Under-occupancy Penalty

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Thursday 28th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justin Tomlinson]

Why was no additional support provided to vulnerable people when Labour introduced it for the private sector? That was not fair.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

Will the Minister —[Interruption.] Mr Speaker, I apologise, but I have lost my voice and cannot shout.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Gentleman says that he has lost his voice, which saddens me. The least that we owe the hon. Gentleman is a degree of quietude so that we might detect what he has to say.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. On a point of fact, will the Minister and his officials by the end of today be able to supply me and all other Welsh MPs with a list of how many people who are in households where there are victims of domestic violence or disabled children will be affected if this decision is upheld? On a point of common decency, if he and his Ministers are unable to issue an apology today, if the decision is upheld, will he then apologise?

[Justin Tomlinson]

I am not sure whether we can get all that information by the end of today, but I am happy to see how quickly we can get as much of it as possible to the hon. Gentleman.

Welfare Reform and Work Bill

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Monday 20th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Timms]

I fear that the hon. Gentleman did not understand the Budget. According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, the Budget reduced the income of 3 million working families by over £1,000 a year on average, and in many cases it lessens the incentive for the first person in a household to go into work. He need only read the very clear analysis of that point by the IFS.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend goes right to the heart of one of the difficulties involved. I support the idea of getting away from taxpayer-funded poverty pay to a situation where people are paid a genuine living wage. The IFS analysis shows clearly that the people most affected by this change are working families in the second lowest decile. If it goes through, together with the other changes, I will have to go back to my constituents and explain why I have made them poorer in work.

[Stephen Timms]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight this, because the IFS is absolutely clear that the cuts in tax credits target working families. Those people will lose out from the changes not in this Bill but in the Budget—that is why we voted against them. This is not about making work pay; it is about making working families pay. As the party of working families, we will be fighting those changes tooth and nail in the period ahead.

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[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

Welfare reform is needed, but if it is badly thought through it will hurt people, including low-paid workers. The Bill cannot be supported without major changes, so I say to the Government, think again. If the benefits and social security regime is not subject to sensible and proportionate reform, popular support for it across society will fracture, and the case for giving assistance to those in need will be undermined. That in turn will give those who are politically or ideologically opposed to providing assistance to the vulnerable, the temporarily jobless, the low-paid in expensive private sector housing, those with life-changing disabilities, carers and others the opportunity to destroy a social contract that has been steadily constructed and refined over decades.

The support regime must of course be refreshed and renewed for each new generation, and to fit prevailing social and economic conditions. Those who argue against any change are doing real harm to the durability of that social contract. But those changes must be carefully considered and evidenced, proportionate and progressive.

The Government are opening themselves up to accusations that their intentions may not be entirely pure and may not be focused on good and appropriate reforms. We can look at the rush, and at the dismissal of critical analysis of the consequences of tax and benefit changes. There is a seemingly cavalier and careless attitude to negative impacts on low-paid working families, carers, some people with disabilities, and absolute and relative child poverty. All those things suggest that the honourable and high ambitions of some Government Members—to reform the regime to help people out of poverty—risk being bound together with a lower and less honourable ideological fixation with urging the poor to sort themselves out.

I have long been in favour of sensible, progressive and radical welfare reform. Most people, including Labour party members and supporters, want those reforms focused on conditionality, which is not limited only to funds, to help people back to work. They want support for those who genuinely cannot work, and help for carers that gives them dignity, not a begging bowl. They also want a continuing commitment and specific policies to target and remove poverty. Those are all marks of a decent society and decent government. Yet I cannot and will not vote for the Bill today, despite the need for reform, because it risks making life more miserable, desperate and unforgiving for some of the most financially exposed and vulnerable people in our society. The full-throated proponents of the Bill do not seem to see that, or perhaps they do not want to see it.

The core mission of government surely has to be to help make the lives of people better, or, at the very least not to make them worse. That is why I urge all Government Members, including well-meaning supporters of the Bill, to think long and hard before swallowing it whole. The digestion of the contents by their constituents back home will be long and bitter, compared with the short-lived, sugary-sweet taste of a brief political moment in Westminster. I say to them: do not punish low-paid workers, when the IFS shows clearly that the combined impact of the tax and benefit reforms will do exactly that; do not further impoverish children, when groups such as 4Children, which are not against reform, call for changes to be made sensitively and intelligently; do not shoot the messenger by dismissing authoritative organisations and individuals who point out the flaws in the Government’s proposals.

The Bill as it stands will not have my support today, and unless it is changed to take into account the valid concerns that have been raised, it will not have my support in future. In the light of all the dangers contained in it, I call on the Government to think again.

