Jobseekers (Back to Work Schemes) Bill

Debate between Derek Twigg and Liam Byrne

Tuesday 19th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

The hon. Lady raises an extremely important point, and that is why we have sought to ensure that the Bill includes our safeguards, which preserve the right to appeal with good cause, and the 13-month appeal window during which people can lodge objections to the sanctions regime. To answer the hon. Lady directly, I do believe that the DWP should be equipped with the power to issue sanctions. That general foundation has been in the hands of Ministers for more than a century. The new deal programmes and the future jobs fund that Labour put in place had sanctions attached to them—indeed, they were tightened by the Welfare Reform Act 2009—and I do not believe that those powers should be empty ones. However, nor do I believe they should be in the ether—in the hands of Ministers who have no obligation to put in place genuine back-to-work programmes that are better than doing nothing, unlike today’s Work programme.

[Derek Twigg]

Is there not evidence in our constituencies of people being taken off benefits for no good reason? For example, a constituent who was attending the funeral of a close relative had her benefits stopped. People with mental health issues, particularly young men, are kicked off benefit for no good reason.

[Mr Byrne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to flag that up. He will know that the DWP’s own guidance says that “good cause” for appealing against a sanction decision includes bereavement where the claimant was arranging or attending a funeral of a close relative or friend. That is why it is vital that we seek to protect these appeal rights in the Bill.

The ultimate test of whether a back-to-work programme is working is perhaps the one the Secretary of State set out when he spoke in Easterhouse all those years ago. He said that

“we need a jobs revolution. Every working-age adult capable of earning a decent living for themselves and their dependants must be helped to have the opportunity to do so”.

Since he took office, unemployment has increased in three quarters of the estates with the worst unemployment levels in Britain. It has not got better; it has got worse.

Finance Bill

Debate between Derek Twigg and Liam Byrne

Tuesday 6th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

That is precisely right and I will have more to say on that in a moment.

I promised a ray of good news among all the bad news and depressed expectations from the business community. A command paper was sneaked out last week. It had barely a press notice—it ran to a grand total of six lines—and there was no written ministerial statement with it. What could justify such secrecy? All is revealed on page 52 of the public expenditure survey, published last week, wherein we discover that Departments under Labour’s management underspent their budgets last year by £5 billion. Anyone would think that the Government wanted to keep that news secret. In a knee-jerk response yesterday, they decided to cover it up by announcing another £1.5 billion of spending cuts instead.

[Derek Twigg]

In Halton, £168 million of the Building Schools for the Future project was cut yesterday. The Mersey gateway has been postponed, and if it is cut it will take the total loss of investment—in that one area—to £0.5 billion. In an area like Merseyside and Cheshire, which especially needs that investment, that will be a massive blow to the construction industry. Does not it also underline the fact that public expenditure provides private sector jobs?

[Mr Byrne]

One of the great flaws in the Budget is that the Government are relying on a bounce-back in private investment, for which there is barely a precedent, and nor is there any evidence from the business community that it might happen.

Make no bones about it, since the Chancellor sat down a fortnight ago, the gloom has grown. However, the Finance Bill does not adjust the Government’s strategy. All we have heard from the Chief Secretary this afternoon is a very clear economic credo: where there is worry, let us spread fear, and where there is risk, let us bring danger. Whereas the Labour Government planned to halve the deficit in four years—a plan that the Chancellor’s own independent advisers said we were on track to deliver, and which the G20 said met its timetable—this Chancellor has added nearly £40 billion in new tax rises and spending cuts. He has locked us on a course to slash away come what may, and, in a world full of risk, he is now preaching to others to do the same.