Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 26th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ms McVey]

My hon. Friend is correct, and I want to thank him for going to meet people at his Jobcentre Plus and for speaking to the dedicated work coaches who are working tirelessly to help people to get into work. These are the tales that I am hearing. Universal credit is an in-work and out-of-work benefit. We are about getting people into a job and then helping them with progression, so that they can get into a job and have a career and also have job progression. That is why we have over 3 million more people in work.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

This question is not dissimilar to that tabled by the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), and she should have her opportunity now, because we will probably not reach her question later.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

18. Thank you, Mr Speaker. Let me take this opportunity to tell the Secretary of State that in three of the eight wards in my constituency, child poverty is at over 50%. Universal credit has only just started to be rolled out, and it will only make things worse. Her Government are also going to take away free school meals—[Interruption.] In the future, there will not be the access to free school meals that there is now. What is the level of child poverty that she is willing to support?

[Ms McVey]

We have had this debate before, and this has been corrected many times. Actually, 50,000 more children are going to have free school meals. These scaremongering stories are not true at all. Let us look at what is happening. We now have 1 million fewer people in absolute poverty—a record low. We now have 300,000 fewer children in absolute poverty—a new record low. There are also 500,000 fewer working-age adults in absolute poverty—a record low. This Government are about helping people to get into work, which is the first step they can take towards taking control of their life. From there, they can have career progression.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

It sounds like a scintillating experience, I am sure.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

T10. My constituent, Emily Johnson, having worked all her adult life, gave birth to a baby daughter in December. Because she moved into an in-work training programme in September, she has been denied maternity pay and maternity allowance. Because her husband is self-employed, universal credit assumes he earns enough to support all three of them, although this is demonstrably not the case. Why is a woman who has paid into the benefits system all her adult life denied any support at this time?

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady raises what sounds like quite a complicated case in terms of entitlement. If she would like, I am more than happy to arrange for a meeting in the Department to make sure that her constituent is getting the help and support that she needs.

Personal Independence Payment

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ms McVey]

As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle (Mary Robinson), this is about tailor-made and flexible support. We are putting in place more training so that people understand mental health conditions, and we are giving our work coaches and mental health assistants as much support as possible. As I say, this is about tailor-made and flexible support.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State talks about the unnecessary vilification of her policies, but her Government were responsible for the vilification of so many mentally disabled people by presenting them as applying for benefits to which they were not entitled. I have seen the misery that such decisions caused many of my constituents, including those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder as a consequence of sexual abuse. Will the Secretary of State now confirm the maximum amount of time that they will have to wait to have their cases reviewed?

[Ms McVey]

It is unfortunate when Opposition Members try to ratchet up the level of emotion in the Chamber, especially when the situation is as emotional as it is. Nobody has ever sought to vilify anyone, and we should get it on the record now that this is not about vilifying anybody—it is about the giving the right support to those who need it. Surely all of us want to focus resources and money on the most disabled people and on the disabled people who need that money. I hope that I can end on that note. The facts speak for themselves: we have spent more than Labour ever did.

Universal Credit Roll-out

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Wednesday 18th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams]

There may be many and varied reasons why the claimant count is down, not least the system of punitive sanctions the Government also introduced in 2012.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Newcastle was also a pathfinder constituency. As the local MP, I have seen at first hand the absolute misery and destitution that this system has forced many of my constituents into. Our Newcastle food bank was already the largest in the country, and now it regularly runs out of food as a direct consequence of this system. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Prime Minister’s attitude at questions earlier today showed a total lack of understanding of the impact and of the destitution and suffering of so many of her citizens?

[Debbie Abrahams]

This is a real test for the Government; if there is a genuine desire to make life better for everybody across the country, UC is a key way in which we can respond. I am so sorry to hear about the issues in Newcastle as a consequence of the introduction of UC.

Universal Credit

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Wednesday 19th April 2017 Westminster Hall

[Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the roll-out of universal credit.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies, not least because I have been attempting to hold a debate on this issue for several weeks, if not months, because of the sheer volume of universal credit-related problems raised with me by constituents. I originally secured the debate for 22 March, but it was understandably cut short following the appalling attack on Westminster that afternoon, so I would like to take this opportunity to place on the record my eternal gratitude for the selfless and incredible bravery of PC Keith Palmer on that day. My thoughts very much remain with his family and with the families of those from around the world who were killed or injured as a result of that sickening incident.