Child Poverty

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I have never seen such things as either/or. A well-balanced Government will decide how they can help certain specific groups with support where necessary. We have done that in a variety of areas, including through the tax credits we inherited from the previous Labour Government and now through universal credit. I am a great believer in this: if, as we have done, we give people incentives by raising the threshold and taking millions of low-paid people out of tax, that has got to be good because now that they do not pay tax, they can hold on to more of their money.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State will no doubt want to join me in welcoming the Welsh Labour Government’s moves to tackle the deep roots of poverty, whether relative or absolute poverty, including schemes such as the Flying Start programme. He will also welcome the news that Labour-controlled Rhondda Cynon Taf Council intends to move all its workers on to the living wage. Does he agree with the concern that cuts to in-work benefits that happen too soon and are not commensurate or simultaneous with rises in the minimum wage or a move towards the living wage will inevitably impact on absolute poverty in working households?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am not altogether acquainted with the programmes that the hon. Gentleman mentions, but I have talked at length to the devolved Administration in Wales. We have endlessly discussed how we can interact. I would like us to interact more; they are sometimes a bit resistant to doing so. My purpose is to help people to get back to work and out of poverty. Wales is seeing a bit of a renaissance in terms of people going back to work, which is good news. As far as I am concerned, we want to help people through work, and I want employers to pay their people a decent wage. I have ensured that the Department for Work and Pensions in London pays the London living wage to all, including the cleaners.

DWP: Performance

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I will give way in a second.

Equally, under Labour the DWP spent £13 million on first-class travel. I honestly wonder whether anybody wanted to see them that much more quickly as they got off at the other end—I doubt it. We have banned that.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I will give way in a second; I want to set out the ground rules. The motion contains no mention of those efficiencies or achievements, no suggestion of what Labour would do and—there is no better illustration of how cynical the Opposition are—no admission of the shambles they left behind. The economy was at breaking point, £112 billion had been wiped off our GDP and we were burdened with the largest deficit in peacetime history. Welfare bills were completely out of control. Housing benefit alone had doubled, contributing to overall spending increasing by 60%. The benefits system was in meltdown, with a mess of 30-plus benefits that meant that work simply did not pay.

Under Labour, the safety net had become a trap—

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[Huw Irranca-Davies]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for giving way. I make no apology for speaking up for constituents who are very concerned about what is happening to them, having been caught up in the system. He attacks us for cynicism. Is he also concerned by the report last week from Macmillan, which showed that 60% of people who went through the PIP assessment were waiting four and a half months, and a quarter were waiting six months? That could be somebody in my family, in his family or in our constituents’ families? That is not cynicism—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order.

Housing Benefit (Wales)

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Thursday 1st May 2014 Westminster Hall

[Chris Ruane]

rose—

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

rose—

[David T. C. Davies]

I give way first to the hon. Member for Vale of Clwyd (Chris Ruane).

[David T. C. Davies]

Right. Did the hon. Member for Ogmore (Huw Irranca-Davies) want to intervene?

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

Lord Freud kindly appeared recently at a meeting of the all-party parliamentary group on housing. When he was asked by a number of south Wales visitors to the group about the singular impact on Wales of this measure, whatever we call it, his answer was interesting. He said that if there were evidence of what he termed in Latin an “in extensis” impact on a region, he would look at it again. I have heard nothing since. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if there is a singular and extensive impact across Wales compared with other regions, the measure should be looked at again?

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman was invited to intervene, but that was a lengthy intervention. Please keep them short.

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[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

It is great to serve under your stewardship this afternoon, Mr Betts. I commend the way that the debate was introduced by the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies), the Chair of the Welsh Affairs Committee, as well as the speeches that have been made and the work that the Committee does. I will add only a few points.

In my constituency, the policy is about as popular as the poll tax was. There is a march today in Bridgend. I would love to be there, but like my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon), I am speaking up in Parliament on behalf of constituents; otherwise we would be there. I have spoken on platforms in Cardiff and elsewhere in direct opposition to the rule. The Minister will have heard repeated, emphatic and passionate accounts of the impact of the policy on individuals. Undoubtedly, many people are being pushed below the UN definition of poverty. The situation in the Bridgend area that my hon. Friend and I represent—the local authority area covers two parliamentary constituencies—is not unrelated to what one report says is a tenfold increase in the number of people seeking debt advice after getting payday loans. Those matters are related.

The present state of affairs is not distant from the fact that the Government’s report on food aid that came out after a year’s delay showed that the reason for the number of people being driven to use food banks is not increased publicity about food banks, as the Prime Minister said at Prime Minister’s questions the other day. There are three factors, and two are directly related to Government policy. One is benefit changes, and the second is delays in benefits. I could give the Minister the third, which is also related to the Government, but I will leave it at those two. Those things are tied in, and are part and parcel of the issue.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) rightly said that there is a complete failure of understanding about the importance of social housing in parts of Wales—particularly south Wales. That housing is regarded not as a unit of accommodation but as a lifetime home. People have long aspired to be in their home, and not to be in private rented accommodation, which may well be the aspiration in—I do not know—Belgravia or somewhere. They aspire to be in either council accommodation or social housing through a housing association. That is why people have really been angered.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend produced a plethora of data, and they apply to my constituency as well as hers. Within the past few months, Community Housing Cymru has produced an analysis showing that 78% of its members—35 housing association members in Wales provide 156,000 homes to 10% of the Welsh population—have seen a rise in rent arrears. The analysis showed 855 larger properties lying empty and that figure was expected to increase in the next 12 months. It showed that only 3% of tenants downsize, and I can confirm that that is true of my constituency: something like 25 people from about 1,000 properties have downsized. Also, members will deliver more than 1,200 fewer affordable homes, because they will be servicing a £40 million debt as a result of the policy.

