Oral Answers to Questions

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Monday 9th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

That is a very good question, for which I thank my hon. Friend. He highlights the important role of training providers. They are the ones providing opportunities for young people to get their foot on the employment ladder and, importantly, to gain the skills and experience that employers are looking for. My message to him and to other employers is that I hope they will work in partnership with us so that we can encourage more of this activity.

[Ian C. Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

A young autistic constituent of mine was asked by his DWP work adviser what he enjoyed doing. He replied that he enjoyed being a DJ as a hobby. His reward was to have a demand for repayment of £7,000 in benefits, having been accused of working when he did the DJing as a hobby. Is that the type of understanding approach for autistic people that this Minister likes to see from people working for the DWP?

[Priti Patel]

First, I would be happy to look at the particular constituency case that the hon. Gentleman raises, but I would also say that our work coaches do a tremendous amount of work, supporting people in our jobcentres when it comes to employment and providing advice. I understand that he highlights a particular case, and as I have said, I would happy to look at the details of it, and perhaps give some guidance and advice to his constituent to support him in securing an employment outcome.

Personal Independence Payments

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 13th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Ian C. Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

It is a real pleasure to be in a debate that you are chairing, Mr McCabe—I think this is the first time it has happened for me. I apologise to all my colleagues because I have a great deal to say on the issue, and I propose to say it and then, hopefully, to take some interventions. I am very grateful to them for attending to listen to the debate, which has provoked an awful lot of interest not just from fellow colleagues, but from individuals who have contacted me. I thank all the people and organisations who have contacted me; I have read all the submissions they sent.

The Government’s present agenda on disability is to reduce the number of people receiving disability benefits and the amount of money they receive. There has been a marked increase in the number of constituents coming to my office to seek help in connection with disability benefits, particularly with the personal independence payment process. In preparing for this debate, I have worked very closely with, and I am very grateful to, Wrexham citizens advice bureau and the welfare rights service of Wrexham Council.

In recent months, it seems that the Department for Work and Pensions has targeted the Wrexham postcode, inviting large numbers of working age, pre-existing disability living allowance claimants to move to the replacement benefit, PIP. Failure to respond to the invitation results in the existing DLA award ceasing, with an associated knock-on loss of any premiums—for example, means-tested benefits, Motability car tax, blue badge entitlement and so on. At any time in the Wrexham area, about 10,000 people have been in receipt of various combinations and levels of DLA, and considerable numbers of them are now going through the migration process, which is almost entirely driven by DWP, not by the claimants themselves.

The DWP invitation gives people a limited amount of time to claim PIP and return the paperwork, with a claim form of about 40 pages in length. Many claimants struggle to complete social security benefits claim forms and seek help to do so. If constituents do not respond, the DLA stops. That is one way of the Government achieving their objective to reduce the benefit paid.

One constituent of mine—a former nurse—has a degenerative neurological condition, yet her PIP assessment resulted in her losing her Motability car, an outcome repeated and experienced by sufferers of Parkinson’s disease, according to a briefing sent to me before this debate. This does, of course, secure the Government’s objective of reducing the benefit paid to disabled people.

The changes to the system are being made against a backcloth of withdrawing specific benefits advice, reductions in legal aid eligibility and reductions in funding for citizens advice bureaux, welfare rights advisers and other sources of advice. The result is that little advice is available for vulnerable people, which further helps the Government to reduce the benefit paid. In any event, the system operated means that applicants invariably complete the long, complex forms without advice and without any knowledge of the criteria applied to award PIP. As a consequence, it is very often the case that the initial application results in previous recipients of DLA being awarded PIP, if at all, at a lower level.

When an application is made for mandatory reassessment, again the applicants have no detailed knowledge of the criteria, and the reasoning applied by assessors and communicated to the applicant is set out without specific reference to the points awarded for each individual disability. DLA was assessed by health professionals. The Government now contract private businesses such as Capita to carry out assessments. In Wrexham, the largest town in north Wales, there is no geographic base for personal assessments to be carried out and applicants are requested, as a matter of course, to travel more than 40 miles to Rhyl for an assessment. That is a disincentive to vulnerable people to proceed with the application.

On Monday evening, in the excellent “Dispatches: The Great Benefit Row”, presented by Ade Adepitan, we saw the shocking mindset of a number of the assessors. However, the views expressed in that programme reflect what I am told by my constituents. Individual applicants are subjected to rudeness from assessors when they question the obligation to travel distances. When one constituent of mine asked to have an assessment in Wrexham, rather than travel the considerable distance to Rhyl, the conversation went: “Do you receive DLA?” “Yes.” “Use the bloody money to get to Rhyl.”

When the mandatory assessment is completed, the appeal process is complex and difficult and, again, there is a paucity of advice available to applicants. There has been a huge increase in the number of individuals seeking advice in my office, and there are real capacity constraints in handling the quantity of them. Applicants are often vulnerable, stressed and upset by the whole process, and are intimidated by the complexity of the forms.

[Dr Lisa Cameron (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ian C. Lucas]

I am sorry but I am going to continue. I will try to take interventions later.

Applicants are also intimidated by the manner of the assessors and the way in which assessments are set out when they are presented to applicants. Having considered a number of the assessments personally, I find it difficult to draft responses to the assessments effectively. The process is much more difficult than drafting court pleadings—I am a solicitor—and, without training and support, it is very difficult even for those experienced in drafting documents.

It is essential to have detailed knowledge of the points awarded for individual actions in order to respond properly to assessments made. The reality is that most applicants do not have that information themselves and do not have adequate access to expert advice to help them. I quote the experience of one of my constituents, Lindsay Usher, who sent an email to me earlier this week. She says:

“I am a carer for my husband John who had a major stroke, aged 55, in October 2010 that left him with various disabilities. He was awarded indefinite DLA...and recently had correspondence to say that he had to now apply for PIP. I made the initial telephone call on his behalf and then the 40 page booklet appeared. We duly completed it and that in itself is stressful. John could not have done it on his own due to the complexity and ambiguity of the questions. They repeatedly try to trip you up and the stroke has left him with a degree of cognitive impairment. We returned it by the due date, 24 March. The receipt was acknowledged by the DWP by text message.

John then received a letter from Capita dated 28 March informing him that he would be assessed face to face by a ‘health professional’ at his home address on 11 April at 08.00 a.m. John takes about an hour and a half to get up, washed and dressed independently in the mornings (this information was written on the PIP claim form) but even though the timing of the appointment was not ideal we decided to accept it as the wording in the letter from Capita includes, in bold, ‘It is important that you go to this appointment. If you fail to go without a good reason, the decision-maker at the Department for Work and Pensions is likely to refuse your claim’. It’s quite intimidating. A further reminder letter dated 2 April was received from Capita confirming the appointment with the same ‘It is important that…’ sentence. Finally a text message was received from Capita on 6 April once again confirming the appointment…Roll forward to the appointment day…Alarms set for 06.00 a.m. Ready, waiting, stressed and nervous by 07.45 a.m. No sign of ‘health professional’. No email, no phone call, no text message. So I telephoned the Capita ‘Enquiry Centre’ at 08.56 a.m. The lady who answered had no idea why John had been ‘stood up’. I said we would give it a while longer. By 10.32 a.m. I phoned again. We got the obligatory ‘sorry’ but I told the young lady I spoke to that she could not be held responsible for the ‘health professional’s’ failure to appear.”

Another constituent became enmeshed in an argument over whether he was able to fully wash the top half of his body, as he has the use of only one arm due to a stroke; the assessor accepted that he could not wash the whole of the bottom half of his body. Parliamentary colleagues have approached me since this debate was listed to tell me of similar accounts affecting those they represent. This degrading assessment process makes sense only if it is understood that the policy’s central objective is to reduce the benefits of these disabled people. All these procedural steps work towards that end and make it more difficult for claimants to apply.

It made me sick to the stomach to see further personal independence payment cuts proposed in the Budget and to see the Minister defending them even before the Budget speech was made. At the same time, the Government cut capital gains tax and corporation tax. This rotten system endures and is often run by rotten people—we saw some of them on Monday night’s programme on Channel 4—who treat vulnerable people and their families with absolute contempt.

