost. I hope that the small business Bill will deal with that.

It is important that we give young people a better future. Under Labour, nearly 2 million more people went into renting. Young people’s futures were stolen by Labour’s buy-to-let policy and its promotion of buy-to-let landlords. That was a disgrace. It was wrong that, in 2000, 2 million households were in rent and that, by the time Labour left office, about 3.4 million were in rent. That took away the futures of our young people. We should give them their futures back, so I want more action to disincentivise buy-to-letting—it is too incentivised today through the tax system—and to incentivise owner-occupation. We should give back to our young people the chance, hope and aspiration that owning one’s home brings, which the previous Government took away. It was wrong. It was a shame for Labour to do that. We need to promote work for our young people. We need to promote home ownership and owner-occupation for our young people to give them those things. We need to build a society that is fairer and more just.

I have powerfully made the case for tackling tax avoidance. We must tackle want through welfare reform. We must tackle welfare tourism, too. It is important that we make our borders secure to give our young people a greater chance. For the Labour party, borders and immigration are just issues to be discussed at a coffee morning. Those issues involve the hopes, security and futures of our young people, a generation who were sold the pass by the previous Government. This Government are looking after them.

We need to reform zero-hours contracts, which the previous Government did nothing about.

[Christopher Pincher]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, although we do need to reform zero-hours contracts, only very few people on them say they do not get enough hours of work?

[Charlie Elphicke]

I agree. For me, this is about fairness and justice and ensuring there is flexibility while also protecting people. Labour did not do that, but this Government are doing it. That is very important, and social justice lies at the heart of so much of what we are doing.

We need to look after savers. There are too many zombie accounts—too many zombie ISAs, too many savers being taken advantage of. That was allowed under the previous Government. I say we should give consumers and savers a fair and just deal.

There should be more competition in the power markets, and our water bills should be fairer. I have made that case before, and I am glad to see that Ofwat has been listening and has made a stronger settlement for consumers in the 2015-20 period.

There must also be fairness and justice to our way of life. We need to make our Supreme Court supreme. We need to reform human rights legislation, which has too often gone wrong and too often promotes unfairness and injustice. That is the kind of vision a Conservative Government could build after 2015, and it is one I look forward to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 31st March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

In developing universal credit and its IT system, what lessons have the Government drawn from IT projects conducted by the previous Government?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The reason why we are doing this in a way that tests it at each stage, so we make sure we have got it right before rolling it out and taking more numbers on board, is because we want to make sure that taxpayers’ money is protected through this process and that the system works. I recall, as I am sure my hon. Friend does, that when the Labour Government launched tax credits it was a total disaster; we had loads of people in our surgeries with real problems relating to payments. This Government will never revisit that, which is why I will never accept any advice from the lot who wasted billions on failed IT programmes.

amendment of the law

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Tuesday 25th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Of course I want to see more people back in work, particularly young people, but the hon. Lady must remember that we inherited from the previous Government an economy that had hit the buffers, with young people cascading out of work in the two years running up to the election. Youth unemployment rose over their whole period in office, which suggests to me that their policies were hurting young people long before the recession. What we are doing is aimed at getting more people back into work. We have been successful in improving the situation, as the figures now are better than those we inherited—more people are in work, including more young people—but of course there is more to do, and it is this coalition Government who are doing it.

We are also introducing our other programmes, including the Work programme and universal credit, with the pathfinders moving into the north-west and eventually rolling out by 2016. We know that 90% of claims for jobseeker’s allowance and other benefits are already being made online, which is a huge change—only about 10% or 12% were made online before—that is improving speed and accuracy. Some 78% of claimants are confident about their ability to budget with monthly payments, as a result of the programmes we have run. Two thirds think that the universal credit process offers a much better work incentive than jobseeker’s allowance. Even in its early stages, universal credit is having a significant impact on people’s work prospects: claimants are likely to spend twice as long looking for work; two thirds agree that it is easier to understand their obligations; and 86%—rising to 90%—are confident of gaining a job within three months, which is a much higher rate than for jobseeker’s allowance.