Before I expose the myriad issues that my constituents have faced in dealing with this Government policy, and at the risk of repeating what I said on 22 March, I want to set out the context for this debate. As all hon. Members are aware, universal credit is a new benefit that is being introduced to replace means-tested social security benefits and tax credits for working-age individuals and families, including working tax credit, child tax credit, income-based jobseeker’s allowance, income support, income-related employment and support allowance, and housing benefit. According to the Government, the aim of universal credit, using real-time information on claimants’ circumstances, is

“to simplify and streamline the benefits system for claimants and administrators, to improve work incentives, to tackle poverty among low income families, and to reduce the scope for fraud and error.”

Following years of repeated delays and false starts, the infamous reset in 2013 after the Major Projects Authority told the Government to go back to the drawing board, and concerns expressed by the National Audit Office that delivery of universal credit had been beset by

“weak management, ineffective control and poor governance”,

the new benefit is finally, but very painfully, being rolled out across the country. As the Library briefing note helpfully produced for the debate highlights, since the 2013 reset, the Department for Work and Pensions has been developing and rolling out universal credit using a twin-track approach. The briefing note states:

“This involves rolling out Universal Credit using IT systems developed prior to the 2013 reset (the ‘Live Service’) while, simultaneously, DWP develops the Digital Service (now known as the ‘Full Service’) from which Universal Credit will eventually be operated”—

I hope everyone is still following me. That means that, since spring 2016, universal credit has been available in all jobcentres across the country, but in most areas it is available only for new claims from people with relatively simple circumstances—single unemployed people, or people with very low earnings, who satisfy the gateway conditions. In the small but increasing number of areas that have full service universal credit, all new eligible claimants will receive universal credit, as will existing claimants of legacy benefits who report a change in their circumstances that results in their being “naturally migrated” to universal credit.

Following the “reshaping” of the next phase of universal credit’s roll-out announced in a written statement on 20 July 2016, the Secretary of State confirmed that the DWP intended to continue the roll-out of full service universal credit to five jobcentres a month until June 2017 and expand that to 30 a month from July 2017. There will be a break over the summer of 2017. The Government hope to scale up full service roll-out to 55 jobcentres a month between October and December 2017 and accelerate that to 65 a month by February 2018, with roll-out to the final 57 being completed in September 2018.

As a consequence, under the Government’s current plans, universal credit should be available across the country to all new claimants and existing claimants with changed circumstances by September 2018, and the final stage of the roll-out of universal credit, the “managed migration” of existing benefit claimants with no change in their circumstances, will commence in July 2019 and be completed by March 2022—some five years later than the original target. Quite how that complicated timetable now fits alongside the DWP’s proposals, published in January, to close an estimated one in 10 jobcentres and merge or co-locate many others is something on which it would be helpful to receive confirmation from the Minister when he responds to the debate.

It is clear that the roll-out of universal credit is a hugely complex task and that hard-working jobcentre staff are being placed in an incredibly challenging situation. The Library briefing note states that it involves

“not simply the creation of a new benefit but development of entirely new administrative systems to support it. This includes development of the Digital Service, the online IT system via which claimants and DWP will manage awards, and training staff to administer a new conditionality and sanctions regime that imposes requirements on in-work as well as out-of-work claimants.”

As universal credit requires a broader span of people to look for work than is the case with legacy benefits—for example, by including those in receipt of housing benefit or child tax credits and, indeed, the partners of universal credit claimants—there has been a marked effect on the claimant count in areas that have full service universal credit. In the year to January 2017, there was a 25.5% increase in the claimant count in full service areas, compared with an increase of 0.1% across the UK as a whole.

There are numerous concerns about the impact of universal credit on existing claimants, particularly families with disabled children whose caring responsibilities prevent them from working. The charity Contact a Family estimates that those families could be up to £1,600 a year worse off after being transferred to universal credit. We also still have the disturbing two-child limit for the child element of universal credit for all families making a new claim, regardless of when their third child was born, and the totally unacceptable situation in which women will be forced to prove that any third child was born as a result of rape. Serious concerns remain about the cuts to work allowances introduced from April 2016 for universal credit claimants. The Children’s Society highlights that they mean that

“Universal Credit support for most working families was considerably reduced”.