We can have a debate about whether the policy is callous and cruel, which I think it is, but we need to debate the fact that it was dumped into areas such as mine overnight, without foresight or planning to enable alternative properties to be provided. The ineptitude of the decision, which means that housing associations will convert and build fewer properties, is causing misery. I ask the Minister to act according to the word and the spirit of what Lord Freud said when he spoke to the all-party group on housing, about evidence of “in extensis” impact on areas. There undoubtedly is one. I can see the Minister smiling. There is an impact—not just on my constituents, but on housing associations in my constituency. Will the Minister accept a delegation of not simply tenants but housing associations and local authorities from south Wales to talk about what “in extensis” means and how we can avoid the impacts being prolonged any further?

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

We move on to the Front-Bench spokesmen, who have 10 minutes each.

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[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I join in the congratulations to the Chairman of the Welsh Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies). I congratulate him on enabling the Committee to come up with a unanimous report. All of us who believe in the Select Committee system agree that Committees are at their strongest when they can be unanimous. He asked some specific questions for factual information, but in 10 minutes I will be trying to respond to two hours of contributions, so I apologise in advance if I miss one or two points.

I will concentrate on the spare room issue, but one or two hon. Members mentioned direct payment. As the Chairman of the Select Committee said, the philosophy of universal credit is to mirror in out-of-work benefits what happens when people are in work, so that if they make a transition from being out of work to in work, they will not have the sudden shock of having to budget from a wage and pay all of their bills, because they have been used to budgeting from the whole of their income for all of their outgoings. We want to improve that transition from out of work to in work.

The Government accept that direct payment will be difficult or not appropriate for a minority of people—that is not in dispute. Instead of having a system geared around the assumption that most people cannot cope, however, we are twisting that around and saying, “No, actually most people can.” Indeed, we pay housing benefit in the private rented sector direct to tenants, and most people cope. We should not patronise social tenants with the presumption that they cannot cope; we should presume that they can, but then identify the most vulnerable, who will have problems.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

Will the Minister give way?

[Steve Webb]

No, I will not give way, because I have a whole lot of questions which have already been asked that I want to answer.

In response to the question of whether we simply let eight weeks go by, let two months of arrears accumulate and only then start thinking about doing something, the answer is no, we do not. The alternative payment arrangements of universal credit include an assessment of the likelihood that someone will struggle at the outset; we do not simply wait until eight weeks of arrears have arisen. Eight weeks of arrears may be a trigger in a case where we thought someone could cope, but things did not work. If someone is assessed as likely to struggle right at the beginning, however, we can go straight to direct payment to the landlord, if necessary.

The House wants me to focus my remarks on the spare room issue, which is what I will now do. On a matter of fact and numbers, and because the Chair of the Committee asked me for an update, our estimate in May 2013 of the number of Welsh claimants with a spare room with a reduction was 36,000; our most recent estimate is that that figure had fallen to around 32,000 in November 2013. At this stage, we are not able to identify how far that was due to trading down or taking a job and not needing benefit, and so on. Those figures, however, give an order of magnitude.

The issue of what the thing is called is not simply semantics. Whether it is a reduction in a subsidy or a tax gets to the heart of what the thing is. I want to compare three people: a person who is buying a house; a person who is renting on benefit from a private landlord; and a person who is renting on benefit from a social landlord. Two of those three people pay for the size of the house that they live in; the third does not.

The right hon. Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) said, “Hang on, we are introducing this new divide between people who rent and people who buy,” but in actual fact we are treating people in those different tenancies in a parallel manner. If people are thinking of buying a house in Wales and want an extra bedroom, they can have an extra bedroom and pay for it. If people rent from a private landlord, are on benefit and want an extra bedroom, they can have an extra bedroom and pay for it. Until now, however, people who were social tenants in Wales and had an extra bedroom did not pay for it. That is why our measure is the removal of a subsidy; it is not a tax.

