Universal Credit

Julian Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

There is no additional money. All the money has been budgeted for. The hon. Gentleman said that we would not be able to hire people; we have hired a dramatic number of digital experts. They are working in the Department right now to develop the digital option. He is more than welcome to come and see them and talk to them if he likes. The door is open; we have nothing to hide. If he does accept that invitation, perhaps he will also persuade his hon. Friends to visit the IT. They do not want to visit it because they are pretending that it does not work.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

When my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Andrew Jones) and I went to the Harrogate jobcentre recently, universal credit recipients were passionate about the confidence that the new scheme is giving them to get a job, and recruiters were persuasive about how it is making it easier to place people in jobs. Will the Secretary of State ignore the hue and cry from the Labour party and focus on the benefits that universal credit is bringing to the lives of real people?

[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.

DWP: Performance

Julian Smith Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I want to move on, but I shall give way to one of my hon. Friends.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

Does it surprise my right hon. Friend that the shadow Minister made no mention of the 80 constituents who have benefited in her constituency from the new enterprise allowance, creating successful new businesses? There was no mention of them in her speech.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

No, that does not surprise me. The purpose of today’s debate is to avoid anything to do with welfare reform and just pick away at issues that the Opposition think will get them some kind of coverage. That is the cynicism that the hon. Member for Dagenham and Rainham was talking about.

--- Later in debate ---

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

This is a cynical, mean-spirited and dubious motion. It was tabled by a Yorkshire Member, and, as a fellow Yorkshire representative, I cannot tell the House how surprised I am. The economic results achieved by the Government in Yorkshire are incredibly positive. Business confidence is growing: the number of business start-ups in north Yorkshire is now double the national average, and we have more private sector jobs than we have had for years. However, as we get set to welcome the Tour de France to Yorkshire at the end of the week, the economies of Britain and Yorkshire are being been talked down, and that is a total disgrace.

The Government’s welfare policies are key to our long-term plan, and also to our economic recovery. There has been a 22% drop in the number of jobseeker’s allowance claimants in Yorkshire, which is at a five-year low. We have seen a bigger reduction in the number of claimants of employment and support allowance than the national average, and 920 new businesses have been set up under the new enterprise allowance. The hon. Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves) failed to mention any of the 80 success stories in her constituency: she did not refer to any of the businesses that have been set up under NEA over the past few years. Just last week, I heard from a company called Lime Tree Europe in Halifax, which is a key marginal seat. That company has been trading for three weeks. It is delighted by the benefits that the NEA has brought, and is greatly looking forward to building its business.

Even more odd and sinister is the fact that the Labour party has kicked the men and women who work in our jobcentres and at the DWP—and who are working hard to change the culture—firmly in the teeth. Anyone who has been to a jobcentre and observed people working hard to return our fellow citizens to employment will know that there has been a complete revolution in the way in which those organisations operate. When I visited a jobcentre in Skipton recently, I went from desk to desk and saw every woman and every man working flat out to get my constituents back into work. Everyone knew their numbers; everyone was on top of what had to be done. It is not surprising that 300,000 people are now in sustainable jobs, thanks to the Ministers and other hard-working people in the DWP.

A couple of weeks ago, with my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Andrew Jones), I visited a jobcentre in Harrogate. The first person whom we met was Paul, who was doing work experience and was showing older people how to use Universal Jobmatch.

[Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making some important points about the success of universal credit. When we visited that jobcentre, we met users who emphasised the fact that universal credit was making work pay. Surely that is something to which Governments have been aspiring for decades.

[Julian Smith]

Absolutely—and the two people whom we met said that it was giving them the confidence to go out and find work. Representatives of recruitment firms told us that universal credit would make it much easier to place clients, because they would not be losing their benefits.

A surprising aspect of the shadow Minister’s speech was the implication that she and her colleagues had not visited a jobcentre in recent months. If they had done so, they would have heard from jobcentre staff that they want more of the Government’s reforms. They want people to have more work experience and zero-hours contracts, because those things will give them a foot on the ladder leading them back to employment. They want universal credit to work, because it gives them an opportunity to motivate people who are not currently boarding the work bus.

If the hon. Member for Leeds West will not listen to jobcentre staff—the people whom I have met—she should listen to the Yorkshire people, her constituents. What they want is a lower benefit cap. They want the Government to get on with introducing their national insurance cut for young people, which will encourage employers to take on more of those young people, and they want the Government’s benefit reforms to include even tougher measures.