The Government have pressed ahead with their potentially deeply damaging decision to remove entitlement to the housing benefit element of universal credit for 18 to 21-year-olds, subject to certain exemptions—a move that has been roundly condemned by homelessness charities including Centrepoint and Crisis. Meanwhile, organisations including the Federation of Small Businesses and the Low Incomes Tax Reform Group are pressing the Government to think again about the minimum income floor, given its potential impact on many genuinely self-employed people with incomes that fluctuate from month to month.

There is, of course, the fact that the change in the universal credit taper rate from 65% to 63%, as announced in the 2016 autumn statement, does not come close to outweighing the cuts to work allowances. The general secretary of the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers recently commented:

“The very modest reduction in the high clawback rate of 65% of net earnings to 63% is a tiny step in the right direction, but is worth less than £300 for most working parents. It goes nowhere near offsetting the enormous £2,000 to £3,000 annual cuts that Universal Credit represents or taking the taper back to the 55% rate that was originally intended. Universal Credit is a ticking time bomb that will plunge far more working families into poverty, when they are transferred on to it. We supported the initial intentions of Universal Credit, to simplify benefits and improve incentives to work. However, severe cost cutting has turned Universal Credit into a real threat to the incomes of low-paid working families.”

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for securing this important debate and for ensuring that it took place today. She knows that I have raised the issue of the increase in housing debt for those on universal credit, and that in Newcastle the proportion of tenants in debt has increased greatly. The Minister said that that increase had not actually occurred; however, I have figures showing that the average debt for non-universal credit tenants in council housing is £300, whereas for universal credit tenants it is £636. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is a huge increase for working and non-working families?

[Catherine McKinnell]

I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for her insightful intervention, which highlights one of the major issues caused by the roll-out of universal credit when combined with the impact of the cuts agenda. This is a ticking time bomb and it is of particular concern to areas such as ours—Newcastle—given recent analysis by the TUC highlighting that while employment in the north-east grew by 60,000 between 2011 and 2016, a staggering 40,000 of those new jobs were without guaranteed hours or baseline employment rights. That means that some 124,000 people in our region—the equivalent of one in nine workers—now work in insecure jobs. Given that the north-east has the highest rate of insecure employment of anywhere in the UK, those people need a universal credit system that functions.

That leads me to the reason I have been trying to secure this debate. I want to focus on the actual experience of people in Newcastle upon Tyne North attempting to claim universal credit, in the hope that the Minister will acknowledge the clear failings in the system, do something to address the situation and commit to putting the failings right before universal credit is rolled out elsewhere.

To put this into context, the universal credit live service was rolled out to three jobcentres in Newcastle in April 2015, following which full service universal credit was introduced to Newcastle’s Cathedral Square city centre jobcentre in May 2016, the Newcastle East Jobcentre Plus in February 2017 and finally the Newcastle West Jobcentre Plus on 15 March. To return to the written ministerial statement of 20 July, the Secretary of State clearly said:

“It is essential that the Universal Credit rollout for all claimant types is delivered in an orderly and successful manner; that claimants receive the support they need in a timely fashion; and that welfare reforms are delivered safely as the roll out continues.”—[Official Report, 20 July 2016; Vol. 613, c. 23WS.]

I welcome that aim, but I have to tell the Minister that it simply is not happening in Newcastle. Indeed, it is fair to say that my office has been deluged with complaints from constituents about a universal credit system that is clearly struggling to cope and failing to deliver the support that claimants need in anything like an orderly or timely fashion.

Those concerns include a universal credit verification process that requires claimants to produce photographic identification such as a passport or driving licence, which many simply do not possess and certainly cannot afford, even though some have been in receipt of benefits for several years. Deciding that universal credit must be digital by default has also created significant difficulties for many, making it extremely difficult to obtain information about their claim from a human being. Constituents face long and expensive telephone queues, and when they do get through, they are told to report any concerns or queries via their online journal, following which they have to wait for increasingly long periods to receive a response. The fact that universal credit is centred on an online journal system assumes that all claimants have access to the internet or are computer literate. That is certainly not the case for many people across Newcastle, and it can make it very hard for people to verify updates on their claims or post information about their work activity, which is necessary to prevent their claims from being suspended.