Job Insecurity

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Wednesday 5th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Umunna]

My hon. Friend is totally correct to raise that issue. Not only is it an issue of justice in the workplace, but it is also—[Interruption.] I have completely forgotten the point I was going to make—one of those moments. Ah, the thought has returned to me: it is also bad for the economy. If people are frightened out of their wits about whether they will retain their jobs, they will hardly go and spend money in our economy.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

May I draw my hon. Friend’s attention to another historical parallel that goes beyond the Morecambe bay tragedy? A few years ago we marked the centenary of the Tonypandy riots—Members might or might not be aware of them—which took place in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). The significance of those riots, and the parallel with today’s situation, is that mine owners and the representatives on the Government Benches argued tooth and nail that they could not afford to pay a fair wage to miners working in the most difficult seams in the south Wales valleys. Those miners were living in poverty. I suggest that the parallel is that we should all be working together, with businesses and others, to ensure that people are paid a proper wage.

[Mr Umunna]

That is absolutely right. I will explain how we are seeking to promote that through the payment of the living wage.

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[Mr Umunna]

I am not sure that the hon. Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen) is having a very good day.

Several hon. Members have already raised the issue of zero-hours contracts, and let me explain how we would stop their exploitative use. We would prevent employers from insisting that people on zero-hours contracts are available to work even when there is no guarantee that they will be given any work. We would prohibit zero-hours contracts that require workers to work exclusively for one employer. We would prevent the misuse of zero-hours contracts. When, in practice, employees regularly work a certain number of hours a week, they are entitled to a contract that reflects the reality of their regular hours.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

Will my hon. Friend speculate on why for some reason my M4 travel-to-work area, where there is some good and encouraging news on jobs, has the highest level of food bank usage in the whole of Wales and has seen a tenfold increase in payday loans, including to people in work, during the past year?

[Mr Umunna]

We know that there has been stagnation in wages. My hon. Friend has given the clearest evidence of the impact of that in his constituency. That relates to the points that I have made to Government Members. Of course it is a good thing that people who have not been in work are getting work. The key thing is that it must be decent work that prevents people from having to go to food banks because they are not earning enough.

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[Vince Cable]

Give me some time and I will happily take interventions. I am always generous with interventions and I will wait until a suitable point and give way to the hon. Gentleman.

The danger the hon. Member for Streatham faces is that of creating a cliché such as “triple-dip recession” or “no more boom and bust” that then proves to be positively cringeworthy when the situation changes. Labour’s slogan is now the “cost of living crisis”, and at first sight that is a plausible line of attack because, as I have always acknowledged, real wages fell in the wake of the financial crisis, the country is poorer and the consequences have been painful. The hon. Gentleman buttressed his argument by quoting from the Institute for Fiscal Studies that this painful process is likely to go on until the end of next year. That was what it said until quite recently, but I do not know whether he has seen its report today, which states that the cost of living crisis is to turn around this year. Inflation is now falling so rapidly and the economy recovering so quickly that it expects that turnaround to happen by the middle of the year. I fear that the “cost of living crisis” may be another to go in to the museum of clichés.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

Has the Secretary of State done an analysis of when the cost of living crisis might turn around in different regions of the UK, such as south Wales? What is his best guess on that?

[Vince Cable]

I will get on to regional variation. I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman raises the issue of Wales, because I was studying the regional employment changes and Wales has done relatively well against almost every other region of the UK. Despite the terrible history of unemployment in Wales, its unemployment level is now at the UK average. Its increase in employment levels is greater than in any other part of the UK, including London and the south-east. There is a good story in Wales as well as many very deep problems, which I of course acknowledge.

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[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams) and to tell him that we do have jobs fairs. In fact, we have had them for years in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) and in my coterminous constituency, run highly successfully by the Labour-controlled Bridgend county borough council, working with the local chamber of commerce and local businesses. We are not an anti-entrepreneur party—quite the opposite.

Something very odd is going on in south Wales, as I suggested earlier. Long-term youth unemployment is still remarkably high—intransigently so—and the overall level of employment is not good, but there are some encouraging signs. At the same time, however, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend will know, our county borough area has recently been identified as the area with the highest level of food bank use in the whole of Wales. Every single village in my constituency now has a food bank. It is a tremendous tribute to the work of the volunteers, the Trussell Trust, local churches and so on, but why are so many people who are in work having to go to food banks?

My hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend referred to a recent report by StepChange, the UK’s largest independent debt advice charity, entitled “Wales in the red”, which highlights what is going on in Wales. I want to mention some of its findings. Between 2010 and 2013, the demand for debt advice in Blaenau Gwent increased by 60%. In the Bridgend county borough area it increased by 63%. The same pattern was true in completely different, remote and rural areas such as Denbighshire and Gwynedd. In the Vale of Glamorgan the increase was nearly 60%. The same pattern can be seen right across Wales, but it is significantly bad in the south Wales valleys.