If the Minister wants to help disabled people—I respect him, and I am telling him what my constituents are telling me—will he now ask his Secretary of State to carry out a fundamental reappraisal of this appalling system? If he wants to salvage his reputation, that is the only way he will be able to do so. If he wants respect, he and his Department, and those who his Department employs and commissions, need to start treating vulnerable disabled people with the respect they deserve.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Everything my hon. Friend has said is applicable to the Delyn constituency in north-east Wales. It might help Members and the Minister to know that the value of the contract to Capita over 60 months in central England and Wales is £121 million. We can get better value and better, more compassionate performance out of that contract.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian C. Lucas]

I agree entirely.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. He is right that this is a massive issue. “Dispatches” highlighted the concerns that many people have about the PIP assessment. The same firm is contracted to carry out PIP assessments in Northern Ireland, where we have one of the highest DLA claimant rates in the whole United Kingdom because of the troubles. Like me, does he feel—perhaps the Minister will respond to this—that there is a great need for those who carry out the tests to have a higher level of competency?

[Ian C. Lucas]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. There is clearly a major problem, and MPs are seeing that in their constituencies across the United Kingdom. The purpose of securing such debates is to draw to the Minister’s attention to the mistakes made by Government. All Governments make mistakes—mistakes were made under a Labour Government—and there is a real mistake in this particular case that he needs to address.

[Dr Lisa Cameron]

Given the information that we have, this is an extremely valuable and timely debate. As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on disability, I have particular concerns about the lack of involvement of individuals such as mental health professionals and general practitioners in gathering the information. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that should be standardised as part of the procedure?

[Ian C. Lucas]

Absolutely. These assessments, which often deal with vulnerable people who in many cases have particular complex medical needs, need to be carried out by individuals who know what they are talking about and who have not just been sent on an away day to establish whatever criteria Capita want to apply to let as few applications through as possible.

[Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. One of my West Lancashire constituents had their mobility car repossessed following a PIP assessment, but that was before a mandatory reconsideration or a tribunal to reconsider the case. Where is the natural justice? Does he agree that that is just one more area where the PIP process is ineffective? It is not always cost-effective, and it is certainly uncaring in its treatment of people. All of that has consequences for those being assessed, and it is time for the Government to reconsider their absolutely appalling approach to this problem.

[Ian C. Lucas]

I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. The Motability issue is important and is causing concern on both sides of the House.

[Mr Andrew Smith (Oxford East) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his speech and on securing this debate. Are not the shortcomings that he rightly describes underlined by the success rate at first-tier tribunal appeals? The Barton advice centre in my constituency has an 82% record in overturning such wrong decisions.

[Ian C. Lucas]

That is absolutely the case, and it is important to realise the impact of determinations, such as the withdrawal of Motability cars, which are taken back within days pending an appeal.

[Christina Rees (Neath) (Lab)]

Everything my hon. Friend says is happening in Neath. What is the Department for Work and Pensions doing to ensure that the healthcare professionals who undertake the assessments are mental health specialists, as Capita claims? What exactly does “mental health specialist” mean? Are they qualified mental health nurses, doctors or carers? In one case in Neath, a report was done by a paramedic.

[Ian C. Lucas]

I am sure that the Minister will address those points in his response, which I will now allow him to make. I am grateful to him for being patient while I have taken interventions.

--- Later in debate ---

[Justin Tomlinson]

I am sure there will be many other opportunities for the hon. Lady to ask me questions, and I look forward to them. Perhaps I have got a foresight of what her next question at Work and Pensions oral questions will be.

I acknowledge that when we first introduced the PIP process there were major problems with timings, but there has been a settled position for about a year now. It currently takes seven weeks for an assessment and 13 weeks—median end to end—to get a decision. The time taken has been reduced by about three quarters since June 2014.

I will now touch on the TV programme, which is obviously topical. I was as appalled as everybody else who watched that programme. To the credit of Capita, it has reacted quickly and the individual concerned— Mr Barham—has been dismissed, and rightly so. We have not been made aware of any evidence that this is a significant issue; it seems to be a disgracefully appalling but isolated one. We have been told, “The overwhelming feedback gathered so far is one of frustration, disappointment and anger about how this individual has let everyone down, undermining the hard work and effort that everyone puts in daily to deliver and continually improve the level of service provided both to the Department and the PIP claimant community.” Capita has assured me that it will conduct further checks to make sure that this incident was an isolated one, and I was genuinely as appalled as everybody else who saw that programme.

[Ian C. Lucas]

rose—

[Justin Tomlinson]

I will take one last intervention.

[Ian C. Lucas]

Before the programme was screened, individuals had been saying to me that the assessors’ attitudes were wrong. I recounted one particular case, and I have been given other examples that I did not have time to cover today. Will the Minister please speak firmly to Capita and tell it to start treating people with respect?

[Justin Tomlinson]

Absolutely. That is happening; that is a given.

Access to Jobs: Disabled People

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 12th January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Ian C. Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered access to jobs for disabled people.

It is a pleasure to address the Chamber under your chairmanship, Mr Chope. It is important when assessing the impact of Government policy and judging its success to look closely at the individuals we represent. We must bring to the attention of Ministers—I know this particular Minister quite well by now, and I know that he is assiduous in his duties—individual cases that we consider representative of the failure or success of Government policy.

I want to talk about a constituent of mine, Margaret Foster, whom I have come to know quite well over a number of years. Margaret has suffered from cerebral palsy from birth. She has been directly affected by Government disability policy in recent years, because for 26 years she worked at the Remploy factory in Wrexham. During that period, she was a taxpayer who contributed to her community and all of our communities by paying taxes and working hard in her job. She did not particularly like her job; she is quite frank about that. She is a very bright woman, and she felt that it did not stretch her capabilities. Nevertheless, she held down the job for 26 years and took great pride in it.

I first met Margaret in about 2007-08, when the then Labour Government proposed to close the Remploy factory in Wrexham. I argued against that proposal at the time, and I was pleased ultimately to win the argument to the extent that the factory remained open in 2008. Unfortunately, the coalition Government revisited the issue of Remploy in 2012 and decided to close the factory in Wrexham, as they did a large number of Remploy factories across the country, affecting many disabled people.

[Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on bringing such an important issue to the House. Does his constituent feel as betrayed as my constituents about the Government’s broken promises about the closure of the Remploy factories? The Government guaranteed support into employment, which is not there any more, but more than two thirds of the people in my constituency who worked for Remploy have not been able to get employment since the closure of the factories.

[Ian C. Lucas]

Part of the reason why I secured this debate is to point out the failure of Government policy and the way in which it affected Margaret, who worked for Remploy for 26 years. Since the Prime Minister and the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Government decided to close Remploy, making Margaret redundant, she has not been in employment for a single day and has not been offered a job.

Rather than being a taxpayer, Margaret now lives on benefits. She has an income from the disability living allowance, and she receives an enhanced level of mobility allowance—£57.45 per week—and the middle-rate daily care component of £55.10 per week. She has even been refused employment and support allowance. When the initial assessment was made, she received no points. Even on appeal, she was given only nine points. She needs 15 points to qualify for the allowance. How can the disability benefits system present a case such as Margaret’s? She wants help to work and has been disabled from birth, but does not qualify for the benefit put in place by the Government supposedly to support her into work. What does the fact that the taxpayer is not supporting Margaret in her attempts to find work say about the Government’s policy?

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman is telling a powerful story about his constituent, Margaret. Is he aware that in Gloucestershire we recently launched a programme called Supported Internships? Remploy was a partner, as were the local authority, the local further education college and two employers. Supported internships are an effective way for people with significant disabilities to get back into employment.

[Ian C. Lucas]

I have no doubt that they can be, but I am afraid they are not happening.

The 2014 labour force survey recognised that,

“disabled people remain significantly less likely to be in employment than non-disabled people.”

There is a 30.1% gap between levels of employment for disabled people and non-disabled people. I welcome any efforts to find internships and support individuals into work, which is what we all want. Margaret was in work when the Government decided to close Remploy factories, and we were told at the time that they would support those disabled people into jobs in the mainstream. When Remploy in Wrexham was closed and Margaret was put out of work, we received all sorts of assurances about how disabled employees would be helped into the mainstream jobs market.

[Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)]

I lost a Remploy factory in Croespenmaen in my constituency, and the Welsh Government Minister at the time offered to take on the Remploy factories on the proviso that the Westminster Government devolve the Remploy budget to the Welsh Assembly. Does my hon. Friend think it is an absolute shame that, rather than looking at that proposal properly, the Westminster Government flatly said no to those Remploy workers?

[Ian C. Lucas]

It is a matter of profound regret that the Welsh Government’s helpful offer to take over responsibility for the Remploy factories in Wales was not taken up. Their constructive effort to address this issue was rejected out of hand. Consequently, the 35 or so people in Wrexham who would have been in work if the Welsh Government had taken on the responsibility for ensuring that the factories remained viable lost their jobs, and Margaret has remained out of work ever since.

