Universal Credit

Gordon Henderson Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Gordon Henderson (Sittingbourne and Sheppey) (Con)]

My constituency has been operating the universal credit full service since January this year, so I like to think that I know something about what is being delivered at a grassroots level and the effect it is having on my constituents who claim it.

Let me begin by saying that UC is not perfect, but nor is any benefits system that we have ever had in this country. UC replaced a legacy system that was deeply flawed and offered no incentive for people to work. It is true to say that despite a number of improvements that have been made to UC since its roll-out started, it still has a number of faults, which I will come to later. However, it is certainly not the disaster caricatured by right hon. and hon. Members on the Opposition Benches. For some time, the Labour party has been busy whipping up opposition to UC, criticising it at every opportunity. These continual criticisms are not only a metaphorical two-fingered insult to the incredibly hard-working staff in my local DWP offices—they are delivering an excellent service to my constituents—but are misleading the public and frightening some very vulnerable people.

Of course, the introduction of any system can be problematic. I, too, had concerns about how it would affect people in my area when it was rolled out, so I visited my local jobcentres and sat down with the staff to go through their plans with them to ensure that none of the claimants moving from the legacy system to UC would be disadvantaged. I was impressed by the commitment and enthusiasm of the staff and was satisfied that they would be prioritising the most vulnerable claimants.

At the time, I urged staff to contact me should they come into contact with anybody they were unable to help because of the system, and I promised to take up those problems with DWP Ministers. No such problems have been referred to me by the jobcentres.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

I went along to the Jobcentre Plus in Cheltenham and I had the same experience as my hon. Friend. Staff were enthusiastic about the benefits that it was creating, and crucially, people in work were, on average, receiving an additional £600 a year. Does he not agree that that important factor should be weighed in this conversation?

--- Later in debate ---

[Gordon Henderson]

Yes, that is an important factor. I also point out that Opposition Members often quote concerns raised by citizens advice bureaux about the impact of UC on local people. Well, I visited my local citizens advice bureaux and suggested that they work closely with my office to identify people with a problem, so that they could be helped. I did the same thing with a local church group that contacted me expressing concerns about UC. In addition, I used social media to ask people to contact me if they were facing difficulties because of UC, or if they knew of somebody facing difficulties. I have had only a handful of people referred to me since we went live in January and all the problems raised were resolved quickly by my staff.

The Opposition have also made much of the use of food banks, and I want to touch on that issue. My first experience of food banks in my constituency was when our local steelworks closed down and some workers were left without any money to buy food for their families. There was a long delay in getting those people the financial help that they needed and to which they were entitled. That delay did not arise under UC, but under the legacy benefit system. We hear repeated claims from Opposition Members that the transition to UC has forced more people to use food banks, so to check their claims, I went to visit a food bank in my constituency last week to find out for myself. [Interruption.] The volunteers who run that food bank are wonderful people for whom I have the utmost respect, as are the volunteers in the other food banks in my constituency.

[Heidi Allen]

I hope that my friends in the Opposition will forgive me for saying this, but everybody in the Chamber genuinely wants to get UC right, and I would rather that Opposition Members did not belittle my hon. Friend, who is genuinely trying to do his best to find out what is happening in his constituency.

[Gordon Henderson]

As my hon. Friend will understand, the claim is being made that some people who use those food banks were forced to do so because of the difficulties faced when claiming UC. When I pressed them about those difficulties, they said that one was the requirement for claims to be made online, which was also raised by the shadow Secretary of State. Some people claimed that they either were not computer literate or did not have access to a computer.

[Neil Coyle]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Gordon Henderson]

I will not give way again because I do not have time. I pointed out that such people could visit the local jobcentre, where they would be able to use one of the bank of computers installed there. In addition, they would be helped to navigate the system by a member of staff or a volunteer from one of the voluntary organisations that are now based in the jobcentre.

Of course, there were people who faced other difficulties, so I asked the food bank to provide me with details of those people so that I could get somebody to contact them to investigate and take up their cases with the DWP. When we received that information, we discovered that many of the people were living in a local hostel that provides temporary accommodation for homeless adults. A member of my staff contacted the people concerned and it soon became obvious that some of them suffered from underlying problems that affected their ability to manage the transition to UC, and that forced them into using the food bank. Those problems included drug addiction, alcoholism, mental health problems, an inability to manage money, or plain fecklessness. Automatically blaming their problems on UC, which is what the Opposition appear to be doing, is doing those people no favours. If somehow the delivery of UC could be made perfect overnight, that would not make people any less dependent on drugs or alcohol. It would not solve their mental health problems. It would not help them to manage their money better and it would not make them less feckless. Of course, we have to do something to help those people, but the truth is that they would still have the same problems, whatever benefits system was put in place.

Luckily, such people are in the minority. However, there are some people who have genuine concerns, which leads me nicely on to the faults in the system that I mentioned at the beginning of my speech. My No. 1 concern is the five weeks’ delay in the receipt of the first benefit payment made under UC. I urge the Department to look at whether there is a way in which that can be phased in over a longer period. Of course, people can get an advance payment, but some people are simply unable to manage that money well enough for it to last five weeks, so again, I ask for that to be looked at. I know of claimants, by the way, who spend the money in the first week and then have to resort to food banks for the remaining weeks.

The second problem is the repayment requirement for an advance payment. That is something else I would like the Department to look at to see whether it could be done over a two-year, rather than a one-year, period. The third problem is that under the legacy system, claimants were provided with a letter confirming what benefits they were receiving. Under UC, that is not provided and I would like that to be changed if possible. The final thing, which I have taken up with the NHS, is that there is no box for UC on the back of prescriptions, and I would like that to change as well.