The report analysed the proportion of the charity’s clients struggling with rent arrears in each of Wales’s 22 unitary authorities. Blaenau Gwent and Ceredigion, which are completely contrasting constituencies, given Blaenau Gwent’s post-industrial structure and Ceredigion’s rurality, have both seen an increase in the proportion of clients struggling with rent arrears—35% in Blaenau Gwent and nearly 40% in Ceredigion. The same can be said of Flintshire, Neath, Port Talbot, Powys, the Vale of Glamorgan and other areas. The employment figures might offer a crude indication of some recovery, but underneath those figures something odd is going on, because many of the people clamouring for debt advice—StepChange makes this point—are actually in work.

Let me mention a couple of other indicators. In Conwy, the proportion of home-owning clients struggling with mortgage arrears is up to 50%. In Gwynedd, that figure is over 50%. In Pembrokeshire—these are completely contrasting constituencies—it is just shy of 50%. In Powys it is just shy of 50%. Something really odd is going on.

If we look at the proportion of customers with arrears on gas bills—I will skip over electricity bills, but it is a similar story—we see that nearly 16% of people in Neath Port Talbot and in Torfaen are struggling with that situation. Right across the whole of Wales, bills have increased over the past three years. Something odd is going on.

My final point is the most significant of all. In every one of the 22 unitary authorities in Wales, many people in work are seeking debt advice. The Bridgend unitary authority area is on the M4 corridor, still has one of the biggest manufacturing belts in the whole of the United Kingdom, and has a travel-to-work area that includes Cardiff, where jobs should be available. Yet people in that area, including those in work, are struggling with payday loans and debt advice, and there has been a near-enough tenfold increase in the number of those seeking payday loans. It is the same in Flintshire, Newport, and so on. Something odd is going on.

It is great to welcome the crude analysis of people falling off claimant counts, but if they are then falling into debt because they are not being paid enough and are having to rely on loans and getting into debt, that is not good enough. Surely, as a House, we want to do better for our constituents than that.

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[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Only this Labour party could call a debate on job insecurity a week after it was announced that a record number of people have got a job. Such impeccable timing makes me think that the motion must have been written by the shadow Chancellor, for it reminds me of the time he predicted that unemployment would soar by 1 million just before it fell by 1 million to a record low or the time he called a triple-dip recession just before official figures showed we had not even had a double-dip recession. In fact, the only recession that took place was when the Labour Government were in power.

And here we have a motion on job insecurity just after we have had the biggest rise in jobs in 40 years—more than 30 million employed—while unemployment has fallen in every part of the country. It is clear that even Labour Members were disappointed by the motion and had no faith in it, because the Opposition Benches were empty throughout the afternoon. The hon. Member for Streatham (Mr Umunna) has not returned to the Chamber, although it was he who moved the motion, but I can tell the House that in his constituency the claimant count is down by 20% and the youth claimant count is down by 36%. No wonder he is not present to hear those facts. As for the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms), the claimant count in his constituency is down by 27% and the youth claimant count is down by 30%.

Labour Members may talk about job insecurity, but the biggest guarantee of job insecurity is a Labour Government. If Members want the facts, I can tell them that unemployment rose by nearly half a million under Labour, female unemployment rose by 24%, youth unemployment rose by 45%, and long-term unemployment almost doubled between 2008 and 2010.

The truth is that Britain is poorer because of the recession over which the Labour Government presided. As Paul Johnson of the Institute for Fiscal Studies put it,

“That household incomes are lower than before the recession and are lower than they were in 2010 is hardly surprising. We have just lived through the deepest recession in generations”.

We are living beyond our means, but given that they were borrowing £160 billion every year, what do the Opposition expect? What we needed to do—and what we have done, in remarkably good time—was turn the economy around in three years. We did what we said we would do: we stabilised the economy, rebalanced the economy, and grew the economy. Even the International Monetary Fund has said that it is now the fastest-growing economy in the western world, and Mark Carney has said:

“The economy is growing at its fastest pace in 6 years… The recovery has finally taken hold.”

That has happened under this coalition Government.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

rose—

[Esther McVey]

I should love to hear what the hon. Gentleman has to say.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

The Minister is giving a glowing report of the coalition Government’s success, but will she tell us whether she has had sight of what now seems to be the suppressed report on food aid that landed on Ministers’ desks a year ago and has not surfaced? Will she give an undertaking to produce that report, which deals with the causes of poverty among working people?

[Esther McVey]

I have not had sight of the report from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, because I am a Minister in the Department for Work and Pensions, but once it has been authorised and released, the hon. Gentleman can read it.

Let us return to today’s debate. We heard a great deal of what I would describe as misinformation about the number of people in part-time work. Since the election, the number of people in full-time work has risen by 1 million; three out of four people are in full-time work, and we have stabilised the position. In the last quarter, the number of people wanting to move from part-time to full-time work fell for the first time ever, and—Opposition Members may be startled to hear this—between 2005 and 2010, the number doubled. That is the truth of Labour’s legacy.

