Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(5 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mel Stride)
The time taken to process a new PIP claim fell from 26 weeks in August 2021 to 15 weeks at the end of January this year.
Helen Morgan
I have recently helped a constituent who waited four months for an appeal against an initial PIP decision. The paperwork for that decision was incorrect—it referred to another person; we do not know who that person was—and it took another four months to correct that, and another month to pay her. The process could best be described as a shambles. Another constituent has described it as a “highly stressful, bureaucratic nightmare”. Will the Secretary of State give us some reassurance that his Department is working to speed up the process and make it more dignified for those people applying for help?
Mel Stride
I set out the improvement in the processing times that people have been experiencing. In fact, we are now at 15 weeks—that was the figure at the end of January —which is quicker than was the case during the pandemic. I cannot comment on the individual circumstances that the hon. Lady has identified, but I will of course be happy to look at the matter that she has raised.
Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(9 months ago)
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Mims Davies
I was in Aberdeen on Thursday meeting women with health conditions and hearing about how we can better support women who are having debilitating impacts from the menopause. That was in the oil and gas sector, where it takes a long time to build up to a senior career. I would be interested to hear about the work that the hon. Lady’s local team are doing. Through the wider women’s health strategy, we are supporting women to have a thriving career all the way through. I am keen to hear from her and those women, and to support the women to stay in work.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Paul Maynard)
The Government are dedicated to ensuring that parents meet their obligations to children, and we take robust enforcement action against those who do not. Parents who paid some maintenance on the collect and pay service increased from 64% to 69% over the 12 months from September 2022.
Helen Morgan
My constituent’s daughter is a young lady who has missed out for more than a year on child maintenance payments, because her father changed jobs and the Child Maintenance Service lost track of him. My team have been involved, and despite lots of faffing, she still has not received a payment. She is one of around half of children in separated families who are not receiving the maintenance payments they deserve. Will the Minister explain what his Department is doing to ensure that the employers of these missing parents are properly chased up?
Paul Maynard
Where parents have certain categories of taxable income not being captured by the standard child maintenance calculation, they can make a request to the CMS to have the calculation varied. We have consulted on proposals to include more types of taxable income held by His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs in the standard maintenance calculation.
Autumn Statement Resolutions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(11 months, 1 week ago)
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Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
I draw hon. Members’ attention to the fact that I am a vice-president of the Local Government Association. I am afraid that the autumn statement will have come as a disappointment to many living in my North Shropshire constituency and rural places across Britain. After years of mismanagement, the Conservative Government have left hard-working people to pay for their mistakes. Some elements of the statement were welcome, such as lifting the freeze on housing allowance and increasing the national living wage, but they will not change the daily reality for many of my constituents who are struggling with stealth tax hikes and spiralling mortgage repayments.
I turn first to the Chancellor’s announcement to increase the national living wage by almost 10%. My Liberal Democrat colleagues and I welcome the increase for the lowest paid, but, for people in rural areas, it will not offset the impact of the cost of living crisis. People in rural Britain spend an average of £800 more a year on fuel because of poor public transport, and those who are off grid are still paying about twice the amount for their heating oil than they were before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. I therefore urge the Government to support off-grid residents with their energy bills by implementing an off-grid energy cap so that those affected do not have to continue to choose between heating and eating.
The Chancellor has increased the living wage but failed to help local councils fund those increased wages. I have heard from councils run by all political parties that they are currently struggling to provide good services because of the crippling costs of social care, special educational needs and disabilities support, and temporary housing. Councils will have to pay either directly or to their contractors the cost of those increased wages, yet the Chancellor is asking them to find that money from their existing budgets.
That brings me to the closely related subject of social care. There were no announcements of any new investment in adult social care, or indeed children’s social care, in the Chancellor’s statement. For anyone who provides or receives social care, that will be incredibly worrying. Social care services are already under immense pressure, waiting lists for care assessments and provision are at all-time highs, and there are serious retention and recruitment problems in the sector—and they are especially acute in rural places such as Shropshire. Not only did the Chancellor fail to address that in his statement, but his unfunded announcement of an increase in the national living wage will only put further pressure on those services.