Margaret is not alone. I am grateful to the large number of organisations that are interested in the fact that I secured this debate and forwarded me numerous briefings, all of which I have read. Time does not allow me to refer to them in detail, but Mencap said:

“Current back-to-work support for disabled people has proved ineffective. Job outcomes for disabled people on the Work Programme are low at only 8.7 percent”—

nine people out of 100—

“for new ESA claimants, and 4.3 percent for other ESA/Incapacity Benefit customers.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Christopher Chope (in the Chair)]

Since all the key players are here, I call Ian Lucas.

[Ian C. Lucas]

Thank you, Mr Chope. It is always good to be described as a key player.

I was quoting Mencap:

“Work Choice, the Government’s specialist employment support programme, is ineffectively targeted and offers support to a small number of disabled people with just 17 percent of referred customers claiming ESA. This represents only a small proportion of disabled people who are looking for work and it is unlikely that many people with a learning disability are benefiting from it.”

Incredibly, between 2011 and 2015 the number of jobcentres employing a full-time adviser to help disabled people fell by more than 60% from 226 to only 90, with reductions in every recorded year. It is only going to get worse. Under the Welfare Reform and Work Bill, which is being considered in the Lords, employment and support allowance for those in the work-related activity group will be cut by almost £30 a week for new claimants from April 2017.

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

Given the context that the hon. Gentleman is describing and the shocking statistics that he is giving us, is it not not in the least surprising that 3.7 million disabled people in this country live in poverty? That number increased by 300,000 last year and will only get even worse in the light of the issue that he is raising.

[Ian C. Lucas]

Absolutely. We want to get people into work. The irony of Margaret’s case is that she was put out of work. The responsibility must rest with the Government. I am not talking about a private sector job, but about a job taken away by a Government led by our current Prime Minister. He must take full responsibility for that, and it makes me angry.

Seventy per cent. of respondents to a recent survey carried out by the Disability Benefits Consortium said that the £30-a-week cut would affect their health and more than half said that it would mean them returning to work later. So constituents are now approaching us. Margaret is only one example, but it is important to refer to individual cases—one of the benefits of being a Member of Parliament, having constituency surgeries and getting to know our constituents, is learning from them how they are directly affected by Government policy. I want the Minister and everyone in the Chamber to be aware of how Margaret has been affected by Government policy, because if the Government really want to address the situation that they have created for someone such as her, they must give proper support to those who are unemployed.

The mentoring scheme that the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) mentioned sounds like a good one, but we need more of them. We need to find placements for disabled people to give them experience of work and to give them the opportunity to be in a workplace. If someone who has worked somewhere for 26 years has that job taken away by their own Government, that Government have a responsibility to persuade employers to ensure that such people have an opportunity to go to a different workplace and to have proper support.

[Natalie McGarry (Glasgow East) (Ind)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate.

My constituent worked in Remploy, as Margaret did, under a skilled seamstress. She has learning disabilities and although she has worked since, it has been in wholly unsuitable jobs. The ESA group to which she has returned is the WRAG, and the concern for people such as my constituent is the disincentive to go to work because of cuts for new claimants in the WRAG. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that threat of having less work will not promote work for people such as my constituent and Margaret? When things go wrong and their disabilities perhaps prevent them from being able to carry out their employment—

[Mr Christopher Chope (in the Chair)]

Order. I understood the hon. Lady to be making an intervention, rather than a speech.

[Ian C. Lucas]

It is difficult for me to respond to a speech, Mr Chope. I might get an opportunity later, but in view of the number of people present I should move on for now.

We need support, incentives for employers and mentoring of employees. None of that has happened for Margaret in my constituency since 2012. Margaret is only one example and there are many more. Many more people who were made redundant by the Government were told that they would be able to go into mainstream employment, but have not been able to do so. Some are now not even being provided with support through the ESA. As a consequence, they remain unemployed.

I want to hear from the Minister that the Government have a real intent to address the issue. He should be providing the level of support to which I believe citizens such as Margaret are entitled. The Government failed following the closure of Remploy. They have let Margaret and others such as her down. The Government need to up their game, because people’s lives are being destroyed and they are suffering because of ill-advised and improperly implemented Government policies.

Remploy Workers

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 26th November 2014 Westminster Hall

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to raise the very important issue, both in Wrexham and across the country, of the re-employment of redundant Remploy workers. Until 2012, we had a Remploy factory in Wrexham. Although the numbers employed at Wrexham Remploy had declined over a number of years, about 43 people worked there by 2012. They were manufacturing, in particular, office furniture, which was then sold.

There had been a previous proposal to close the Remploy factory by the Labour Government in 2008, but there was a very strong local reaction. It was resisted. There were campaigns, marches and a weekly street stall in Wrexham town centre to support our Remploy factory and the Remploy workers. As a result of that hard-fought campaign, in which Councillor David Bithell played a very important part, the decision was reversed and the factory remained open. Effort was put in to securing more work for the factory, and the production of office furniture continued. One of the great lost opportunities was the lack of procurement opportunities in relation to local government and the Ministry of Defence. That has meant that, unfortunately, the factories that were open in 2008 have now largely closed.

When the Government came to power with the agenda of reducing the money spent supporting disabled people, I had fears that the decision would be revisited. It was not long before my fears proved to be justified. In March 2012, the Government announced that they would close the Remploy factory in Wrexham and make the staff redundant.

The Wrexham Remploy factory was a very special place. During the 2008 campaign and, indeed, in the years leading up to it, I had begun to know the Remploy workers in Wrexham very well. Most of them had worked there for many years, and there was a tremendous atmosphere of mutual support. There was no resistance at all to anyone securing employment anywhere else in the mainstream job market, but for particular individuals, there was strong value in working with other people who were disabled and who had challenges in trying to secure work in the mainstream market.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I apologise because I have to leave the Chamber to chair a meeting. I recall my hon. Friend’s engagement with the Remploy workers, via their trade unions, in his local factory. Can he confirm that, throughout the process, under the last Government and this one, the workers at that factory, through their unions, were willing to engage in any forms of restructuring, were looking at alternative opportunities for income generation in particular, and were willing to engage in a discussion about changing working practices? They were willing to do that all through the period, in a constructive and committed way, in order to ensure not only that the factory remained open, but that it fulfilled its original purposes.

[Ian Lucas]

Indeed. That was very much the case. Such was the commitment to the factory that it seemed to me, certainly in Wrexham, that people were willing to consider any proposal at all. The workers and the unions looked at any way at all of keeping the factory open. The history of the Wrexham factory, which I will come to, is that exactly that happened. There was a very strong effort to keep the factory open.

[Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend will remember that one of the callous decisions that this Government made was when the Welsh Assembly asked whether the Remploy budget could be devolved to the Assembly. It was a very good plan; it could have saved jobs and kept the factories open, but the Government said no. Would my hon. Friend say that that was quite cruel?

[Ian Lucas]

It was cruel and unnecessary. The Government very often fall over themselves to pass on difficult problems to the Welsh Government. In this case, the Welsh Government came forward and suggested that the Remploy budget be devolved, but the UK Government refused. There was an absolute dedication on their part to close the factories. They were determined that they were going to close them, and despite what the Minister has indicated previously, I am convinced that that was part of a cost-cutting exercise on the part of the Government. They have a stated commitment not to reduce the budget, but I will come on to the figures that show that the money the Government are spending on disabled people is decreasing.

I have made the argument repeatedly to the Secretary of State and to the then Minister for the disabled, who is now the Minister for Employment, that there was a group of people who wanted to continue to work in Remploy factories, doing gainful, positive work, and working for the most part with other disabled people. That argument was consistently ignored and the factory closed, despite a further and intense campaign to keep it open. Efforts were made in Wrexham to secure private investment to keep the factory open, and additional support, as my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Chris Evans) mentioned, was suggested by the Welsh Government. However, the UK Government were not prepared to consider allowing the Remploy site in Wrexham to be used and, as a result, it was very shortly thereafter sold off for housing development, which two and a half years on is proceeding in Wrexham town.

There was a private sector effort to keep the factory open. A business called Enterprising Employment, which worked with the Welsh Government for a period, employed about a dozen former Remploy workers for a time, but it was unable to continue and those workers were ultimately made redundant and lost their jobs.

We therefore have a picture of the people who worked for Remploy, many of whom had worked for many years on the site, being made redundant. The site in central Wrexham was sold off for housing development. I make no criticism of the fact that the site is now being used—thankfully, in a positive way—but it would have been much better if those people who were working there continued to work there.