Opposition Members talk of zero-hours contracts, but the number of zero-hours contracts is the same as it was in 2000. The 75% increase happened between 2004 and 2009. Moreover, if we want to think about getting our houses in order, we should note that the council with the worst record for zero-hours contracts is Labour-run Doncaster council, which is in the constituency of the Leader of the Opposition and also in the constituency of one of the ladies on the Opposition Front Bench.

Turning to the contributions of those on the Government Benches, my hon. Friend the Member for St Albans (Mrs Main) talked some good common sense about people getting their foot on the ladder, job progression, the fact that the number of apprenticeships has doubled in her constituency, and how this Government are helping families and young people into work. She also questioned what the hon. Member for Streatham (Mr Umunna) meant when he said, “Don’t take any old job; some jobs are different from other jobs.” There was some real job snobbery from the Opposition Front Bench.

My hon. Friend the Member for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams) talked about youth unemployment being down by 25% in his constituency, and how he does not talk down the economy, but instead talks it up because that is positive and it helps people into work.

Ford and Visteon UK Ltd

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Thursday 12th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House notes that, when Visteon UK Ltd was spun off from the Ford Motor Company, employees transferred from Ford’s pension scheme into the Visteon UK pension fund on the clear understanding that their pension rights would be unaffected; further notes that, when Visteon UK subsequently went into administration, now over four years ago, former Ford employees suffered a substantial reduction in their pension rights; regrets that the resolution of any court action is still some way off; believes that Ford should recognise a duty of care to its former employees and should make good the pension losses suffered by those worst affected without the need for legal action; and calls on the Government to use the power and influence at its disposal to help ensure that Ford recognises its obligations and accepts voluntarily its duty of care to former Visteon UK pensioners.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for inviting me to open the debate. As chair of the all-party parliamentary group in support of Visteon pensioners, I thank the Backbench Business Committee for finding time in the schedule to allow us to discuss this important national issue.

I do not really want to be standing here, criticising one of Britain’s great institutions and highlighting publicly what I believe to be a scandal, but I must. I owe it to my constituents and to the thousands of former Ford employees who transferred their pensions from Ford to the new entity of Visteon to do so. An injustice has been done and it continues to be done. I therefore stand here more in sadness than in anger.

This is a truly national issue. The request for today’s debate was signed by more than 10% of Members of this House and by Members who represent all parts of the country and sit in all parts of the House. Although a good number of Members are in the Chamber, there are many others who unfortunately cannot be with us. I mention in particular my hon. Friends the Members for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) and for Enfield North (Nick de Bois), who have Public Bill Committee duties.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

I commend the hon. Gentleman and other hon. Members for securing the debate. There are other Members, like me, who were unable to put their names to that request, but who are here and who support the motion. He is right to say that Ford is a good company. It employs 2,000 people in the neighbouring constituency of Bridgend. However, people who transferred their pensions to Visteon are at a loss in trying to explain why, when they were given categorical assurances, time after time, that their pensions would be safe and protected, they have not been. All we are asking Ford to do is to step up to the mark and comply with its moral obligations as well as its legal obligations.

[Stephen Metcalfe]

I could not agree more, and the issue transcends any legal debates that might be in a court of law. This is about trust and moral responsibility, and a fine company such as Ford has unfortunately blemished its character by not living up to the expectations of its former employees. That is the nub of the matter, and why I will address my remarks not so much to Ford in the UK, but perhaps to Ford globally. This is a global issue, and ultimately its resolution lies in Dearborn in the United States. I hope that Ford executives in the States are watching this debate, because it is they who are able to solve the issue.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Simon Burns (Chelmsford) (Con)]

I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this important debate. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for South Basildon and East Thurrock (Stephen Metcalfe) for the tremendous work that he has done as chair of the all-party parliamentary group in support of Visteon pensioners since his election to the House, and the way in which he has led his merry band of warriors in keeping this issue at the forefront of people’s minds. We are not prepared to allow it to fade away with time and be forgotten. I think that the strength of feeling and the outrage over what is basically an issue of decency and morality have been obvious in the two speeches that we have heard so far today.

I, too, do not wish to use my speech to knock an international company that provides valuable jobs, expertise and innovation in this country. However, I am baffled by the fact that that it is seemingly being led by its north American approach to business—which is infinitely hard-nosed—and is not prepared to recognise what it is doing to a group of people who, although totally innocent, are being made to suffer ruined retirements, despite the assurances that they were given back in 2000 that their pensions would be looked after and would be on a par with the pensions of those who worked for Ford.

I am surprised at Ford’s intransigence in not recognising its moral duty to act decently. I know that business can be very cynical—Bob Dylan used to say that money shouts—but one would have hoped that there was still a sense of decency, and that this company would be prepared to consider the position of a small group of people who, although they have fought magnificently, will always be the Davids in this David and Goliath battle.

Like my hon. Friend, I find it sad that nothing has moved forward since the last debate, in which I was unfortunately unable to participate because I still wore the shackles of ministerial office. It seems that if we are not careful and if Ford is not prepared to regain its sense of decency, the matter may have to be resolved in the courts, which I do not think is in anyone’s interests, especially given the time scale.