Shropshire Council has reported that it spends 85% of its budget on social care. Since I was elected, I have spent a significant amount of time talking to care providers in North Shropshire. They report struggling desperately to meet the need for care packages; they often cross-subsidise them through their private work. But care providers for adults with learning disability, autism spectrum disorder or lifelong high levels of need often do not have such private work, so with central Government not funding the increased wage costs—or local government unable to raise its own finance—there is a risk of a huge crisis in the sector. Crucially, a social care service under more pressure will have dangerous knock-on implications for bed availability in hospitals and—where I am, this is the most acute problem—ambulance waiting times.
After hearing the autumn statement, many people will feel they are about to relive last winter’s NHS nightmare, which the Government have repeatedly promised to prevent. For example, in the last week, NHS Shrewsbury, Telford and Wrekin Integrated Care Board has urged my constituents to stay away from A&E if at all possible because it knows that the department will be under extreme pressure with limited bed availability. The root cause of that is in delays in discharging patients who are well enough to leave hospital. That will only be exacerbated if care providers are unable to recoup their staffing costs from the local authority paying them to provide that care. It is a disgrace that the Government have not recognised the desperate need for investment in adult social care, and as such hospitals are bracing for another incredibly difficult winter.
Conservative Ministers have not got a clue about how to get the economy back on track. They simply do not understand that a healthy economy needs a healthy population, and that requires a healthy NHS and a healthy care sector. The Tories have cut taxes for the big banks and let fossil fuel extractors off the hook from the windfall tax. Liberal Democrats urge the Government to look again at those taxes to fund the sectors that will allow the economy to grow again.
I turn to the Chancellor’s decision to lift the freeze on local housing allowance to support more households with paying their rent. I am sure that is good news for the 8.5 million people who the National Housing Federation estimated are living with unmet housing need this year. A lack of affordable and social housing is a real issue in North Shropshire, where the average house price is 8.6 times average earnings, according to the all-party parliamentary group for rural business and the rural powerhouse, of which I am a member. About 175,000 people are on rural housing lists at the moment, and homelessness is increasing, especially among young people.
I draw the House’s attention to two key shortfalls to the announcement. First, the Chancellor did not commit to ruling out reinstating a freeze in the future, so the policy could be reversed, with the result that councils cannot easily plan ahead their financial budgets. Secondly, it did not apply to temporary accommodation, so the maximum subsidy will remain capped at 90% of rates in January 2011. In my constituency alone, the number of households living in temporary accommodation has more than doubled since 2018, placing yet more strain on council budgets.
Councils of all political parties have recently written an open letter to the Chancellor to explain the unprecedented demand for temporary accommodation and its associated astronomical increase in costs on their budgets. They need urgent clarification that housing allowance will not be frozen again in future and that they will be subsidised to manage this difficult problem going forward.
On mobile signal investment, I welcome the Government’s announcement that 10 regions will be awarded funding for 5G connection for businesses and residents. Mobile connection is an issue that I have significant personal experience with. A mobile signal is essential to a functioning community and paves the way for successful and growing businesses. It will surprise no one that all those areas of the UK that do not receive a 4G signal are classed as rural. Thirteen per cent of my constituency is a partial notspot, and 50% of indoor spaces in North Shropshire do not receive a 4G signal from any of the top four operators. That significantly impacts businesses in my constituency as they struggle to operate without a signal. Therefore, while 5G technology is welcome, I hope that the Government will understand that, to level up rural Britain, a 4G signal needs to be available first.
To conclude, I am worried about the stability of local government to provide essential services, the impact on the health service and the levelling-up of rural Britain.
Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(1 year, 9 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mims Davies)
I wholeheartedly agree that, as we have heard, work is more than just a pay packet. I am delighted about the impact of more than 150 youth hubs, such as the Factory—I visited the one at the central library, but I did not get to that one—that are working with flagship employers and small employers. I am keen to see how that youth hub changes lives and opens up progression for young people who would like to learn from my hon. Friend’s local DWP team’s success.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Tom Pursglove)
I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s question. It is important to point out that the reform to the warm home discount, which expands the support available, means that 160,000 more households where a person is disabled or has a long-term illness will receive a rebate. If she provides me with the details of the cases in question, I will be happy to look at them.
Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(1 year, 11 months ago)
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Tom Pursglove
I thank the shadow Minister for raising the issue of Carolynne’s situation. I am, of course, under no illusions about how challenging many people are finding the current circumstances and climate. We are providing the package of support that I have already described—which is the right thing to do—in addition to the discretionary help that is there to address particularly pressing needs in individual cases. As the hon. Lady will know, the Chancellor announced in the autumn statement that as part of ongoing future work we would be considering, for instance, social tariffs, and I also want to look into what more we can do in the longer term to help families deal with continuing significant costs.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Laura Trott)
State pension age equalisation and subsequent increases have been the policy of successive Governments. The phasing in of state pension age increases was agreed to by the hon. Lady’s party in 2011 and 2014.
Helen Morgan
Last July the pensions ombudsman concluded that the Government had been too slow to inform many women that they would be affected by the rising state pension age. Along with the cost of living crisis, this means that many of the WASPI women—Women Against State Pension Inequality—are struggling to get by, and it is one of the concerns most frequently raised in my weekly surgeries. I wonder whether the Secretary of State will commit himself to an interim payment for the women affected by the change in pension age while they wait for the release of the ombudsman’s final report.
Laura Trott
As the hon. Lady knows, the investigation is ongoing, so it would not be appropriate to take any further steps at this stage.
Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(2 years ago)
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Mims Davies
This is an issue that I was already looking into. I am aware of my hon. Friend’s concern, and I shall be happy to meet him and be given an update on the situation.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
Along with many other Members who are present today, I have received a number of emails from concerned pensioners, including one who wrote that if the triple lock is not maintained:
“myself and many others will have to pare our spending even more. Occasional meet-ups with friends will be the next to go and then more and more people will become isolated and depressed.”
Does the Secretary of State agree that maintaining the triple lock will improve the health and wellbeing of our pensioners as we go into the winter?
Laura Trott
I completely understand those concerns, but that is why we have provided a package of support—now—which is worth more than £850 for everyone receiving a state pension and £1,500 for those receiving pension credit.
Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Dr Coffey
Mr Speaker, I was going to say that when we share taxpayers’ money with people looking for work, it is important that they honour their side of the bargain. When they do not, there often have to be consequences. That is not something that we seek to do—we try to work with people—but it is really important that people do their bit of the bargain when they look for work.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
I am troubled by the number of constituents who have recently come to me because either they have been overpaid in error by the DWP or they are struggling to receive their first payment because of administrative difficulties, when they are already really struggling. What steps is the Department taking to ensure that errors and disputes can be resolved satisfactorily and in a timely way so that those repayments will not push them over the edge and into poverty?
Guy Opperman
If the hon. Lady writes to the Department, whether to me or to the Secretary of State direct, we will look into those specific examples, ensure that they are addressed and get a decent answer to her on the specific problems. However, I cannot give a generic answer today.
Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Guy Opperman
I sincerely hope that my hon. Friend’s local paper contains a letter from me this week explaining exactly why upwards of £3,000 is available to vulnerable pensioners—serious money that is as yet unclaimed. We are keen that my hon. Friend’s constituents and others claim pension credit, because it is an important source of money for the most vulnerable. We already spend £5 billion on it, and we want to spend more, but people must claim.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
Countless pensioners across my constituency have been forced to make the heartbreaking choice between heating and eating. They were told all their lives that if they worked hard enough then, when their time came to retire, we would take care of them. However, it is evident from those contacting me that that is no longer the case.
As the Secretary of State and the Pensions Minister have already outlined, the Government provide a range of benefits to older people in a whole host of areas, including housing, NHS dental treatment and transport costs. Those things can go a long way to helping with the cost of living crisis, but many such benefits go unclaimed each year. What steps is the Secretary of State taking to ensure that older people are aware of and able to access the benefits for which they are eligible?
Dr Coffey
My hon. Friend the Pensions Minister has already set out the huge number of ways that we are trying to increase awareness. I think it is accurate to say, from internal management information, that we have seen a 30% increase in people applying, so we are encouraging take-up. The lowest proportion of pensioners taking up such things are those with an income above the basic state pension who are still entitled to savings credit, and we need to work harder on that. Just getting a few pennies from the state can unlock hundreds of pounds for their costs.
Cost of Living Increases: Pensioners
Helen Morgan Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
Increasing numbers of pensioners in my constituency have been reaching out to me in recent weeks, because they face the real choice of heating or eating. It seems unfair that while some businesses have made enormous profits from the pandemic and the energy price hike, individuals face financial ruin for exactly the same reasons.