Following what my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough and I saw in Harrogate, I hope that universal credit will be rolled out throughout the country as quickly, but as responsibly, as possible. Rather than hearing criticisms of the DWP and jobcentre staff, I want to see more incentives given to those staff, who are performing incredibly well. They currently have an opportunity to receive a bonus amounting to 0.25% of their salaries. I want them to have more such opportunities.

Labour Members have to admit that if they ever get their hands on the tiller again, they will never reverse the reforms that the Government have introduced. They have to come clean about their proposals for a national insurance rise. Are they going to place a burden on British business as a result of which it will again fail to employ the necessary numbers? We want the Secretary of State and other Ministers to press ahead with these reforms. I say to them: please turn up the volume.

Capping Welfare Spending

Julian Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 10th July 2013 Westminster Hall

[Charlie Elphicke]

I completely agree with the powerful point that my hon. Friend makes. The number of households in which no member has ever worked doubled under the previous Government. As he says, we cannot stand by and allow social failure on such a grand scale to continue for a moment longer. That is why no family who are out of work should be better off on benefits; why a benefit cap is right; and why it is set at £26,000 a year.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, from the perspective of a Yorkshire MP or an MP from another part of the country, the benefit cap could be much lower in certain areas, which would be much fairer to working people in those areas?

[Charlie Elphicke]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point, which is certainly a topic for debate, so I hope that the Minister will address it when he responds. The Government have sent a positive social signal that work is a force for social good. Capping the amount of benefit that any one family can receive is right and has been met with great approval in my constituency. My constituents raised the issue time and again.

--- Later in debate ---

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

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke) on securing the debate. It has clearly created a great deal of interest among Conservative colleagues and it is a pity, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Basildon and East Thurrock (Stephen Metcalfe) said, that no Opposition Members are here, because they have a lot of questions to answer when it comes to welfare reform, the benefit cap and the welfare cap. I shall now deal with those three areas.

It is absolutely right that we reform the welfare state and ensure that we have a fair and affordable system that provides incentives for work. Both my hon. Friends referred in their speeches to the benefit cap, which is a good example of our ensuring that there is fairness in the benefit system. It is absurd to have people on benefits taking home more than the average wage, and it is absolutely right that we tackle that through the work we are doing. Earlier this year, we rolled out the benefit cap in four areas across London, and this month we are moving to a wider national roll-out. The example cited by my hon. Friend the Member for South Basildon and East Thurrock is a powerful testament to the transformational effect that the cap can have on people’s lives.

I visited the London Bridge jobcentre in the run-up to the roll-out of the London pilots, and I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell) is aware of the work being carried out in his borough in the pilot stage. What struck me during that visit was the amount of support that was going in to help people, either to move accommodation or to find work as a way of avoiding the impact of the benefit cap. The link between fairness and incentivising work is embedded in the benefit cap, because if someone gets 16 hours’ work a week the cap does not apply to them, so there is a real incentive there for someone who has perhaps been out of work for some time and has depended on benefits to move into employment.

I pay tribute to Jobcentre Plus advisers who have worked with people to get them closer to the labour market to tackle the problem, and to the co-operation between Jobcentre Plus and local authorities in relation to the implementation of the benefit cap.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dover made a powerful point about the relationship between landlords and their tenants. There are many good examples of housing associations and local councils that work holistically with their tenants. They are concerned not only about whether they get the rent on time, but about their tenants’ health and employment prospects, as well as a range of issues, such as antisocial behaviour. The benefit cap and the roll-out of universal credit will drive that further forward. The move away from direct payment in universal credit requires landlords to take a much greater supportive interest in their tenants—to get them into work so that they can pay their rent. Our reforms are therefore working.

[Julian Smith]

May I tempt the Minister to comment on the idea of a regional benefit cap?

[Mr Hoban]

My hon. Friend may tempt me, although I do not want to be distracted from moving on to the welfare cap. Particularly given regional wage rates, what is set at a fair level in London appears to be higher in other parts of other country, but that is a debate for another day.

Since coming into office, we have sought to put the public finances on a more stable footing across the board. It is notable that this Government, unlike previous ones, have sought to find savings in the benefit bill. We must ensure that we do not repeat past mistakes—for example, the fact that the amount of money spent on tax credits and on housing benefit almost doubled under the previous Government. We need to have a system that is affordable in the long term and enables us to manage the welfare bill in a way that is sensible, reflects economic conditions and provides much greater discipline about how we spend our money.