These are dynamic changes that we are making, improving the path back to work, the incentives and the choices that people make. We are improving their work prospects and helping them into meaningful, long-term jobs. However, I gather from the Chief Secretary that the Treasury received a submission from the Opposition in the run-up to the Budget for an alternative to our programmes, which they call a jobs guarantee. I thought that we should look at that, just to examine whether it was worth embracing. I think it only fair that we tell the House whether or not it would work. Having looked at the proposal in a completely ambivalent manner, I have to say that it is confusing. The first submission said that it was a six-month programme for young people. The second submission said that it was a year-long programme. The third submission said that it was a two-year programme for the long-term unemployed. I gather that there is now some suggestion that it might be a six-month programme for everybody.

Apparently the jobs guarantee is now a flagship policy for the Opposition, but I understood that it would be funded for only one year. Now we hear that the same funding they announced for one year is meant to last all the way through a full Parliament. We asked the Treasury to do some formal costings for that, which I hope have been made available to the Opposition. They said that their scheme would cost only £1.9 billion in its first year and £0.9 billion thereafter, but the Treasury’s formal costings—[Interruption.] I know that Opposition Members do not want to listen, because the last thing they want to hear is how they would pay for it The Treasury, which is full of decent people doing a hard day’s work, has shown that there is a massive gap of £2.6 billion per year between what the Opposition say their jobs guarantee will cost and what we calculate it will cost.

Not only have the Opposition underestimated the costs by £0.6 billion in the programme’s first year, and £1.7 billion in future years, but they have no robust means of funding it. They say that they will fund it with a bankers’ bonus tax that will raise £2.3 billion, which is questionable, but I understand that they have spent that 10 times over. Let me list a few of the things they have committed to spend it on: reversing the VAT increase, which would cost £13.5 billion; more capital spending, which would cost £5.8 billion; reversing child benefit savings, which would cost £3.1 billion; reversing tax credit savings, which would cost £5.8 billion; and more housing, which would cost £1.2 billion. They have made £30 billion of spending commitments, apparently to be paid for by a tax that would save them £2.3 billion.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the lesson of Labour’s crash is that more spending, more borrowing, more debt and more taxes do not work? Does this not show that the Opposition have not worked that out, because they have spent their bankers’ bonus tax more times than the number of sides on the new £1 coin?

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[Margot James]

I heartily agree, and I would not be surprised if things got even better than that over the next few years. We have momentum now, as my hon. Friend’s point shows.

Our economic strategy has been about far more than reducing the deficit: how we do that matters. The Chancellor set out a strategy to rebalance the economy, and we wanted to see growth that was more balanced between London and the south-east and the other important regions, between the service sector and the manufacturing sector and between the public and private sector. We also wanted to build an economy made more secure by savings and investment, instead of one built on excessive debt.

This Budget marks another milestone—it capitalises on the hard-won and sustainable economic progress to secure radical reforms that will restore the incentive that has been so recklessly destroyed over recent years. Scottish Widows estimates that fewer than half of us are saving enough for our old age, and that one in five are saving nothing at all. The bold increase in the ISA tax-free limit to £15,000 is welcome. There are more than half a million ISA savers in the west midlands alone. Not all of them will be able to put away the maximum every year, but the fact that they will now have complete freedom to invest cash as well as equities will encourage more saving among people who just want their cash to grow in a tax-free environment.

Before 1997, Britain had one of the best-funded occupational pension systems in the world. That proud state was totally undermined by the last Government’s decision to end dividend tax relief on pensions. Incentives to save were also undermined by the growth of means-testing of the state pension. The welcome pension reforms that the current Government have already introduced were given a further boost last week by the Chancellor’s dramatic announcement that we are no longer to be forced to buy an annuity. That is welcome news for everyone who is saving into a pension scheme, regardless of their age.