I also have numerous examples of universal credit claims being shut down before they should be; of documentation being provided to the DWP, at the constituent’s cost, and repeatedly being lost or even destroyed; and of totally conflicting, often incorrect, information being provided to constituents about their claims. That is because of a clear lack of understanding about universal credit by the staff who are trying to administer it, and it also results in incorrect payments being made. Indeed, one of the cases I have been handling involves a constituent who received a £600 universal credit payment, while no one at the DWP is able to explain what it is for. There are significant inconsistencies in payment dates and amounts paid, even for people who work regular hours and have regular incomes, leading to overpayments of universal credit that the introduction of real-time information was supposed to prevent.

Claimants are waiting significantly longer than the commonly advertised six-week period to have their universal credit payments processed. That leads to many finding themselves in very serious financial difficulties as they wait for the DWP to get its act together—hardly surprising when all their benefits are rolled into one payment, which, if delayed, can make just about managing feel like an aspiration.

Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 27th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Damian Green)]

I would like to draw the attention of the House to the more generous universal credit taper rate coming into effect over the Easter recess, on 10 April. It demonstrates our commitment to helping people to gain independence in their own lives by getting on and progressing in work. The new taper rate of 63% will boost the incomes of about 3 million families by £700 million a year; a couple with two children could benefit by as much as £425 a year. When combined with the introduction of the national living wage and increases in the personal tax allowance, those changes equate to the biggest pay rise for the lowest earners in a generation.

[Chi Onwurah]

Newcastle has paid a high price for being the first city to go full service with universal credit, with claims routinely lost, delayed or repeatedly deleted. However, the six-week wait period is doing the most to drive so many into destitution and cause people to lose their home. With 80% of Newcastle council house tenants on universal credit now in rent arrears, will the Minister end the wait period, or will he explain how they are supposed to keep a roof over their head with no money?

[Damian Green]

I have two points for the hon. Lady. First, the National Federation of ALMOs—social housing providers—calculates that some 75% of tenants are in arrears under the legacy benefits, so she is not right in her suggestion.

Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 20th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I am happy to join my hon. Friend in welcoming the work of the Dorset Young Chamber. I have seen the great work that my local chamber of commerce, Kent Invicta, does in schools. My hon. Friend chairs the all-party parliamentary group for youth employment, so he will be pleased to know that the youth claimant count in his constituency has gone down by 74% since 2010 and by 7% in the past year alone.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

More young people are claiming benefits in Newcastle Central this year than they were last year, and the north-east has the overall highest unemployment rate in the country. Too many of our young people have to leave the region to find good jobs, so when will the Secretary of State make the northern powerhouse a reality for the north-east?

[Damian Green]

We are determined to make the northern powerhouse a reality. As the hon. Lady says, youth unemployment is higher in certain areas than it is in others, but I hope she recognises that youth unemployment as a whole has come down markedly in recent years in her region, as in all others. Some 86% of 16 to 24-year-olds are now in full-time study or work, which is a record high, and the employment rate for 16 to 24-year-olds who have left full-time education is up by 0.4 percentage points in the past year.

State Pension: Working-class Women

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Thursday 9th February 2017 Westminster Hall

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

The hon. Lady is giving a graphic account of the difficulties that Mrs Tenniswood and many other women have faced. Mrs Tenniswood has paid national insurance contributions for 42 years. Is it not the case that somebody in her situation was doing that under the impression that that was a contract with the Government—an entitlement to a pension? The hon. Lady has described how Mrs Tenniswood has had to write and ask for her pension statement, but the Government should have communicated with Mrs Tenniswood. That failure of communication has not allowed people the time to properly prepare, which is the real damage caused by the changes.

[Chi Onwurah]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right—there is a sense of a broken contract between the state and hard-working citizens. The failure to give adequate notice means that the changes could not have been planned for. The consequences of many life decisions that WASPI women have taken are now that they face many years of reduced income that they could not have anticipated.

Mrs Tenniswood’s experience is far from unique. One woman told me that she has a neck injury and spondylitis —two debilitating diseases that would exclude her from many jobs. She said:

“I do not want to be forced to work until I drop.”

Why should she be? Another woman told me that she had recently been diagnosed with osteophytic lipping in her hips. She said:

“I am not so mobile as I once was. I cannot possibly carry on getting in and out of a car with the chemist’s deliveries—”

that is her job—

“30 to 50 times a day.”

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. Constituents of mine have been in exactly the same position as Mrs Tenniswood, so her case is not exceptional, but unfortunately very much the norm. These women have paid in year after year and then, when they come to take back something that they thought they would receive, it is not there. Not only that, but they cannot get other entitlements that are linked to the age of retirement, so it makes things very difficult for them. Sometimes, if they fall on hard times, the Department for Work and Pensions deals with them in a way that is demeaning, which also does not help.