That is why my right hon. Friend the Chancellor announced a welfare cap in his spending review. The cap covers more than £100 billion of welfare expenditure that has not been managed until now: because it is classified as annually managed expenditure, it was considered to be largely outside Government control, but that is not sustainable and it is not right. We are in a global race in which we must ensure that our tax rates are competitive and that we can control our benefit spending.

The Government can and should take action to control expenditure. The introduction of a cap will improve spending control, support fiscal consolidation and ensure that the welfare system remains affordable. Housing benefit, tax credits, disability benefits and pensioner benefits will all be included, but some benefits will be excluded, including the basic state pension and the additional state pension.

There are better ways to control expenditure on pensions, such as increasing the state pension age, and we have already announced plans to bring forward a state pension age of 67 by 2028. We are committed to introducing a regular and structured method for considering future changes in the state pension age, with the first five-year review taking place in the next Parliament.

We have received representations, such as those from the shadow Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls), about including the state pension in the Opposition’s version of the welfare cap, meaning that a future Government could offset a rise in working-age benefits by cutting the pensions of older people. I understand that some in the Labour party oppose the increase in the state pension age, but that would mean a reduction in state pensions under its version of the cap. I thought that the shadow Chancellor’s intervention showed that he had not properly thought that through and indicated that the Opposition’s target is really to cut the pensions of older people who have contributed to society and worked hard all their lives. Cutting pensions to pay for working-age benefits or to reduce the state retirement age are choices that this Government are certainly not prepared to make.

We will exclude also expenditure on automatic stabilisers, which are those areas of welfare expenditure that rise and fall with the economic cycle and dampen the effects of fluctuations in the country’s economic output. That will mean excluding from the cap a small number of the most cyclical benefits, such as jobseeker’s allowance and spending that is passported from jobseeker’s allowance.

My hon. Friends asked for more details about the cap. A nominal cap will be set from 2015-16 that will support the delivery of fiscal consolidation during the spending round period and beyond. It will be set over a five-year forecast period, starting in the second fiscal year from the date of the forecast, to allow policy changes to be developed and to take effect, if necessary. As the cap’s purpose is to manage structural increases in welfare spending, a margin above the cap will ensure that policy action is not triggered by small fluctuations in the forecast.

The Government will set the cap for 2015 in the Budget, alongside the Office for Budget Responsibility’s fiscal forecast, and we will publish further technical details in advance. To ensure that there is real challenge, the independent OBR will judge the Government’s performance against the cap. In future, when a Government look likely to breach the cap because they are failing to control welfare spending, the OBR will issue a public warning and the Government will be forced to take action to cut welfare costs or publicly to explain why they are breaching the cap.

The measures announced by my right hon. Friend in the spending review make a major contribution towards the control of long-term welfare spending, and they rightly recognise the contribution that older people have made to their pensions through saving. The Labour party did not recognise that contribution in its alternative proposals. To go back to my hon. Friends’ comments, we need to take difficult decisions on welfare and on how we spend taxpayers’ money, and we need to make sure that we have a system that is fair and affordable, so there is a real challenge.

People who criticise the reforms, as Labour Members do, need to tell us what they would do: would they reverse the cuts or accept them? Too often, we have heard mealy-mouthed statements from Labour Members, who say that they are against the cuts, but cannot say whether they will reverse them or stick to them. We know that our reforms are the right ones.

My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central made a helpful statement, in that the system too often stops people from working, as does the uncertainty that comes from people not knowing whether they are better off in or out of work and whether or not they earn more money. The major reforms that we are introducing—universal credit, the benefit cap and considering how to get more people out of welfare into work—are aimed at ensuring that our welfare state is fair, affordable and incentivises work. Today’s debate is an important contribution to making that argument. My hon. Friends’ interventions have made clear the scale of the change we are making.

I hope that this is not the last time that we debate this subject, and that next time someone from the Opposition might stand up and tell us what they believe in and are going to do, so that they can be pushed on that. I will not tempt any hon. Members to take part in the debate, but one, the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock), has just entered the Chamber—not quite the 8th Cavalry come to rescue the situation. We should now hold the Opposition to account by finding out what they would do to tackle the long-term challenges to our spending and to ensure that we have a fair and affordable welfare system that encourages and incentivises people into work.