The Government’s rationale for closing the Remploy factories was that they wanted to spend the budget of the Department for Work and Pensions more efficiently, so two and a half years on from the publication of the Government’s response to the Sayce review, back in March 2012, is an appropriate time to look at the Government’s record on those vulnerable people. What is their record?

[John McDonnell]

Before my hon. Friend moves on from the Sayce review, it is worth putting one point on the record. The Government have prayed in aid the Sayce review all through the process. The Sayce review said that there should be a proper process of consultation—that was envisaged to be six months so that people could engage in a proper dialogue about their futures, but we got 90 days. That was one of the earliest grievances and it betrayed the Government’s intent, which was to make cuts rather than to protect those individuals.

[Ian Lucas]

There was never any doubt about the Government’s intent. There was never any real effort to keep the factories open. The intent was to close them. What has been the consequence? We know from an answer to a parliamentary question given to my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) on 15 October 2014 that, nationally, 1,507 people are, to use the Government’s euphemism,

“choosing to work with our personal case workers to find another job”—

that means they are unemployed—and 774 are in work. From the Government’s figures, we know that, nationally, twice as many former Remploy workers, who used to be gainfully employed, are without work than have work.

I am speaking about the matter today because, 10 days ago, I went to visit the Remploy employment agency in Wrexham and met the staff who are working to try to place disabled individuals in work. That is a dedicated service for finding work for disabled people in the town. The staff who work there are impressive and committed to their work. I want to make it absolutely clear that I am not criticising their work, because they are working hard to place disabled individuals with jobs in today’s job market—I commend them for their efforts, but they have a tough job.

On my visit to Wrexham, I met three men whom I have known for a number of years, who were in the agency and who previously worked in the Remploy factory. They had all worked at Wrexham Remploy for many years, and they were still sitting together because they had known each other for a long time. They had been part of the campaign to keep the factory open, with all the marches, the street stalls, the efforts and the camaraderie that that entailed. When the 2012 campaign was in force, the Government’s response to that camaraderie was to have a very limited period of consultation, make no real effort to engage in keeping the factory open and reject the Welsh Government’s proposal to devolve the budget. The result was that individuals who had been employed became unemployed. I listened to the accounts of the difficulties that those three gentlemen had encountered in securing work. Some of them had secured work for some time, and some had not, even though they had had dedicated support for their efforts to find work. I applied for this debate to report on the efforts that they have been making and to hold the Government and Ministers to account for the failure that their own statistics show.

The employment market in Wrexham is now intensely competitive. We are fortunate to have a diverse economy, with people working in manufacturing, retail, and the service sector. However, agency work dominates the market, especially for those who are unemployed, and access to new jobs is often subject to rigorous gatekeeping by employment agencies. The result is that former Remploy workers are, as they told me, at an immediate disadvantage in the job market because of their disability, and the agencies have no interest in accommodating the needs of the disabled. Agencies look for the most physically able staff, and often reject disabled staff either before they are taken on or shortly thereafter. Even when jobs are available, they are subject to the vagaries of reduced-hours contracts that are often terminated at short notice, which play havoc with the arrangements that the Government impose through the local jobcentre.

The overall consequence is that, during the past year in Wrexham, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics, median weekly earnings have fallen by 7.4%. Even for those who are in work, life is getting tougher under this Government. The Government present the 774 former Remploy workers who are in work as successes, but those individuals are worse off as a result of their current jobs and income. They also have to deal with the obstacle course that the Government have imposed on individuals in the employment market.

When people lose work, securing access to benefits is a lengthy process and there are often delays in paying benefits to which people are entitled. The majority of applicants to the local food bank are awaiting payment of benefits. In Wrexham, 2,864 people have been forced to use the food bank in the six months from April to September 2014, a figure that has increased by 40% in the past year. When I spoke to former Remploy workers, they told me that they were applying for jobs they knew they had no chance of securing in order to comply with requirements imposed by the Department for Work and Pensions and the jobcentre. If they do not do so, they will be subject to benefit sanctions.

That is the reality for Remploy workers who were sacked by this Government more than two years ago. For many years, they had gainful employment doing productive work. The excellent briefing provided by the House of Commons Library tells us that a coalition Government in 1944, led by a Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister who were worthy of the offices they held, legislated to set up Remploy. The current Government, by their actions and approach, have let down some of the most vulnerable people in our society, and they should be ashamed. As a taxpayer, I pay my taxes to support vulnerable people in Wrexham and across the country. We are talking about worthy individuals who deserve support and who want to work. They now face intense competition in a difficult job market, in which it is difficult for them, with their disabilities, to compete. The Government’s decision to take away their opportunity to work for Remploy, a dedicated business for which they had worked for many years, was a cruel step that took away their opportunities, their camaraderie and their strength.

The Government promised to help former Remploy workers, but the Government’s own figures show that those promises have not been kept, because two out of three of those workers are unemployed. That is the responsibility of the Secretary of State, the Minister and the Government. They need to look at those disabled workers and act. Why have the Government failed to secure re-employment for so many former Remploy workers? What obligation is there on job agencies to accommodate the needs of disabled workers? What percentage of individuals placed in work by employment agencies are disabled? What proportion of former Remploy workers are employed on reduced-hours contracts? What proportion of former Remploy workers are being paid less than they were when they were employed by Remploy? How much did the Government receive for the sale of the Stansty road site in Wrexham, which is now being used for development?

This is a sorry tale of a Government who, in their commitment to reducing budgets, made people redundant, put people out of work and broke the spirit of a proud work force who had worked together for many years. I believe in Governments who support the most vulnerable in society, and I hope we will shortly have a Government who meet that fundamental obligation, an obligation that any worthy Government would maintain. This is a dreadful tale that the people of Wrexham will remember when they vote next May. I hold the Government responsible for the dreadful actions they have pursued throughout this matter.

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[Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Ian Lucas) on securing the debate. It is pertinent to remember that it is in meeting people and experiencing their despair in a very difficult job market that we see the personal side of the Government’s decision. Although I will address my comments to a broader economic perspective, we must never lose sight of the effect on the individual. The difficulty is that the actions the Government have taken in closing the Remploy factories and the lack of support they have given to workers to find new outlets for employment have happened against a backdrop of the destruction of the economy in the very parts of Wales where those workers are looking for jobs.

Former Remploy workers face some of the greatest barriers. Recruitment agencies inevitably go for the people who can be most flexible, because that is the type of job market we have. Former Remploy workers are often based in areas with the least transport connections to other job opportunities—that is why the factories were set up in the first place.

From the figures we have, we know that the tops of the valleys—the areas that are furthest from the job markets—have suffered most under the Government’s tax and welfare reforms. The knock-on effects on those local economies make it particularly difficult for anyone who faces barriers to travelling or being employed. That particularly affects former Remploy workers.

A Sheffield Hallam university report recently analysed the effect of the tax and welfare reforms on Wales. It showed that they are taking £1 billion out of the Welsh economy and that the people in the least well-off communities are suffering most. Because those on the lowest incomes spend their money quickly in their local economy out of necessity, the knock-on effect of the loss of £1,000 a year of income per working adult—if there are two adults in a home, that is £40 a week—has been net losses of 7,000 jobs in the local service industries in Wales. That is purely as a result of those reforms.

Even before Remploy people came into the market, the number of jobs was decreasing, so before new jobs can be created, it is necessary to overcome the loss of jobs in those areas. Inevitably, spend is in the bigger towns, meaning that there is even less in some of the deprived areas where there is the most difficulty in finding any opportunities for people to get new employment. That affects anyone who faces any barriers to the workplace, which is the case for many former Remploy employees.

[Ian Lucas]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, in addition to the difficulty in securing work, the income of those in work is falling? That means that the spend in the local economy is decreasing, which adds to the depressed nature of the economy in those areas.

[Nia Griffith]

Absolutely. The way in which the Government have implemented their tax credit reforms means that many working people have lost out significantly. Add to that the fact that 7,000 whole jobs have been taken out of the economy, and the result is that many people have fewer hours and fewer shifts, so they have less to spend. At the same time, they are hit by high fuel prices, which the Government are not doing anything about. They cannot avoid paying them, so they have less money to spend in the local economy. In fact, four times as much money has been taken out of the Welsh economy as comes in from the EU grant to the valleys and west Wales. That has a significant knock-on effect.

What is sad is that we recognised that this was a difficult time, which is why the Welsh Government wanted to step in to do their bit to support the Remploy factories and look at ways to help. The Welsh Government have put in support through the employer’s support grant, which encourages employers to take on additional workers, and there has been some success in the Swansea area in setting up successors to the Remploy factories. However, the climate is difficult and those measures cannot account for all the former workers. Therefore, although we have one or two successes to celebrate, they are not sufficient. There are Remploy workers in my constituency who have not been re-employed in any way.