[Chi Onwurah]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. As I said, part of the debate is about dignity in old age. It is also about the contract with the state. In fact, he has anticipated what I was going to say. In the case of Mrs Tenniswood, one bureaucratic letter took away the certainty that she had had for most of her working life in a very hard trade. The belief that the state would provide her with a pension in her old age—one she had earned—was torn to shreds.

Because Mrs Tenniswood is working class, her life expectancy is lower. In Newcastle, the gap in average life expectancy between inner-city Byker and more affluent South Gosforth is 12.6 years, and the gap is rising under this Government. This pattern is repeated across the country. Owing to the health inequalities from which we still suffer, working-class women are on average expected to die seven years earlier than their peers from more affluent backgrounds. When Mrs Tenniswood finally receives her pension, she can expect to have less time to enjoy it than other women of her age, and she is likely to have a worse experience of old age.

A quarter of Newcastle’s neighbourhoods are in the 10% most deprived in the country. In Newcastle, we are more likely to die earlier from cancer, heart disease and strokes. We suffer from the diseases of our industrial legacy, such as asbestosis. Heart attacks are responsible for 1,100 premature deaths in the north-east every year, which is higher than the national average because of the income disparity. Such inequality is replicated in regions across the country. Data from the Office for National Statistics tell us that, compared with women who live in more affluent areas, working-class women will live for 19 years longer in poor health. So they live shorter lives and a higher proportion of their time is spent in poor health before they die. That is also true of working-class men; I recognise that. They also suffer from significant health inequalities, but, as we have heard, they have not had their expectations of retirement overturned without any attempt to ease the transition.

Our pension system, and the wider system of social security of which it is a part, was founded on the principles of reciprocity, justice and fairness. I fail to see anything just, fair or reciprocal in the treatment of the WASPI women by the Department for Work and Pensions. The Government have rejected many opportunities to deliver a fair settlement for WASPI women, and by accelerating the changes they have embedded unfairness. To add insult to injury, they insist on ignoring and trivialising the issue.

Last week the Minister, who is with us today, refused to use the phrase “working-class” in what passed for an answer to my question on the subject, and argued that

“we are all working now.”—[Official Report, 2 February 2017; Vol. 620, c. 1171.]

I take issue with that premise. In Newcastle, unemployment stands at 5.4% of the economically active population, which is almost twice the national average, and that figure is rising year on year. The figures are even bleaker for older adults. Nationally, the employment rate for people aged 50 to 64 is only 70%. Last Thursday—the same day I asked the Minister my question—the DWP published a guide to help employers hire older workers, noting that three out of four retiring men and two thirds of women have not worked for five or more years. So we are not all working now. Perhaps the Minister was not informed that that was a priority for her Department: hardly an example of joined-up Government.

Irrespective of whether the Minister believes that we are all working now, the conditions that we work in are not equal. Perhaps the Minister should consider that not all women were so fortunate as she was, staying in full-time education until the age of 22—[Interruption.]—Twenty-one. The Minister corrects me. And immediately starting work as a researcher for an MEP who happened to be her father. I do not want to make assumptions, so perhaps the Minister will clarify whether she considers the job working for her father, or a subsequent one as chief executive officer of the National Pony Society, to have been manual labour.

One of the women who got in touch with me told me:

“The Conservative Government has never had pocket money, just blank cheques—they have no idea about the real world.”

I will leave it to others to decide whether that is a fair depiction, but it is obvious that the Government have not done enough to help the women. Talk of a Government who work for working people would be laughable were it not such a serious subject.

Whenever such issues are raised, we are told that we live in a country with a social security system that prevents changes such as the change in pension age from leading to hardship. If the Government seriously believe that our social security system—gutted under Tory changes since 2010—is providing adequately for the women, perhaps it is true that

“they have no idea about the real world.”

However, I will give the Minister the opportunity to demonstrate her understanding of reality by asking her: first, does she acknowledge the existence of working-class women? Secondly, does she acknowledge that although many more of us may be working now, working-class women, who often face the challenges of poverty predominantly in manual trades, have specific experiences? Thirdly, does she acknowledge that working-class women were more likely to start working earlier, and to work in jobs that take a higher toll on the body? Fourthly, does she acknowledge that working-class women are more likely to die younger and to suffer more ill health in retirement? Fifthly, does she acknowledge that they are more likely to be more dependent on the state pension, not having benefited from subsidised work pensions? Does she agree that those five factors make it much more likely that they will not benefit from their retirement to the extent that more privileged groups do, and that the state pension changes are therefore more unjust? Will she commit to considering transitional arrangements for WASPI women? Will she commit to working with the Treasury to announce a solution to the dire predicament in which so many women have been left in the forthcoming Budget?

