Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill

John McDonnell Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading
Tuesday 29th April 2025 Commons Chamber

In conclusion, it is ironic, is it not, that a massive state overreach and the draconian legislation used for lockdown led to high levels of fraud, error and millions more people on benefit? It will, supposedly, now be solved and corrected by yet another massive state overreach and draconian legislation. It was wrong then and it is wrong now.

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

Sometimes in these debates, we are trying to influence those on the Front Bench; to be honest, on this legislation, I have given up on that. I just want to get on the record, for my constituents, why I am concerned about this piece of legislation and why I support amendment 11.

We have all prefaced our speeches by saying that we all want to tackle fraud. To follow on from the speech by the right hon. Member for Tatton (Esther McVey), in that process during covid, I think I was the first MP to raise the issue of the massive fraud that was going on with bank loans. When I wrote to the then Chancellor and to various Ministers, I received responses that had almost been dictated by the banks, saying that all the security measures had been put in place and that it was being administered effectively; we then discovered that it was, I think, £13 billion, although we recovered an element of that, so I am very wary about ensuring that public expenditure avoids the levels of fraud that we saw during that time.

I am concerned about this Bill, which takes huge steps constitutionally, legally and on civil liberties. Others have made similar points. Our tradition is that someone is innocent until proven guilty—that has been the legal principle from Magna Carta onwards. The investigation powers are usually triggered by some element of suspicion. This legislation rides roughshod over that long 1,000-year tradition.

On privacy, whatever assurances we are given about the Bill’s compliance with human rights legislation— I have my doubts—it introduces, for the first time that I have seen in this country on an issue like this, mass surveillance.

[David Davis]

The right hon. Gentleman goes right to the point I tried to make with the Minister. There are 25 NGOs supporting amendment 11. It is almost certain that if we go down this route, it will end up in court. I think the Government will lose on article 8, on the question of individual privacy.

[John McDonnell]

Following the right hon. Gentleman’s track record on issues like this—he has been proved right on virtually every occasion—I agree. In addition to the mass surveillance, the extent of the information that can be sought and interpreted from the Bill is extremely wide-ranging and open to challenge.

What has annoyed me is that we are now introducing legislation in advance of what we were promised by way of codes of conduct and operation. We have no idea how this will work out in practice without those codes. Members may recall that the codes set out detail on how the system would operate at every level, with the information seeking, investigatory powers and so on. We do not have those, but we are being told not to worry, because the other place will receive them—well, that is not our responsibility as MPs. Our responsibility is to deal with the matter here.

We also do not know how the “independent persons”, as they are described in the legislation, are to be appointed or how they are going to operate. The hon. Member for Brighton Pavilion (Siân Berry) raised the question of how their reports and recommendations will then be implemented. There is also the question of whom they will be accountable to and whether there is any accountability for those independent persons to this House.

Time and again, when we have introduced legislation like this in the past that has short-circuited the traditional protective constitutional and legal mechanisms, it has led to debacles and miscarriages. I warn Ministers that that is exactly what we are facing here. Reference has been made to issues with regard to the use of computers, models and algorithms. We seem to have learned nothing from where we have made those errors.

As I also raised on Second Reading, what is happening here is discriminatory. We are choosing a class of people—largely working-class people—who are claiming benefits, and we are targeting them. If there is a class of people we should be targeting who have a record of fraud and of claiming things that they should not, well, here we are. As the expenses scandal demonstrated, if there is one group of people we should be examining more closely, it is Members of Parliament.

I want to talk very briefly about the impact of these measures from a constituency point of view. As an MP for 28 years and a councillor for over 12 years—40 years in total—I have met lots of people who do not claim benefits to which they are entitled. They are often older people, but there are others as well. Why do they not claim? In my experience, it is because of the stigma attached to claiming benefits. With this Bill, we are adding a bit more stigma, which will act as a disincentive to those who genuinely qualify for benefits and should be coming forward. It is that terror of making an error, that fear of risking being penalised for claiming a benefit they may not be entitled to—or of being paid too much. There is a real fear among my constituents about such miscarriages.

Most of the constituents who come to our constituency surgeries have tried everything else by the time they get to us. They are the ones with the most chaotic lives. And they are the ones who get sanctioned time and again, not because of any deliberate act, but often because they have mental health issues, or because something in their life, prevents them from attending that interview, or from applying for enough jobs in time. What will happen to them? They will be dragged into this system again. At the moment, they come to us—this is largely the case in my constituency—because most of the advice agencies have been closed down thanks to the cuts that have taken place, and they come to us in desperation. This Bill will make people even more desperate. It will deter people who qualify for benefits from claiming, and it will cause real hardship and impose severe penalties on those who least deserve it. That is why I think this is a poor piece of legislation, and it will not be long before we are back here again to amend it, to restore some elements of civil liberties and protection for the poorest in our society.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I shall impose, with immediate effect, a four-minute time limit.