We want a much more determined effort by the Government to help the individuals concerned. In the Welsh Affairs Committee report on the Government’s Work programme in Wales, we did not find that the work being done was successful. The success rate for people with disabilities getting jobs in the Work programme was 5%, which is below the national average of 7%. That shows the scale of the problem: only one person in 20 is being found a job opportunity. A huge failure of the Work programme is its ability to address people who are former Remploy workers and those who might have looked to work in the various opportunities provided by the Remploy factories.

While the Government have thrown out the Welsh Government’s proposal to take a more positive approach to the Remploy factories, they have not put anything else in place that would lead us to jump for joy and say, “What an excellent idea.” There seems to be a failure. Oxfam Cymru suggested that, in some instances, those in the more-difficult-to-find-jobs-for category are being parked. That is a damning statement.

The worry is not only that there is a total failure to identify and help people who have specific disabilities, but that, within the greater economic context, the Government’s decisions have made it difficult for poorer areas to generate employment opportunities. In fact, those decisions have exacerbated the problems in those areas where we are trying to find employment opportunities, where there have been major job losses, and where there are difficult economic circumstances. At the same time, the Government programmes are not working to help the people in those areas.

We praise those employers who have made an effort, who are trying to take on people and who are trying to accommodate people with different forms of disability. However, even in the harsh reality of the present time, the evidence given by Remploy to the Welsh Affairs Committee shows that there is such a large number of temporary, short-term and short-hours types of employment that that situation is creating a huge difficulty. That reminds us why the form of employment at Remploy, with a proper timetable, proper week and proper factory to work at, was so important, particularly for people for whom routine is essential.

Former Remploy workers face travel problems in my area. They must cope with difficult travel arrangements to get down to the various centres, which makes things even harder for them. The result is that some do not attend those centres—it is simply impractical for them to do so.

When the Minister responds, I ask that he comes forward with positive ideas, because we would like a significant improvement in the outcomes for Remploy workers, and we would like the Government to take the initiative.

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[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Havard. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Ian Lucas) on securing the debate and all colleagues who have contributed to it. I thank the former Remploy workers whom I have had the opportunity to meet over many months, who have spoken to me about their feelings about the Remploy closure, and the Unite and GMB trade unions who support them. In that connection, I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

Today’s debate comes just over one year after the closure of the last Remploy factory. It is clear from what we have heard that there is a wide gulf between the picture painted by Ministers when the closures were announced, which suggested that the Remploy model was outmoded, outdated and not offering genuine employment opportunity to disabled people, and the real situation we find ourselves in today. My colleagues have highlighted some personal consequences of that prejudice against the Remploy model: the fear that people have been left with, the insult to their dignity as proud working people and their sense of loss of hope for the future. That has come as no surprise to many of us, and it would not have surprised us when the closures were proposed.

Even when Ministers announced the intended closure of the factories, many colleagues sounded the alarm. They highlighted the challenge that many Remploy staff would face when trying to find work in mainstream employment, particularly in areas that have already been hit hard by job losses, as my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) said, and particularly for those workers who were employed by Remploy for many years, often for decades, or who lack formal qualifications. Such circumstances do not give people a head start in the labour market. That was well known and well understood from the outset.

Concerns were raised when the closures were proposed, and well before then, about the failure of the then Remploy management to optimise business performance. That has been mentioned during the debate. Accusations by trade unions and others suggested an over-costly management structure and an absence of will and determination on the part of senior Remploy management to seek and develop new business.

The business plan put in place in 2008 under a Labour Government had not been allowed to run its full course when the present Government announced the wholesale closure of the factories, but many Remploy workers strongly believed that, with the right management and focused business development efforts, that business plan offered the basis for a successful future for Remploy. When it was announced that the factories would close, some workers hoped to take over parts of the business themselves, such was their faith in the future of the Remploy model, and they were determined to make a go of it. It was a reasonable ambition. Evidence from other European Union countries, including Scotland, suggests that supported employment alongside other labour market strategies to promote the employment of disabled people can be effective in increasing their employment. This blanket assumption that supported employment is a dead-end for all really is not borne out by an analysis of the evidence.

As hon. Members have said, the real situation we face is that, according to the DWP, 1,507 disabled workers were laid off as a result of the closure and were, in the DWP’s words, “choosing to work” with personal advisers, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham said. The Library quotes a higher figure of around 2,000 workers losing employment, possibly because the DWP figure only reflects stage 1 lay-offs or because it is deliberately ignoring those workers who are not engaged with DWP, as the Department simply does not track them. Will the Minister be absolutely clear about the figures? How many people were previously employed in Remploy at the time of the closure and what destination has each of those individuals reached today?

At best, only about half the former workers are now in employment. The Minister said in a written answer to me on 15 October, that 774 are currently in work, 389 are in receipt of employment and support allowance, 345 receive jobseeker’s allowance and 382 confirmed their intention to retire. A survey by GMB in 2014 suggested that only a quarter of former workers were in employment and that many of those were working short hours or were on lower pay than when they worked in Remploy.

[Ian Lucas]

I noted an interesting statistic from the written answer that my hon. Friend mentioned. Does she agree that the fact that 345 former Remploy workers are in receipt of jobseeker’s allowance suggests they are not receiving dedicated help as disabled workers? Does not she find that disturbing?

[Kate Green]

I, too, found that statistic interesting. I hope that the Minister will explain whether they are receiving the same access to the personal help and support programme as those workers who have been placed on employment and support allowance, because it would be a matter of concern if a two-tier offer was being made to former workers, all of whom have emerged from the same circumstances. It also points to the fact that these workers have much to offer the labour market, with the right support.

Of course, we know that the assessment processes for determining who is in which category of employment support allowance or jobseeker’s allowance are not particularly trusted—I think that it would be fair to say—by those seeking employment support. The Minister would do well to delve a little more closely into the destinations of that JSA group, particularly, because if the Government’s logic is correct, it ought to be moving into work very easily. Yet here we are, 18 months on, and it would appear that 345 of them have not done so.

The GMB survey suggests that the picture is rather more gloomy in any event, with only a quarter of former workers in employment, often in poorer conditions than under their Remploy contracts. We know from the GMB research that many more of those who are now categorised as retired have chosen to retire in the light of futile searches for alternative employment or because of a lack of help from the Department. That is dispiriting, because Ministers assured Parliament at the time of the closure programme that extensive support would be put in place. An extra £15 million was committed to the Access to Work programme and £8 million was committed to create the guaranteed people help and support package, which was to provide support to each affected disabled employee for 18 months after they left Remploy.

Despite that funding, we have to accept that the employment outcomes are disappointing. It is unclear what the additional funding committed to Access to Work and PHSP has achieved. In a written answer on 14 October, the Minister told me that 265 former workers were receiving Access to Work support and that 827 former workers had taken part in community support fund projects, of whom 348 were helped into employment. Unfortunately, the DWP does not track those working fewer than 16 hours a week and has no information on whether the type of employment they are accessing is fixed term, temporary, part time or voluntary.

Former workers have reported difficulty in accessing the support they want. One group of workers in Yorkshire who have established their own business and are attracting contracts from former Remploy customers reported a rigid reluctance on the part of the DWP to support them with grants, other funding and advice. Other people have told me that the employment support they were offered was inadequate and did not meet their needs, although the Minister told me in a written answer on 14 October that the DWP has spent £5.5 million on providing individual specialist support. I would be grateful if he offered his analysis of why, when more than £20 million has been spent on supporting former Remploy workers, around half of them remain without work. Is he satisfied with that performance? If not, what further action is he taking to increase the employment rate of former workers? Why has only £5.5 million of the £8 million allocated to personal support been spent more than a year after the factory closures? What will happen to the remaining funds?

According to the DWP, former workers who receive specialist support through the PHSP will continue to receive specialist support after the first 18 months of support is complete, usually from the same specialist adviser. Where is that support coming from and how is it being paid for? How are the advisers being remunerated? Are they being paid on the basis of results? How many former Remploy staff have moved on to other labour market programmes, such as the Work programme or Work Choice? What outcomes are being achieved for those workers if they are participating in those programmes? Will the Minister comment on the issue raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham of the attitude of private employment agencies? What are their success rates in placing former workers into employment? What fees are they receiving? What is their attitude to former Remploy employees?