I called this debate on behalf of all women whose lives have been blighted owing to the ill-considered and discriminatory nature of the changes. As I started with the example of a constituent, I would now like to end with the experience of another working-class woman who, to my great regret, did not live long enough to be a constituent of mine: my mother.

My mother was born in the 1920s in the depths of another great depression when there was no national health service. She grew up in Newcastle in great poverty. Of her six siblings, only one survived into adulthood. Five died of the diseases of poverty: diseases that, in the absence of the national health service, destroyed the lives of so many and had consequences much later in life, causing health inequalities that the health service cannot eradicate—certainly not one as underfunded as the NHS is now. I am sure that that childhood poverty influenced her life expectancy. She died before her 70th birthday, but had lived—cheerfully—with ill health and disability for two decades previously.

It is absolutely iniquitous to imagine that my mother would have had perhaps just three or four years of pension —and that in great ill health—because the Government cannot recognise a fundamental injustice, and, indeed, do not even recognise the existence of working-class women. The debate is, however, not about my mother’s experience, or even Mrs Tenniswood’s experience; it is about the experiences of tens of thousands of working-class women whose lives and retirement have been blighted by changes that were ill-advised and poorly implemented, and in which they and their experiences were not considered.

I want to close my remarks with a small selection of quotations from the appeals that I received. One woman said:

“Stress has made me so ill, physically exhausted and mentally struggling to survive”.

Another said:

“Being too disabled to work is humiliating enough without being made to suffer further humiliation at my age. Hopes, dreams and careful plans to enjoy our retirement shattered. Savings all gone, future bleak! No letter, no notice.”

This came from another woman:

“I am at times very depressed as it felt like I had done a prison sentence for 44 years then, just before my release date, it was extended another six years.”

I came into politics to fight for people like those women, but I am not simply fighting on their behalf. I am fighting with them, side by side.

Another WASPI woman said:

“My mother welded fan blades for Ford Dagenham and it was women who all stood shoulder to shoulder that achieved equal pay for women.

Nothing is ever impossible if women are united in their cause.”

I believe that to be the case and I plead with the Minister to heed the voices of the thousands of working-class WASPI women who are crying out for justice.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison Thewliss]

The hon. Lady is correct. Some women are able to work, want to work and do work. Some do not want to retire, but want to keep working, and that is great for them. I knew women when I was a councillor for eight years before becoming an MP who want to work, are part of their community and want to contribute. That is fine if they are able to, but not all woman are able to. We must think of them and look after them all the more, because they have given so much during their lives.

[Chi Onwurah]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent contribution, but my intervention relates to the previous one. I have had two jobs that I have really enjoyed—Member of Parliament and engineer—and I hope to continue working into my seventies. Does the hon. Member for Eastleigh (Mims Davies) agree that my mother’s generation and the WASPI woman generation did not have our opportunities? Most of the Members of Parliament here are women. The previous generation did not have the opportunity to build up the sort of pension fund that we have and they did not have the opportunities for careers that give fulfilment without manual effort late in life. We should recognise that.

[Alison Thewliss]

The hon. Lady is absolutely correct. Some women have had opportunities stifled throughout their lives. They were not given the chance to go off and have the careers they wanted. My grandmother was forced to leave school. I have her school report and she was one of the brightest in her class, but her family said she had to go out and work and not stay on at school or go on to further education.

That has been the life path for many women. It is what they have done. During their working lives they have not spent as much time as they would have liked with their children, but they saw their retirement as an opportunity to get that back, to look after their grandchildren and to enjoy that experience instead of being forced to go out to work at all hours to try to bring in a wage. The Government should at least acknowledge the impact of that, particularly on families in poorer areas where childcare is not as available or is too expensive. These are women who were hoping to make a contribution to their families, providing childcare so that their children could go out to work and bring in an income.

We need to think about the contribution those women have made to society in the round and the debt we owe them. I urge the Government in the Budget in a few weeks to see what transitional arrangements can be put in place and what can be done to give those women the fair retirement they deserve.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chi Onwurah]

Will the Minister give way?