Just under 20,000 people in Stourbridge are of pensionable age, and many have been badly hit by the poor annuity rates and exceptionally low interest rates of recent years. I was therefore delighted on their behalf by the new pensioner bond, which from next year will offer a much better return than anything available on the market today. Low-income savers will also benefit from the abolition of the 10p tax rate on savings from income of £5,000 or less.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Does my hon. Friend agree that unchaining annuities is likely to encourage more people to save into pensions and pension funds, so that contrary to what was said by the former Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling), that is likely to mean more money for infrastructure funds and other forms of investment?

[Margot James]

I know that my hon. Friend is an expert in these matters, and I strongly agree that the change will definitely encourage more people to save into pensions. The forced way in which people have had to invest so much of their pension savings into annuities was a disincentive, certainly to my generation.

In my last couple of minutes, I want to turn to opportunities for young people. The number of people aged 18 to 24 claiming jobseeker’s allowance in my constituency has fallen since 2010 by 18%, and we can all agree that we would like such falls to accelerate. The vast majority of young people on JSA gain employment within six months, but a small group do not. They face very real social problems, but this Government’s Work programme and their reforms in very much improving jobcentres and supporting young people—and those of all ages—into work will make and are making a difference.

Unfortunately, an even smaller minority of young people have been conditioned to not want to work. For too long, they have perhaps been allowed to be too choosy about their first job: if it is not the one they really want, they would rather have none. I am talking about a very small minority. There is no doubt, however, that the changes introduced by the Government—I give the credit to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions—have made people realise that they are entering a contract with the jobcentre and the taxpayer, and that they need to put in the effort to make a serious attempt to find work, with the state providing the necessary support.

In addition, I strongly welcome the continued support for the apprenticeship programme. My constituency has had a 90% increase in apprenticeship starts in the past couple of years. Last week’s Budget gave further support to apprenticeships by providing £85 million for the employers’ apprenticeship grant scheme and £20 million extra to support apprenticeships right up to postgraduate level, which carries on the good and vital work of creating greater parity of esteem between apprenticeships and degrees.

None of the support—for exporters, manufacturers, taxpayers, savers, pensioners—announced in the Budget last week would have been possible without the work done on restoring the public finances. There is a very long way to go to overcome our indebtedness, but the fact that we are now so clearly on the right road, with results starting to come in almost daily across every single economic indicator, means that the Government can provide support where it is most needed. That was amply demonstrated by last week’s Budget, which will make Britain truly competitive once again. I am delighted to support it in the Lobby tonight.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Thursday 13th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Grant]

I am certainly very happy to take up the matter that the hon. Lady raises. Increasing participation in sport for disabled people is a key priority for this Government and for Sport England. There is still an unacceptable gap between the numbers of disabled and non-disabled people doing sport, and we need to make sure that the gap closes.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree that skiers such as Kelly Gallagher and our Paralympians are a fine example of what everyone can achieve in this country?

[Mrs Grant]

I certainly agree with my hon. Friend. Jade Etherington and Kelly Gallagher, and their guides, Caroline Powell and Charlotte Evans, are glowing examples of what can be achieved by sportswomen in this country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Penning]

That is exactly what I have been looking at. In particular, I have been looking at tribunal cases, as we have a backlog of cases on the WCA, the policies before PIP and the disability living allowance. I am looking carefully at what is happening. Some can actually go for up to 10 years. That is what I intend to do for people who are desperately in need of the benefit, so that they are not called in as much as they are now.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree that it is really important that everyone in this country can fulfil their potential and do really well in the workplace? To that end, what is being done to engage employers and help disabled people do really well in business?

[Mike Penning]

As I have said, we have a programme going round the regions at the moment—it was started by the Prime Minister in London—to give employers the confidence to take on employees and to break the myth that it is more expensive and more difficult to employ disabled people or people with long-term illnesses. We all know that they will give more loyalty, dedication and commitment than anyone else in the work place.