What steps have been taken to assist former workers in reskilling and developing new skills for a different labour market? How successful has that been? What process is in place to analyse, identify and prepare them for specific employment opportunities in their local communities? As my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli pointed out, travel is not a reasonable option for many. In some parts of the country—Wales is a good example—travel distances would be extremely large in reaching any other offer of employment.

What support is being given to enable groups of former workers to come together to form their own businesses or social enterprises? In particular, what steps are the Government taking to help them in accessing public contracts? It was noted in the debate that the failure to put energy into delivering public contracts to the Remploy factories through public procurement processes as intended was a factor in the difficulties they experienced in achieving their business plans. It would be useful to know what advice is being given across central and local government to encourage procurement from social enterprises, where those have replaced Remploy.

The wider well-being of former Remploy workers has been raised in the debate. My hon. Friends have highlighted the importance of social contact with colleagues and of employment routines for this otherwise potentially isolated group of individuals. It seems that information on the nature of the impairment or the condition of former workers has not been tracked, so we will not know how their ongoing physical or mental health has been affected.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham highlighted that there would have been a capital receipt from the sale of the former Remploy factory in his constituency. Will the Minister say more about what has been achieved overall from the realisation of capital assets? How much has been recouped in that manner? If the Government have received capital money, where does that funding sit and what will it be used for?

It seems that there has been complacency in the Government on the future of former Remploy disabled staff, both at the time and subsequently. There is little sign that Ministers can show what has worked in helping former workers into sustainable employment. There is little evidence of help to build successful businesses or social enterprises. For those individuals left without work, the future remains bleak. I hope that the Minister can provide details of further effective, ongoing support, since he surely cannot be satisfied that half the former employees remain without work. Many fear that they will never work again.

In conclusion, if the Minister proposes further sensible plans to maximise the employment chances of former Remploy staff, the trade unions, the workers themselves and all my parliamentary colleagues here today, as well as those colleagues not present who had Remploy factories in their constituencies, stand ready to do what they can to support the Government in increasing the employment chances of those workers.

[The Minister for Disabled People (Mr Mark Harper)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Havard. I congratulate the hon. Member for Wrexham (Ian Lucas) on securing the debate. It was surprising that we spent so little time on the full history of the process, going back to when the previous Government started the factory closure programme and recognised reality. I remember those events clearly, because I was the shadow Minister for Disabled People between 2007 and 2010. I had a small Remploy factory in my constituency in Lydney.

It is worth putting on the record that the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr Hain), who was the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions at the time, was right and had our support. It is disappointing that Opposition Members have ignored the reality. In a statement on 29 November 2007, he recognised that change was necessary. He said:

“The reality is that without modernisation Remploy deficits would obliterate our other programmes to help disabled people into mainstream work. With no change, in five years’ time Remploy would require £171 million a year on current trends.”—[Official Report, 29 November 2007; Vol. 468, c. 448.]

That would have represented the entire annual Workstep budget at the time. I know that he did not find that a comfortable process, but he recognised the reality that the situation simply was not sustainable and closed 28 factories. We know nothing about any of the employees involved in that, because the previous Labour Government chose not to follow their progress.

It was interesting to hear about the GMB survey. If I heard the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) correctly—I am disappointed he could not stay for my response to his questions, but I am sure he will read it in Hansard tomorrow—he referred to 2,700 or so employees. As there were not that many disabled employees employed by Remploy enterprises when the Government came to office, it must be the case that quite a lot of those employees were made redundant by the factory closures under the previous Labour Government. We simply do not know anything about them, because the previous Labour Government failed to track their progress. That was an improvement made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) when she was the Minister; she said that we would track employees’ progress. The only reason why we have any of the statistics is that we chose to maintain them while the previous Government did not.

[Ian Lucas]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. He said that Opposition Members ignored the previous Labour Government’s record, but I specifically referred to it and to their initial decision to close the Wrexham factory. Will the Minister withdraw the suggestion that I ignored the previous Labour Government’s record?

[Mr Harper]

If the hon. Gentleman looks at the record, he will find that he characterised it in a slightly different way. He skated over the matter. He characterised the decisions that this Government made, when faced with the same financial reality, in a completely different manner, and ascribed motives to the decisions that my hon. Friends took that are simply not warranted. He did not ascribe such motives to the right hon. Member for Neath when he made similar difficult decisions.

[Ian Lucas]

The Minister said that we ignored the record of the previous Labour Government. I specifically referred to it in my speech, so will he withdraw that suggestion?

[Mr Harper]

I am happy to say that he did not ignore it, but he skated over it and ascribed motives to my hon. Friends that were simply not warranted. He did not ascribe such motives to the right hon. Member for Neath who made similar decisions when faced with exactly the same difficult financial circumstances.

[Mr Harper]

The statement of the right hon. Member for Neath made it clear that, despite the 28 factories that he had to close, the previous Labour Government managed to keep open the sites that they did only

“on the basis of very stretching procurement targets and a tough forward plan.”

He continued:

“It will be up to everyone with an interest in Remploy—Government, management, trade unions, local MPs and other political representatives—to pull together to ensure that those factories meet their ambitious targets, otherwise they, too, could be put at risk.—[Official Report, 29 November 2007; Vol. 468, c. 449.]

The reality is that when this Government came to office we faced an even more challenging financial situation, due to the previous Government’s appalling fiscal legacy, which included borrowing £1 for every £4 that was spent. It is no good the hon. Member for Wrexham shaking his head. When this Government came to office, we inherited the worst fiscal position of any Government in the western world. The budget deficit was 11% of GDP. It is no good his shaking his head again. He simply cannot ignore that fact. We had to deal with it, and wanted to ensure that we could support disability employment programmes, on which we have increased spending. That would not have been possible had we not made difficult decisions about the Remploy factories.

[Ian Lucas]

When this Government came to office, they inherited growth and falling unemployment from the previous Labour Government. Will the Minister confirm—he should know this, because I have checked him on it once already—that the deficit is higher now than it was this time last year?

[Mr Harper]

The deficit has been reduced by a third compared with the position that we inherited from the previous Government. The hon. Gentleman can ignore those fiscal realities, but there are now 2 million more jobs in the private sector. The most recent set of statistics contained the excellent news that the number of disabled people in work has increased by 259,000 over the past year, and that the employment rate for disabled people has also increased. There is more to do of course, but that is welcome news.

It is worth putting on the record the financial position that was faced by my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke, when she had to confront the challenges. Two factories were specifically referred to in the debate. The Wrexham factory, referred to by the hon. Member for Wrexham, was losing £878,000 a year in 2011-12. The Croespenmaen factory, referred to by the hon. Member for Islwyn (Chris Evans), was losing £889,000. I do not deny that they may well have won some contracts and increased their business, but the truth is that those factories were losing a significant amount of money.

That is important because that money—around £25,000 a head—was being spent on a small number of disabled people when thousands of disabled people in all our constituencies were not benefiting. If that money had carried on being spent, it would have put at risk the Government’s other employment programmes. We have increased the amount being spent on the Access to Work programme, and we are increasing the resources going into both the Work programme for employment and support allowance claimants and Work Choice. If we had not taken these decisions on the Remploy enterprises that were losing money, those programmes would have been put at risk. The entire Access to Work budget is £108 million a year, which is less than the Remploy factories were costing. The situation was simply unsustainable.

The decisions were difficult. In this very room, the right hon. Member for Stirling (Mrs McGuire), then the Minister with responsibility for disabled people, had to set out and defend her Government’s policies to some of her colleagues. She received my support, because she was doing the right thing. Even if they are from an opposite political party, Ministers who do the right thing deserve support.

Looking back at the decisions that we made, various organisations were supportive of what we did. Disability Wales said at the time that it

“endorses the promotion of fully integrated services and does not see Remploy as either progressive or forward thinking in their approaches to service provision”,

and that Remploy

“are now standing in the way of full integration and indirectly hampering individuals’ chances of progression.”

Those are not my words, but those of Disability Wales. Disability Rights UK said:

“We appreciate that the Sayce Review has caused some concern for disabled people and their trades union representatives working in Remploy factories. However, we believe segregated employment for disabled people is unacceptable.”

On Monday, I was at a Scope event with the shadow Minister and spoke to several representatives from disabled people user-led organisations, all of whom told me that closing the Remploy factories and moving away from segregated employment towards supporting people in mainstream employment were the right things to do.