[Caroline Nokes]

Well, I might if there were not a little private chat going on at the front of the Chamber. Still, I acknowledge that the hon. Lady is no part of that, so I give way.

[Chi Onwurah]

So far, the Minister’s contribution has not really reflected what this debate is about. I remind her that I asked her five specific questions and that I observed that this is a debate about working-class women. She has yet to use the word “working-class”; I hope she will before she sits down.

[Caroline Nokes]

I draw the hon. Lady’s attention to the specific title of the debate, which I believe I am covering: “That this House has considered the effect of state pension changes”. I have dealt with the new state pension thoroughly, and I hope that we will all acknowledge that we have indeed had a significant change with the introduction of the new state pension.

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Nokes]

Thank you, Mr Flello.

As I was saying, that is why we continue to spend £90 billion a year on working-age benefits to assist those in this country who are unable to work. For those seeking work, people in receipt of working-age benefits can access a range of support from Jobcentre Plus and tailored support from the Work programme.

Specifically, the evidence is clear, and we as a Government are clear, that work is the best route out of poverty. That is why this Government’s approach has been about recognising the value and importance of work, to make work pay and to support people into work, while protecting the most vulnerable in society.

Our reforms are transforming lives. Today’s labour market statistics show that we continue to have a record number of people in work—over 2.7 million more than in 2010. The number of workless households is down by 865,000, and the percentage of households in the social sector where no one works has fallen from 49% to 38%, which is a decrease of nearly 350,000 households.

We have made a real difference for women, with more than 1 million more women in work since 2010 and the highest rate of female employment on record. The gender pay gap is also at its lowest level since records began, and there are now 1.2 million women-led small and medium-sized enterprises, which is more than ever before. We are rightly proud of our record but recognise that there is more to do.

We had to equalise state pension age to eliminate gender inequalities in social security provision—it is the right thing to do—and we had to accelerate this process due to increases in longevity, in order to protect the long-term sustainability of state pension provision in this country.

We know that whenever things change, there have to be dividing lines, and I understand that the changes are most stark for those closest to the line. That is no different in this case. We understand that and the Government listened to the concerns expressed at the time. Therefore, a concession worth more than £1 billion was introduced, despite the fiscal situation, to lessen the impact of the changes on those worst affected. The concession reduced the delay that anyone would experience in claiming their state pension and benefited almost a quarter of a million women.

However, going further than that simply cannot be justified, given that the underlying imperative must be to focus public resources on those most in need. I have listened to Opposition Members, and I have heard and understood their concerns. However, let me be clear—we are making no further concessions on this issue. As well as being unaffordable, reversing the Pensions Act 1995 would create an anomaly, whereby women would be expected to work for less time than they work now, and it would be discriminatory to men. It is not practical to implement.

John Cridland’s independent report on state pension age will consider wider factors that should—

[Chi Onwurah]

I certainly thank the Minister for finally coming to matters that are relevant to this debate and the people here. However, does she recognise the point that because the women we are discussing today started work earlier—at the age of 15, which is long before she or I started work—they are the generation who are working longer than any other generation? When she says that giving a further “concession” would mean that they ended up working for less time than other women, does she not recognise that they have worked, and are working, for longer?

[Robert Flello (in the Chair)]

Just before I call the Minister to continue, may I suggest that she perhaps speaks for only a couple more minutes?

--- Later in debate ---

[Chi Onwurah]

Thank you, Mr Flello, for calling me to speak again, and I congratulate you on your excellent chairing of this debate—if, indeed, we can call it a “debate”.

I thank the hon. Members from the Scottish National party and from my own party, in particular the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris), for their contributions, and for highlighting the experiences of so many hundreds of thousands—indeed, millions—of WASPI women; the poverty they have experienced and, indeed, the betrayal that so many of them feel at the tearing-up of the contract between state and citizen.

While I thank the Minister for including some relevant parts in her contribution, they were relevant only inasmuch as they made clear the Government’s total lack of understanding of the experience of WASPI women, and that no further “concession”—as the Minister chose to call it, whereas I would call it basic justice—would be offered.

