Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Sajid Javid

Monday 28th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid (Bromsgrove) (Con)]

20. What estimate he has made of the likely effects on welfare expenditure of implementation of the provisions of the Welfare Reform Bill.

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

In real terms working age welfare spending climbed by 54% over the past decade from £48 billion in 1999-2000 to £74.7 billion in 2009-10. The explanatory notes to the Welfare Reform Bill report that there will be savings of some £960 million in 2012-13,rising to around £3.9 billion in 2014-15. We have also set aside £2 billion to cover the costs of implementing the universal credit.

[Sajid Javid]

This Government inherited a record Budget deficit, which rightly requires the re-examination of every Department’s spending. Instead of getting constructive suggestions from the Opposition, we too often get opportunism, including a demeaning comparison this weekend between protesters, civil rights marchers, people who fought for women’s rights and anti-apartheid campaigners. Does my right hon. Friend believe that the best way to bring down our welfare bill sustainably is to get people back into work by giving them the right work incentives?

Housing Benefit

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Sajid Javid

Tuesday 9th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid (Bromsgrove) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend was right to point out that I was shocked to learn in the Select Committee that I had been homeless as a child. I believe, however, that the question is not so much one of the definition of homelessness as one of whether people living on housing benefit should be forced to make the same choices that other low-income working families are forced to make. Those low-income working families typically pay rent to the 30th percentile and their children are forced to share bedrooms, as they would be in any ordinary family. It should be no different for anyone on housing benefit.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

My hon. Friend’s exchange was the most interesting one to come out of that Committee sitting, and he is right about this. I do not think that the previous Government intended these consequences; they simply failed to recognise that their change was going to fuel this growth. If they are honest with themselves, they would say that they know that. The ex-Chancellor actually said that he thought that this was out of control. These are the sort of choices that ordinary people have to make when they cut their budgets in accordance with what housing they can afford, and that is what we are trying to do here. It is not about punishing people; it is about trying to get the rents in the social area of private renting back into line with what people are paying who are working and earning marginal incomes and are therefore unable to make ends meet.

Welfare Reform

Debate between Iain Duncan Smith and Sajid Javid

Monday 11th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am not sure what the hon. Gentleman is moaning about. Two cities are in the pilot, one in England and one in Scotland—he forgot that. The cities are different in character—they have quite different populations in terms of income. The hon. Gentleman made the point that some people travel long distances, and it is important for us to understand the exact effect of that. Sometimes I wish that he was not quite so parochial.

[Sajid Javid (Bromsgrove) (Con)]

I paid a visit to my local jobcentre in Bromsgrove earlier this month, and I learned from the advisers that, in many cases, it takes them more than an hour to determine whether a jobseeker would be better or worse off by taking just six hours of employment in a week. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the introduction of the universal credit and the taper relief system will make a dramatic difference to job incentives for jobseekers, and also increase their life chances?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am glad that my hon. Friend sees it like that, because that is exactly how I see it. Of course, the devil will be in the detail, but we want a process that is easy to understand for those who are trying to get back to work, so that they do not need a maths degree to figure out exactly how much money they will retain if they do seven, eight, nine, 15 or 20 hours’ work a week. We want it to be easy for them to understand that there is an incentive for every hour that they work, and for those in jobcentres to figure it out, so that they can give proper advice. We want incentives, not disincentives, to go back to work.