Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Simon Clarke

Monday 24th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Mr Simon Clarke)]

We are always up for new ideas. Town deal boards should be business-led and representative of their communities. We provided guidance on their membership and made it clear that we expect to see a business chair and the local MP on the board. We will set out a clear decision-making process for boards to follow.

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

T2. Some 850,000 people are currently living with dementia, and that includes 2,000 people in my Oldham East and Saddleworth constituency. The typical care costs for somebody living with dementia are £100,000. In its Fix Dementia Care campaign the Alzheimer’s Society has called for an additional £8 billion to be spent on social care, including £2.65 billion specifically for dementia. What discussions has the Secretary of State had with the new Chancellor to ensure that that happens?

Department for Work and Pensions

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Simon Clarke

Tuesday 2nd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clarke]

Child benefit is, obviously, a sensitive issue, but the point is that a family not in the welfare system, perhaps just above the entitlement level for welfare support, has to make rational choices in their life. All families have to make rational choices in their life about the size of the family they can afford. Lots of people find it wrong that the system would allow people to have any number of children, whereas those people not in the system have to make budgetary choices. That is not a principle I am uncomfortable defending.

Let us go to the wider point, as we need to go back to first principles on this. I do not doubt the sincere differences we have and Labour Members’ concerns, but they have to justify the fact that under their Government 1.4 million people spent most of 2000 to 2010 trapped on out-of-work benefits, with some receiving more than the average wage. Some 50,000 households were allowed to claim benefits worth more than £26,000 a year. I represent a low-wage constituency in the north of England and I simply cannot justify a situation whereby the logical thing was for people to stay earning that amount of benefits rather than to be in work. That has profound and adverse social consequences.

[Debbie Abrahams]

I think what we are trying to do with this debate is look at where we are now. The hon. Gentleman is right, and we did not get everything wrong, but what we need to do is look at the system now. It is clearly not fit for purpose. The way he was talking made it sound as though he also had concerns about the number of children, and the number of sick and disabled people, living in poverty. I am sure he was not suggesting that all the sick and disabled people who require support are shirkers or scroungers, and that there is nothing wrong with them. So what do we do now?

[Mr Clarke]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right; of course, there are lots of people who, for reasons that are totally out of their control, need our support and compassion. No Conservative Member would argue with that. I would argue that we get more money for those people by ensuring that the system has the resource available to devote to those families and those individuals, rather than to those who do not need that support and need to be in work. We have seen a record number of people come into work. We are seeing record female employment. We are seeing a record number of disabled people move into work. We should celebrate all those things. Just as those on the other side are quick to point out the problems with the system—and any system run by Government that is as Byzantine as the welfare system will always throw up hard cases that need to be looked at carefully—we also need to recognise the considerable social policy success that has been represented by helping the equivalent of the entire population of Wales, more than 3 million people, move into work during this Government’s time in office. That is a really important shift and we do not want to see this go backwards because we have changed the incentives in the system.

That is one reason I was so profoundly opposed to the amendments tabled by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) in this debate. I do not think it was appropriate for this debate and these estimates to be drawn into the context of the Brexit debate. That was profoundly unwelcome. No matter which side of the House someone sits on, we have to try to keep certain aspects of the debate separate. It will be interesting to hear from the shadow Front Bencher what the Labour party’s position would have been had the amendment been accepted and what it would be were a future such attempt to be made. It is important to put on the record that there are some aspects of this debate that are simply more important than the issue of the UK’s membership of the European Union—or not. In truth, the two things are fundamentally discrete.