Universal Credit

James Heappey Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ms McVey]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for mentioning my openness and the fact that I was willing, by myself, to come and apologise for using the wrong words. People who know me will always say about me that I am open, that I am straight and that I say it as it is, which I will do. Equally, if we need to make more changes, which I have done from the moment I got here—I did not seek leave to appeal to the Court of Appeal because I did not feel it would have been right; and I looked at the position of kinship carers and did not think it was right, so we changed it, as we did for the 18-to-21 group—I am more than happy to change things when we can, if we can.

[James Heappey (Wells) (Con)]

The NAO report notes that jobcentre staff have said that universal credit systems have “improved significantly” since they were first introduced. Will my right hon. Friend join me in thanking Sedgemoor District Council and other councils among the first tranche to adopt universal credit for the quality of the feedback they have given, which has allowed those improvements to be delivered?

[Ms McVey]

I thank my hon. Friend, because nobody can do this in isolation or by themselves. We need the local councils to be on board, we need the housing associations to be on board and we need MPs to be on board—we need everybody supporting the most vulnerable. I thank him for that comment, and he is quite correct.