It appears from all the evidence that even if, back at the turn of the century, Ford was following what other companies were doing and removing its suppliers from its direct control by creating new companies, the hands of Visteon, a company created to be independent from Ford, were tied from the outset. I understand that Ford had a virtual monopoly over the parts coming out of Visteon, and was thus in a position to drive down prices unilaterally. There was no proper, vibrant, functioning market, and that is not in any independent company’s natural interest. I also understand that Visteon had to buy its materials from the Ford foundry in Leamington, although they could have been obtained elsewhere at a more competitive and lower price. Once again, Ford seems to have kept Visteon’s hand behind its back and thwarted any opportunity that it might have had to develop as a vibrant, successful company.

I find it incredible that when Ford was keen to create Visteon and cast it aside, in effect, from Ford itself, those who worked for Ford and were going to be employees of the new Visteon were advised that the Ford European works council agreement guarantees that

“Visteon employees transferring their past service benefits to the Visteon Fund will receive the same benefits as at Ford, both now and in the future for all their pensionable service.”

Beyond that, employees were encouraged to join the Visteon scheme and transfer their pensions with statements such as:

“Your accrued pension rights will be protected.”

To me, and probably to all those people who were about to become Visteon employees, those were cast-iron, concrete statements of fact that gave them protection.

We also have to remember that this is not some plan to change pension arrangements in the future. I accept that many private companies over the last decade—as well as Government, and including Members of this House—have been changing their pension arrangements because it has been found that the existing arrangements are too expensive in the current economic climate. They are moving to salary-average schemes, but that is always for the future. They do not start tinkering with the commitments, the payments, the arrangements and the deals that have been done in the past. These changes are for the future. That is not what has happened to the Visteon pensioners, however. Their pensions—that they took out in good faith, and that they believed were safe and secure for all their pensionable life—have now, because of what happened to Visteon in 2009, been noticeably, and in some cases severely, cut by this cynical operation to create a new company independent of Ford.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

The right hon. Gentleman is making a powerful point, particularly on this issue of the assurances that were given to Visteon pensioners. He, like me, will have received the Visteon action group briefing so he is clearly familiar with this quote:

“Your accrued pension rights will be protected.”

It was also stated that “not only” would their pension be “secure” but it would be in their best interests to “transfer” their pension and their pension benefits were “guaranteed”. People were not being greedy or stupid; they were acting in the best interests of their families and themselves on the best available advice, and it is morally repugnant for a company to walk away from those assurances now, when they were either delivered by that company or were vetted by that company before being delivered.

[Mr Burns]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making that point because he is absolutely right. There were no weasel words. There were no cop-out clauses or any excuses that could be made that people had misunderstood what had been said to them or the commitments that had been given to them. They were, in so far as anything in life can be, cast-iron guarantees that those people, who in most cases had worked so loyally for so long for Ford, would have their pensions guaranteed. Having met a number of them, including constituents of mine, I have no doubt that they feel as though they have been kicked in the stomach because of what has happened to them and that they are having to suffer through no fault of their own.

That is why I say that Ford—and in particular Ford in the United States of America, which I believe is leading Ford in the UK on this issue—should sit down and quietly consider their conscience again. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Colchester (Sir Bob Russell) says, “If they’ve got one,” and I can understand why he says that because it does seem that they are without conscience. Of course companies have a responsibility to their existing work force and their shareholders to make a profit, but this is even more important: “You don’t make a profit if you don’t have a loyal, hard-working and decent work force.” If the company is prepared to see some of its work force treated like that, despite the cast-iron guarantees that it gave them, we have to wonder what kind of conscience it has.

I hope that the company will think again as a result of this debate and of the lobbying by Members on both sides of the House, by the trade unions, by the action group and by others, and that it will not consider drawing the matter out even longer, because, sadly, some of those pensioners will die during that time. I hope that the company will do the decent thing, the morally right thing, and restore those pensions to the people who should never have had them taken away from them in the first place.

Mesothelioma Bill [Lords]

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Monday 2nd December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Kate Green]

I would never push the Minister too far.

We had hoped to have received fuller details of the scheme’s operation by now, but regrettably the regulations have yet to be published. I am sure, however, given the shameful history that precedes this Bill, that Members will agree it is vital that the scheme is seen to be run in a transparent and wholly independent manner. In the House of Lords, Lord McKenzie asked for more information about the oversight committee, and I have seen the letter that Lord Freud wrote to peers on 4 September on that matter. That offers some reassurance, but we would like to see provision for the oversight committee included in the Bill. That is of particular concern because, as I understand, the insurance industry could—and intends to—bid to run the scheme. I confess that I am not entirely comfortable with that notion, but if ultimately the industry is selected to manage the scheme, the role and make-up of the oversight committee becomes all the more important.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

May I suggest to my hon. Friend and the Minister that a precedent that could be considered is the miners compensation scheme for those with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease? That had clear oversight, including democratic engagement both at UK level and also in the regions, which gave the surety that every last penny piece was paid out to the people who deserved it.

