Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Mark Lazarowicz

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The problem is not what the hon. Lady describes. It is with Labour Members, who cannot bear the idea that, when they were in government, they had an archaic system that worked only from 8am to 6pm. Our system works for 24 hours. It works while people’s computers are shut down. It nominates jobs, and advisers can offer advice online. This is a major success story. The problem is that Labour does not get it. We are getting more people into work, higher levels of employment and falling levels of unemployment. In fact, we have some of the lowest levels in the European Union.

[Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)]

7. What recent progress he has made on the universal credit programme; and if he will make a statement.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)]

Universal credit is on track to roll out against the timetable set out last year. The claimant commitment is in place across all jobcentres. Universal credit is live in 14 sites, and from today further expansion is under way across the north-west, with couples and families joining at a later stage. Based on the case load projections, there are, at the moment, around 11,000 people making those claims on universal credit.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

I am interested in the Secretary of State’s answer. In 2011 he announced that a million people would be claiming universal credit by April 2014, when the true figure was just 6,000. What went so badly wrong with his projections, and what are his current milestones for the delivery of universal credit?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I think I made that clear before, but I will repeat it again. Back in 2012, I was not happy with the plan for the roll-out, because it mirrored too much the roll-outs that used to happen under the previous Government—[Interruption.] We hit the bump. [Laughter.] It is interesting that Opposition Members sit there laughing, because I remember the tax credit fiasco. They launched tax credits and people suffered. People did not get their payments and were out of pocket. That has not happened with universal credit. In answer to the hon. Gentleman, I simply say that we deliberately set a pathfinder and we are expanding it now, with 90 new sites. Universal credit is rolling out carefully, and we are ensuring that all those who are eligible get the money that is due to them when it is due. It is not the disaster that we had under the previous Government.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Mark Lazarowicz

Monday 1st July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I recognise that this is an issue. Some 200,000 people are employed on zero-hours contracts, which is just less than 1% of all workers. The current benefit system deals with claimants on zero-hours contracts, but universal credit will mean that they will not have to re-sign on. Personally, I think there should be far fewer zero-hours contracts. We are trying to work with employers and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to persuade those who have a genuine long-term job to get off zero-hours contracts and get a proper contract of work.

[Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)]

The pensions Minister’s answer a couple of minutes ago on discretionary housing payments was quite frankly absurd, because he knows full well that the bedroom tax was not in operation in the last financial year.

To return to the question of impact, local authorities throughout the country, including my own, now find that arrears are going up because people cannot afford the bedroom tax that is being imposed on them. What does the Minister expect local authorities to do about this, because it is affecting their overall budgets as well?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Mark Lazarowicz

Monday 20th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State blithely told us earlier that if the budget given to local councils for discretionary housing payments runs out, they should just top it up. Where exactly does he think they should get the money from to top up their budgets, and, if he is not prepared to accept the failures of the bedroom tax, why does he not at least agree to top up the budgets himself in order to make up for the deficiencies of his own policy?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I have said all along that we will keep this under review and talk to local authorities. The Opposition have not once apologised—they did not do so when in government, either—for the fact that, under them, house building fell to its lowest level since the 1920s and that there was more overcrowding. There are 1.5 million spare rooms and 250,000 people live in overcrowded accommodation. There were record levels under the previous Government. Why do they not say sorry for the mess they left housing in?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Mark Lazarowicz

Monday 25th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We are doing all those things. The housing benefit changes are necessary to bring back under control a budget that was spiralling under the Government the hon. Gentleman supported. In almost 10 years, we saw that budget rise from about £11 billion to £21 billion. That was madness, and it was their lack of control and their creation of the local housing allowance that led to that problem, so we will take no lectures from him or his hon. Friends about what is right or wrong in relation to housing benefit.

[Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)]

How many young people under 25 does the Secretary of State think will lose their jobs as a result of the measures that his Prime Minister is proposing?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am not aware that any would lose their jobs. I am aware that, as I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies), the housing benefit changes that we have introduced are already leading to a large number of those who were not in work now seeking work. That is the difference between us and the Opposition—we believe that these changes should be about helping people to become independent; they think welfare is about making people dependent on them.

Welfare Reform

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Mark Lazarowicz

Thursday 11th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Very simply, that is a disincentive for people to go to work. The policy stands as it is, as I announced in the debate on Tuesday, and if the hon. Gentleman had any issues to raise, he should have raised them then.

[Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central (Anas Sarwar) asked a reasonable question about the gap between the end of the current programmes and the start of the new programme. I am afraid that the Secretary of State departed from his general tone by giving him a fairly party political response. Will he take the point seriously? A gap of three to six months will be extremely significant, so if the new schemes are not ready, why can we not consider extending the current schemes in the meantime, to ensure that we do not leave people without the support that they need?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I believe that the programme that we have set out and the timings that we have set for it—it starts next year in the summer—will help all those who need support to get back into work. We can debate or argue about the gap, but my general view is that as employment rises and as we start that process, we will see more people going back to work, and we will be able to support them in a better way than through the previous programmes, which we believe actually cost more money than they returned.