We have put aside more support for disabled people, not less. The hon. Member for Wrexham said at the beginning of his remarks that we were spending less money on disabled people and that he would go on to set that out, but I did not actually hear him do so. We are spending £50 billion on support for disabled people through things such as personal independence payments and ESA. We have signed up 1,100 employers to our Disability Confident campaign in order to increase the chances of disabled people finding work. The employment figures bear out that that is starting to be successful.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Harper]

I am grateful, Mr Havard. Let me tackle the point about the Welsh Government’s offer, mentioned by the hon. Lady and the hon. Member for Islwyn. The offer was not really an offer. The Welsh Government wanted us to carry on subsidising the factories and to carry on spending a significant amount of money—some £25,000 a head—on a small number of disabled people, which would have been at the expense of the programmes that we were running to support a much larger number of disabled people. If the Welsh Government had said that they had a significant amount of money to put on the table, things may have been different, but they did not. They wanted us to continue to subsidise the factories, which was simply unsustainable. The previous Government knew that. I sat in here and listened to the uncomfortable decisions that Ministers in the previous Government took. They were not comfortable decisions, but they were the right decisions. Those Ministers had the support of my party and me when making those decisions, because they were the right thing to do.

The hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) wanted me to cover the support that we have provided to Remploy employees. We put in place the people help and support package, which has been referred to by a number of Members. It was an £8 million package available for individuals to access for up to 18 months after factory closure, and it included access to a personal caseworker and a personal budget. The caseworkers hold meetings and discussions with employees affected to identify suitable support and opportunities, and to signpost or refer them to appropriate provision.

The hon. Member for Wrexham mentioned three individuals. I spotted a report of his meeting with them in the Daily Post, in which he said:

“I saw three Remploy workers last week who are still unemployed and I met them at the Remploy Agency”.

I am happy for him to correct me if I am wrong, but Remploy tells me that of the three individuals whom the hon. Gentleman met, one is in employment at a local cleaning firm, working in a local educational establishment; one has just received his Security Industry Authority licence and has a job offer at a local company; and one does indeed remain out of work, but he has been on a work placement and work trial, and he received a job offer, which he decided to decline. Two of the three are in work or about to start work, which is positive.

[Ian Lucas]

It is two and a half years since the Government made the announcement of the redundancies. Two of those three people were out of work. In my remarks, I did not say—the Minister can check Hansard—that they were not in work. A lot of my speech was about the fact that people are worse off even when they are in work. That was a specific aspect of my speech. He should not misrepresent what I said in the debate.

[Mr Harper]

I am not; I am quoting from the newspaper report. If that is not what the hon. Gentleman said, obviously it has been misreported, but the quote is that he met three Remploy workers “who are still unemployed”. I am simply pointing out that one is employed, one has just received a job offer because he has his SIA licence, and the other person does indeed remain out of work but had received a job offer. I am simply putting that on the record. If he did not say that they were unemployed—

[Ian Lucas]

Two and a half years.

[Mr Harper]

The thing is, we know about the Remploy workers who lost their jobs through out factory closures; we know nothing about those who lost their jobs under the previous Government. More of them lost their jobs under the previous Government, who did not track the progress of such employees, but we did so, which was welcome.

Let me say more about what the hon. Member for Llanelli was asking about. The other thing that we built into the package of support was a community support fund, providing grants to local voluntary sector and user-led organisations so that they could run job club projects to support disabled Remploy employees. In Wales, three local organisations have successfully delivered such community support fund projects, supporting 90 participants, 72 of whom have moved successfully into employment. In July I had the chance to visit one of those community support fund projects at the Lennox Partnership in Glasgow. I understand that 833 former Remploy employees have participated in such projects, which have enabled 352 people to take up new employment opportunities.

On the statistics, we can of course only track employees who have given us permission to do so—we cannot find out what is happening to employees if they did not wish us to know that. On the figures that we have, therefore, 774 of the 1,507 people who were made redundant are in work, which is more than half of them. At the end of October, to update the figures that the hon. Lady had, we had spent £5.7 million of the £8 million support fund; we expect the budget to be fully spent.

It is also worth mentioning Remploy employment services. When the right hon. Member for Neath made his statement, which I remember clearly, he said that the employment services part of the Remploy business had got some 5,000 people into work that year, which was the same as the total number employed in the factory network. The employment services business has continued to be successful. Since 2010, it has supported more than 100,000 disabled and disadvantaged people into work. As Members know, a commercial process is under way at the moment and on track to be completed by next March. The employment services business has been successful in getting a significant number of people into work. As shadow Minister, I had the opportunity to visit some of the successful people whom it had placed in work.

The hon. Member for Islwyn mentioned the consultation process and the time line. I deliberately read out the relevant section from the 2007 speech of the right hon. Member for Neath, so it is not as if the factories did not know that there was an issue. From 2007, he put on the table the fact that those factories that were not closed by the previous Labour Government had to hit what he described as stretching targets and a tough forward plan if they were to be successful. The idea that people only started thinking about such things when we set out our proposals is not true; those factories all knew that they were losing money, and that there was a significant challenge to get profitable work from 2007, or five years before we set out our proposals.

Furthermore, when the Sayce review was under way, there was a consultation on our process in which people could commit to things. That process was not as swift as the hon. Gentleman made out. There were two stages: in stage 1, the Government reduced its subsidy to Remploy from the beginning of the new financial year, so that we ceased funding factories that made significant losses and restricted funding to those factories that might have the prospect of a viable future. The Remploy board looked at all the factories and decided which ones had a reasonable chance of being successful. At the end of that early stage, therefore, some factories were closed.

In a further commercial process, the board worked with bidders and interested parties to see if there were other viable options. The fact is, however, there were no viable options for most of those businesses. Some of the businesses successfully exited Government control. At stage 1, the health care business in Chesterfield and the filters business in Barrow successfully moved into the private sector, and the employees there have ongoing employment. At the end of stage 2 of the commercial process, three businesses successfully exited Government control, completing the process.

A reasonable chance was given to those businesses that had a reasonable prospect of being successful, but in the commercial judgment of the board some businesses simply did not have a viable future. That is why the decision to close them was taken at that time.

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Welfare Reform (Disabled People)

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 28th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Mr Mark Harper)]

I am very disappointed by the tone of the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green). This is a cynical debate, and I think my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State put his finger on the issue because if the hon. Lady meant what she said about the remarks of my noble Friend Lord Freud, she should have exposed them when she first knew about them. The fact is that the Opposition, right up to and including the Leader of the Opposition, used those remarks as a cynical device to detract attention from the excellent performance of the economy and the 2 million jobs that were created—news that was announced on 15 October but that the Leader of the Opposition did not want the House to focus on. That is what this is about.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Harper]

Not until I have at least made some opening remarks.

The Leader of the Opposition did not want the House to focus on the fact that employment is at record levels or that there has been the largest annual fall in unemployment on record. He did not want the House to focus on the fact that the claimant count had fallen below 1 million or that there had been the largest annual fall on record of youth unemployment. He did not want the House to focus on the fact that long-term unemployment was down, and that there are 400,000 fewer workless households since 2010. That is what this was about—a cynical piece of politics, and the hon. Lady had no answer to the charge of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. [Interruption.] She did not, and that will have been exposed to all those watching this debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Lucas]

Will the Minister confirm that the deficit increased by 10% in the past year?

[Mr Harper]

Let me focus on the motion before the House—[Interruption.] We have reduced the deficit by a third since the election. The hon. Gentleman does not want us to focus on the record of job creation among businesses in our country, so let us get back to the motion.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Monday 1st September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

My hon. Friend raises an interesting point. Overall the total number of national insurance number registrations to adult overseas nationals is down by more than 7,000 on the year, or 1%. NINo registrations from outside the EU are down by 30,000 on the year, or 17%, and outside the EU annual registrations to all world areas have fallen to the lowest level since records began in 2002.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State confirm that when the Prime Minister finally reveals the shopping list for presentation to the European Union on renegotiation, it will include renegotiation of the position relating to benefits? Will he now specify which particular benefits he has in mind?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am not in a position to pre-guess what the Prime Minister will decide in his negotiations—he will make it altogether clear. But I hope that both sides of the House, including the hon. Gentleman, will recognise that a negotiation followed by trusting the people to vote on whether they wish to stay in the EU is a good plan rather than a bad plan.