[Kate Green]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that advice, and he is right to draw attention to the importance for local communities of a scheme that is transparent, credible, and which they are able to scrutinise and interrogate.

I expect that other issues will arise during our deliberations on the Bill, for example in relation to medical research, where I welcome the commitments made by the Government in the House of Lords, and on the differential between the levels of award made before a sufferer’s death and the level that can be obtained afterwards by his or her dependants. Frankly, that difference has little to commend it for a condition where death is the certain outcome. I recognise that the situation arises not from this Bill but from existing fatal accidents legislation, but I hope there may be scope for a more generous and flexible approach to mesothelioma.

There remain many complex and important issues to explore, and while we share the Government’s ambition to get the scheme in place and payments flowing, it would be a dereliction of our duty as parliamentarians if we did not scrutinise the full detail of the scheme and do all we can to maximise its generosity for sufferers. Victims have waited long for justice in the face of what can only be described as a hitherto intransigent industry. Now it is time to right a long-standing wrong, and give some small peace of mind to victims and their families in the midst of the most terrible suffering.

Let me conclude with the words of my constituent, Mrs Elaine Haskins, who first drew my attention to the terrible injustice and cruelty that victims have long lived with. Her husband died of mesothelioma in 2005—a death she describes as

“very stressful and painful. Two of the insurance companies were not traceable and the others did everything possible to get out of paying a penny. The sad thing was my husband died before he could see justice for his suffering and death.”

For too long we have let down too many victims of this cruel and terrible disease. Let us resolve today that we will right that wrong, and at last give justice to those victims.

Housing Benefit

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Tuesday 12th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Thank you, Mr Speaker.

In Leeds, where I am a Member of Parliament, two thirds of the budget has been used with less than half the year gone, despite the fact that the council has topped up the discretionary housing payment pot to help as many people as possible, so that money is not nearly sufficient to help all those who are hit, particularly disabled people.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that this is not just a callous policy but a downright stupid one, because in my constituency we now have two and three-bedroom properties lying empty and unable to be modified, while housing associations throughout south Wales have rising levels of bad debts on their books that are jeopardising their financial security?

[Rachel Reeves]

I could not agree more. It is putting housing associations and local authorities in impossible situations where they potentially have to condemn housing that is perfectly fit for people to live in because people cannot afford the rent.

Oral Answers to Questions

Huw Irranca-Davies Excerpts

Monday 14th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Esther McVey]

My hon. Friend is right. Work Choice has been a success. We are looking at the disability employment strategy. For the first time ever we are considering greater segmentation and greater differentiation, and the greater support that is needed. We have also engaged with business as never before. We have started a two-year disability confident programme, engaging with 430 businesses and 35 of the FTSE 100. We need employers to work with us to give these people jobs.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

19. In the same way that the miners’ buy-out of Tower colliery succeeded in sustaining well-paid jobs and exposed the lie that every pit was uneconomic, does the reopening this week of the former Forestfach Remploy site in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) with workers’ redundancy money give the lie to the need to shut so many viable Remploy factories, such as that in Bridgend, where the workers and management had both the business case and the burning desire to keep the factory open?

[Esther McVey]

I think that the hon. Gentleman does not really understand what happened with the whole set of Remploy factories. In 2008, the Labour party put in £555 million for a modernisation plan that failed. Those factories that can exist as viable businesses are doing so. We have helped them in that. We have supported them, and more than nine have reopened. Of those that could not, we have got some of the employees into work and others are opening up as social enterprises. The Opposition tried and failed. We are doing something about this and supporting those people.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Webb]

This is money designed to help and support separated families. We have spent £6.5 million so far on seven projects in the voluntary and private sector designed to help with things such as mediation. Although it is early days, we have anecdotal examples whereby we have enabled families to function together for the benefit of the child, and whereby the child’s performance at school is improving as well as maintenance flowing.

[Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)]

T4. Housing associations in Ogmore are carrying a rising level of debt on their balance sheets as a result of rent arrears. They have a desperate scarcity of one and two-bedroom properties to rent, and yet they have three-bedroom properties lying empty. Is this just a necessary but painful adjustment to the Secretary of State’s benefit and bedroom tax changes?

[Esther McVey]

This is something we have to do. I have answered this before: how many people we have to look at who are on waiting lists, how many are in overcrowded housing, and how the bill doubled under Labour. The hon. Gentleman is quite right—we have to get the stock right: the fact that there are three-bedroom houses and why in the last three years they have not been modified into one and two-bedroom houses. Those questions have to be asked. That is what we have to do: get the stock right and support people as best we can.