I also observe that the Minister went through her entire contribution without mentioning “working-class women”, which is in the title of the debate. These women have worked the longest and suffered the greatest indignities in facing challenges that the Minister and I know nothing of, with regard to discrimination, poverty and lack of opportunity. That the Minister, from her privileged position, should nevertheless refuse to offer any kind of support or consideration to the great women of this country, who have worked so hard and deserve so much more from this place, I find absolutely unbelievable. Indeed, Mr Flello, I will sit down before I am forced to be disorderly in my condemnation of the Government’s position on this issue.

Question put,

That this House has considered the effect of state pension changes on working-class women.

The Chair’s opinion as to the decision of the Question was challenged.

Question not decided (Standing Order No. 10(13)).

Jobcentre Plus Offices: Closure

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 30th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Nokes]

Co-location is an important part of our strategy, and I am glad that my hon. Friend welcomes it. We need to identify the ways in which our claimants can best gain access not only to DWP services, but to the services of other organisations such as, in this instance, the local authority.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

The Minister has refused to answer this question, so I am going to give her another chance. Is she saying that she will repay the bus fares of my constituents who will now have to travel from the west end of Newcastle into the centre, or is she seriously proposing to make the most vulnerable people in Newcastle pay the cost of her failure?

[Caroline Nokes]

One of my first visits as a DWP Minister was to the jobcentre in Newcastle, and it was a great opportunity to see the universal credit full service being delivered at first hand. It is important to reflect on the specific criteria, and I am happy to answer the hon. Lady’s question. When people have to attend a jobcentre more than once a fortnight, we will reimburse them. As for those who are vulnerable and have childcare responsibilities, we are considering various ways in which we can deliver the service, which include allowing them to claim by post. We are very conscious that many people already travel much further than the distances that the hon. Lady has mentioned, either to go to work or to gain access to jobcentre services.

Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 11th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justin Tomlinson]

I would like to thank my hon. Friend, as his taskforce concluded its work within a month, and we have now secured agreement from my Department and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to open up in the apprenticeship programme greater opportunities for those with a learning disability. I am sure we will be coming to my hon. Friend very soon to help to extend the remit of the taskforce, which I am sure he would be delighted to chair.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

The Government are trialling distributed ledger technology, or blockchain, for the payment and spending of claimants’ benefits. It is a fantastic new technology, but the Government’s own report says that it needs a regulatory, ethical and data framework. How do we know that vulnerable benefits claimants are not being forced to share their data without giving proper informed consent?

[Stephen Crabb]

I thank the hon. Lady for that very interesting question. This technology is very new, and I confess that I am not an expert on it—the person who is is my noble Friend Lord Freud, who is, of course, in the other place. When it comes to security of claimants’ data, we are absolutely committed to the very highest standards of protection. However, in terms of the wider technology issue the hon. Lady refers to, I look forward to discussing it with her in more detail.

Oral Answers to Questions

Chi Onwurah Excerpts

Monday 1st February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vara]

The hon. Gentleman has a problem understanding, so I will say this very slowly: as a consequence of the triple lock, which means an increase in line with whichever is highest out of inflation, earnings and 2.5%, when the new state pension comes into place in April, pensioners will get £1,000 a year more than under the old system. As he should remember, Gordon Brown insulted pensioners with a 75p rise, so we will take no lectures from the Opposition on who really cares about pensioners.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

9. What assessment he has made of the effect on the income of working households of changes to the universal credit work allowance.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

The changes to universal credit work allowances form part of a broader package of measures, including the introduction of the new national living wage, the increase in the personal tax allowance and the enhanced package of childcare support. Importantly, the single taper rate of 65% ensures that the benefits of work are clear and that support is withdrawn at a predictable and consistent rate, unlike under the existing tax credits arrangement.

[Chi Onwurah]

The Government were forced into a climbdown over tax credit cuts, but it was only a temporary reprieve, because cuts to the working allowance mean that 2.5 million families will be £1,600 per year worse off by 2020. How can the Secretary of State say that he is making work pay, when low-paid working families are paying the price for his cuts?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I disagree with the hon. Lady. An independent study has already shown that with universal credit people get into work faster, stay in work longer and progress faster in earnings. She cannot take this in isolation, however; it is worth remembering that the national minimum wage is rising to some £9, and that under universal credit women will get 85% of their childcare costs, instead of 70%. There will be free childcare for poorer people with two-year-olds, and childcare support for people with three and four-year-olds. The total package is hugely beneficial to people who want to work, which is why, as we get more people back to work, our record will only improve. That compares with the last Government’s shocking record: one in five households with nobody in work.