Universal Credit and Terminal Illness

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Wednesday 9th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Drew Hendry]

My hon. Friend rightly answers his own question. It is indeed the local authorities, the food banks and the local charities, as well as those serving the community by supporting people in these positions. During the transfer to full service, our constituency office was swamped with universal credit issues.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

We can trace this back to the Government’s talk of austerity in the last two general elections and their promise to cut £12 billion from the social budgets. That is why we are in this situation today. They can dress it up however they like, saying it is a wonderful thing, but we all know it is not. It is a cruelty being inflicted not only on terminally ill people but on ordinary people earning poverty wages today. Would the hon. Gentleman not agree?

[Drew Hendry]

The hon. Gentleman is exactly right in his description of the circumstances that have brought about this situation.

Since the roll-out of full service, I have stood here too many times to relay the devastation roll-out has caused for many of my constituents. I have supported hundreds of constituents with their universal credit issues, I have all the case studies, I have shared them and given voice to them as their MP, but, again, that has all been ignored. Such was the devastation we experienced from full-service roll-out that we even set up a universal credit roundtable group, which included the Highland Council, local Department for Work and Pensions staff, Citizens Advice, housing officers and others, to come up with local workarounds. We wrote to the Prime Minister, the previous Minister and anyone who would listen. We tried to be constructive. We shared real stories to back up our arguments. We offered process solutions. I even held a summit that included heartbreaking testimony from constituents and invited every Conservative Member to attend. Again, we were ignored.

For many, many months, I have campaigned alongside Macmillan CAB in my constituency, as well as Marie Curie, the Motor Neurone Disease Association and clinicians, on the specific issues facing people with a terminal illness.