A retired couple in my constituency wrote to tell me that the combined impact of removing the triple lock on pensions, the increase in energy prices, and the Conservative-led Shropshire Council’s maximum 4.9% council tax rise this year means that they can no longer afford to heat and eat. They worked throughout their adulthood before retiring, but their energy bill has increased from £960 a year to more than £2,400. Every week, there are stories of people from all parts of society reporting the same issues, such as that they can afford to heat only one room of their house and they are experiencing damp inside. Citizens Advice has even told me that it has had someone who is afraid to boil the kettle for a cup of tea because their financial situation is so precarious.
In more rural parts of Britain, as hon. Members have said, there is an additional element to the energy cost crisis: people whose homes are off grid or rely on oil or liquefied petroleum gas to heat them are not protected by the energy price cap. They have to pay huge amounts up front to fill their tanks and in addition, there are now shortages of heating oil and rationing. I have constituents in their 70s who have no access to heating or hot water, let alone the means to pay for the fuel if it were available. We desperately need the energy price cap to be extended to heating oil and LPG to protect people who live in isolated areas.
It is not all about energy either. Elderly residents in rural communities are most likely to be isolated without access to a car or public transport and without a computer to shop online. Research by Citizens Advice Shropshire shows that a basket of essential items is up to two and a half times more expensive in a local village shop than in a town-based supermarket, so our pensioners are being hit really hard by this cost of living crisis. It is so extensive this time around that it is hitting households who have not previously faced fuel poverty, and those who, sadly, are only too used it are seeing a crisis like never before.
It is just not right that this is being allowed to continue while companies that extract oil and gas reap billions as a result of what, for them, are purely lucky circumstances. It is desperately unfair. Tax, benefits and pensions should be fair, and should be used to protect the vulnerable. That is why I support, among other measures, a windfall tax on oil and gas companies and a temporary reduction in the rate of VAT, and I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement earlier that the Government will honour their own manifesto commitment to reinstate the triple lock on pensions.
It is also essential for the Government to take more effective action to ensure that those who are eligible for pension credit are aware of that fact and are able to access it. As many people have mentioned, it is estimated that more than £1.5 billion goes unclaimed every year, and yet it is a key to unlock all sorts of other essential benefits. Surely it should now be a priority to ensure that all of those who are eligible are accessing all of the help available to them. Every day that goes by is another day of deep concern for our pensioners. I think the time to act for them was months ago, but I hope the Chancellor has a set of meaningful measures to announce in his statement on Wednesday, because although it may already be too late, I hope it is not too little for North Shropshire’s pensioners.
Several hon. Members rose—
Oral Answers to Questions
Helen Morgan Excerpts(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Mims Davies
I absolutely agree about the challenges when it comes to employment. That leads us to the need for a longer-term plan for pensions and everything that comes with it. Indeed, one in 100 women experience menopause by the age of 40. The hon. Lady and I were both in the first cross-Government taskforce, with the Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield), on Thursday. This is a key agenda point, and I look forward to working with the hon. Lady on it.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Guy Opperman)
I welcome the hon. Lady to her place in the House of Commons, and I welcome back the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Amy Callaghan). It is good to see her back in her place—I am pleased to see that.
The practical truth is that pensioner poverty has reduced under this Government. This Government increased state pension by 2.5% in 2021-22 and will uprate it by 3.1% in 2022-23. We are also spending approximately £5 billion to support 1.4 million pensioners through pension credit.
Helen Morgan
Pensioners across North Shropshire and the rest of the country are falling into poverty. Last week, a retired couple from Ellesmere, in my constituency, contacted me to tell me that even though they live in a modest bungalow, because of the rising costs of their food and energy bills they have been put in the heartbreaking position of having to choose between heating and eating. That is a choice no one should ever have to make.
Rural communities are being hit hardest by the energy bill price hike, and they have higher numbers of pensioners hit by the suspension of the triple lock. In Shropshire, the Conservative-led council is pushing through the maximum council tax increase this spring. What steps can the Secretary of State or the Minister take to ensure that our retired residents are not put into this dreadful position of choosing between heating and eating?
Guy Opperman
I refer the hon. Lady to the specific points set out by the Chancellor last week, namely the £144 million-worth of discretionary funding, the non-repayable £150 cash rebate and the £200 smoothing rebate on energy bills for all households. Those are in addition to the ability to claim for pension credit, which is, of course, a passport to many different pension awards in many different situations.