Universal Credit

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I always make it my priority to ignore the nonsense that comes from the other side. The Opposition live in la-la land when it comes to the welfare reforms. My hon. Friend is absolutely right that this is about real people who are trying to get back to work. We are delivering for them right now, and we will deliver even more when universal credit arrives safely and securely.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

On Monday, I received an e-mail from the Secretary of State’s office telling me that he would be visiting Wrexham on Monday afternoon. Every week, I meet constituents in Wrexham who are suffering from his incompetence. The only person who is running away from conversations about benefits is the Secretary of State. Will he meet me to hear what is happening in Wrexham in respect of personal independence payments, universal credit and all the other benefits that are falling apart?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I accept that the hon. Gentleman needed to plan that statement. I did visit Wrexham the other day and the jobcentre there. It has a phenomenally dedicated group of people who are doing brilliantly. As a result, unemployment levels in his area are falling. They are falling as a direct result of the welfare reforms that we have brought in. I only wish that he had said the same thing to the last Government. My door is always open. If he wants to come and talk to me about any problem, I will be very happy to see him.

DWP: Performance

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Maybe the letters got lost in the post, but I have never received a letter from the Minister for disabled people.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

May I just say that the Minister last week did contact my office, because I was sent a letter by an official, not him—

[Mike Penning]

And I apologised.

[Ian Lucas]

And he apologised. But I have to say that the Secretary of State clearly does not know what is going on in his own Department. He is not even listening to the debate, and, frankly, let me say this about the views expressed by the Conservative party about the vulnerable people who are coming to us for help: they are being disregarded and treated with contempt by the laughing cavaliers opposite. They should be ashamed of themselves.

[Rachel Reeves]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention.

I hope the Secretary of State also responds to the calls we are making today for the Government to give sick and disabled people some clarity and assurance by publishing a guaranteed time limit for the assessment of claims. For example, Macmillan Cancer Support has recommended that the personal independence payment assessment process be limited to 11 weeks. I hope the Secretary of State will tell us today that he will undertake to give that guarantee—if not, why not?

We are also calling for the Secretary of State to own up to the extent of the problems in his Department, particularly the mounting costs arising from problems with the personal independence payment, the work capability assessment and universal credit. The introduction of personal independence payments in place of disability living allowance was supposed to save £780 million in annual spending by next April, but with £200 million a year being spent on administration, including £127 million a year going to contracted-out assessment providers, this change is set to be completed not next year but, at this rate of progress, in 42 years’ time.

--- Later in debate ---

[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—

[Ian Lucas]

Give way.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

At its peak, 5 million people on out-of-work—

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Lucas]

Give way!

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. Mr Lucas, the Secretary of State is not giving way. Do not shout.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I said that I will give way, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I wanted to set out the successes of this Government against the nonsense of the Opposition’s debate.

At its peak, when I walked through the door, our inheritance was 5 million people on out-of-work benefits, a million of them for more than a decade. Youth unemployment had increased by nearly half and long-term unemployment doubled in just two years. One in five households was workless and the number in which no one had ever worked almost doubled.

[Ian Lucas]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way. I want to talk about incompetence on his part. Every week, people come to my surgery who cannot have their personal independence payment claims processed. Will he take some responsibility and apologise to them for the incompetence of his policy and his Department?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

We take full responsibility for ensuring that that benefit is rolled out carefully, so that when we do the full national roll-out of the whole benefit, we will know that it works. We have made a series of adjustments and also have more recruitment going on and more staff going in. I will give some pointers about where we will be when I return to this point. I simply say to the hon. Gentleman that when Labour rolled out tax credits, more than 400,000 people failed to get their money and the Prime Minister had to make a personal apology. I do not want to repeat that in this case. I want to ensure that those most in need will get the benefit.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Monday 23rd June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mike Penning]

One of the first things we can do to get appeal waiting times down is to have fewer people needing to appeal. I accept that it is taking too long in Kettering and perhaps in other parts of the country. That is for another Department, but I will contact it today.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

A constituent of mine has had an application for the personal independence payment refused—a decision that I regard as perverse. I wrote to the Minister personally to draw to his attention how bad the decision was, but received a reply from a civil servant. I wrote to the Minister because I thought he was interested in creating an efficient system. Will he please do me the courtesy of replying to my letter and addressing his mind to the case of my vulnerable constituent, who has been so badly affected?

[Mike Penning]

I have a personal policy that I write to all Members of Parliament—from both Houses—if they write to me. If a civil servant wrote back, that is wrong. I will reply and perhaps the hon. Gentleman would like to come to see me at his leisure to discuss his constituent’s case.

Independent Living Fund Recipients

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 18th June 2014 Westminster Hall

[Nic Dakin]

I am sure all those who turned up to present the letter will want to thank my hon. Friend for carrying out that duty on their behalf. Obviously, it would have been much better had they been able to access the Department themselves, and I am sure the Minister and his colleagues will reflect on that. Sometimes these things happen, sadly, but the Minister has heard my hon. Friend’s concern, and I am sure he will want to address it.

A fundamental concern for Jon, Ashley and others is whether they will be able to employ their specialist staff in future. The question was raised with North Lincolnshire council, which responded on 9 June 2014 with these words, which are rather bureaucratic:

“We appreciate this situation may cause you concern as an existing Independent Living Fund customer and would wish to reduce any worry or anxiety you may have.

Allocation of future monies will be based on your updated assessment and support plan and on future Local Authority funding so at this stage we cannot give any specific guidance on the amount of monies that you may receive from us or cannot give guarantees on the future employment status of any Personal Assistants you may currently employ.”

As hon. Members can imagine, such “reassurances” serve only to heighten anxiety and build mistrust.

I return to my central question: will the Government guarantee that Ashley, Jon and all those currently receiving ILF will not lose their independence as a result of the Government’s decision to close the fund? I believe that that decision is aimed at saving money, but it might end up costing far more in other budget areas, such as health.

A better way forward would be for the Government to engage with ILF recipients—they clearly had an opportunity to do so recently when my hon. Friend the Member for North Tyneside (Mrs Glindon) went with recipients to the DWP—to learn from their experience and to find ways of shaping future services that are cost-effective, but that continue to deliver true independence.

[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that another profoundly worrying aspect is that the coalition Government have been in situ for four years? The worry he describes has been expressed by my constituents Rosemary and David Burslem for four years, but it is still unresolved. What we are seeing from the Government is a hospital pass to other people, who will have to make the difficult decisions the Government have deliberately left for four years and have now misjudged.

[Nic Dakin]

That is why I keep repeating my question to the Minister. This is happening on his watch; he is a good Minister, and he is a man who, I believe, cares, but he cannot wash his hands, like Pontius Pilate, of the future of these individuals. He needs to nail his colours to the mast, and today he has an opportunity to do that by guaranteeing that, as a result of the Government’s decision, there will be no detriment to people currently receiving ILF. My hon. Friend is right to emphasise that people have been living with this worry and concern for the past four years, which has affected the health and well-being not only of ILF recipients, but their families, friends and carers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Penning]

Okay, I will shout; but there was certainly no slight intended to the hon. Lady or the people with her. Security make the decision, and like all Ministers I must bear with them on that. I would obviously meet at any time and place.

The subject is enormously emotive and important, but we must not make assumptions about what will happen. My reason for thinking that we can have some confidence is that the scheme has been closed since 2010, so people with exactly the same needs as the people we have heard about in the debate have had them met by the new system. They have been helped by it. It is vital not to have a two-tier system, as we do at the moment. People who have needed a version of the ILF since 2010 have had that from the local authorities, but people such as those I met last night, who are on the scheme, are having their assessments, and the change is taking place. Did families say to me yesterday that some of the questions seemed bizarre, given the disabilities of the person concerned? Yes—and I am taking that issue up. Colleagues may want to liaise with me and work with me; I think that is the key to this.

I will be honest and frank: the scheme is closed to new entries and the money will go out to local authorities. We will monitor what happens very carefully. Will there be teething problems? Yes. Will there be issues to do with the forms? Yes. However, I think we desperately need to get away from the process and from thinking that my Department, or a part of it, is the best place from which to bring a benefit right into the communities and to the individuals who need it. That is not the case. I came new to this.

[Ian Lucas]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mike Penning]

I will give way, though I promised I would not.

[Ian Lucas]

I am grateful. Does the Minister agree that because new entrants since 2010 will come within the scheme, and the budget that he transfers will be the same as it is now, inevitably people who are now receiving money from the ILF will have their income reduced?

[Mike Penning]

No. I completely do not agree with that logic. I know where the hon. Gentleman is coming from. [Interruption.] He can shake his head as much as he likes, but I am always honest and straight. Do I agree with him? No, I do not, and the reason is that those people are already being helped. Those who were in the scheme, who have come in since July 2010, are already being helped by the money that is in the local authority part, not by the money that is coming across from us. The money that is coming across with the ILF is the funding that sits with the ILF now. That is how it is, and we may have to disagree. If I am wrong factually, I shall write to the hon. Gentleman and tell him.