Oral Answers to Questions

Julian Smith Excerpts

Monday 10th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Esther McVey]

I am afraid that the right hon. Lady never did one when Labour was in government. Disabled people remain my top priority. Let me reiterate to the House that the disability living allowance, carer’s allowance and the support group of the employment and support allowance will all increase with CPI. We have protected the disability support programme in its entirety, and an extra £15 million is going into Access to Work.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

5. What plans he has to increase access to the new enterprise allowance.

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

We have recently taken steps to increase access to the new enterprise allowance by extending eligibility to day one of an individual’s jobseeker’s allowance claim and increasing the number of mentoring places available by 30,000.

[Julian Smith]

Take-up of the scheme in Yorkshire has been excellent, but how do we ensure that those considering taking it up are given the best possible advice on developing their nascent business ideas?

[Mr Hoban]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight take-up in Yorkshire. In his constituency, 40 claimants have started with a mentor, and so far 30 have started training. That is a good result—better than the national average—so clearly people in his constituency are getting good advice. We need to ensure that the quality of advice increases. We want more people to see self-employment as a way into the work force.

Oral Answers to Questions

Julian Smith Excerpts

Monday 23rd April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

17. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the new enterprise allowance.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Chris Grayling)]

We have not yet made a formal assessment of the effectiveness of the NEA because it is too early to draw robust conclusions. We will of course carry out a proper impact analysis in due course. Participation in the scheme has so far proved popular; at the end of November last year, when the most recent figures were published, nearly 2,000 new businesses had been created, and many more have been created since then.

[Julian Smith]

I thank the Minister for that answer. Is it not correct that Yorkshire and the Humber has one of the highest take-ups of the scheme anywhere in the country? Has he thought about how we could increase the number of places on the scheme in order to allow people who want to set up a business to start much earlier?

[Chris Grayling]

Yorkshire and the Humber has indeed proved to be a pathfinder for the scheme. I am aware of how popular it is and am now looking at ways in which we could modify it in order to provide a greater focus on those areas where demand is high and see whether it makes sense to allow people to access it earlier.

Oral Answers to Questions

Julian Smith Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

1. What contribution his Department has made to the cross-government review of employment law.

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

As part of the cross-government review of employment-related law we have implemented a number of easements for employers’ automatic enrolment following independent review, which will save small employers about £90 million a year, including increasing the earnings level at which automatic enrolment applies, introducing a simpler way for employers to check their existing pension schemes meet the required standards and introducing an optional waiting period of up to three months.

[Julian Smith]

The Secretary of State’s Department is responsible for a huge amount of employment law. May I urge him to work closely with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills on its review to ensure that the Government make a cross-departmental effort to free small businesses up to take on staff?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

My hon. Friend definitely may. We are working closely with BIS in all it tries to do and my Department is doing quite a lot to help small employers. We listened carefully on auto-enrolment, we made a change to give a little more time and that helped small businesses enormously.

Oral Answers to Questions

Julian Smith Excerpts

Monday 14th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I can indeed confirm that. What makes the new enterprise allowance different from all its predecessor schemes is that it will offer people who are seeking to start new businesses specialist support from people who have been there and experienced enterprise. We want to see voluntary sector groups that already offer mentoring become part of the scheme, and we want experienced business people to come forward and become mentors, perhaps through their chambers of commerce. This could make a huge difference to getting people off benefits and into self-employment.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

15. What plans he has for collaboration between jobcentres and voluntary organisations.

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

We were pleased last week to announce the new partnership between Jobcentre Plus and the voluntary sector generally, which will help people to get back to work. Prince’s Trust advisers and other local voluntary organisations will start to have a desk that they man in jobcentres in the next few weeks, and that provision should be available pretty much around the country in April. This will be enormously helpful in tying the voluntary sector in to some of the most difficult people.

[Julian Smith]

Does the Secretary of State agree that voluntary groups can help jobcentres to help jobseekers? The Skipton and Ripon Enterprise Group, a group of leading business men in my constituency, is keen to help mentor jobseekers now. What advice can my right hon. Friend give to its members?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

First, what we are doing will really open the door to the voluntary sector’s engagement in the whole process. As my hon. Friend knows, the Work programme that the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) has been working on has the voluntary sector embedded at the heart of how it will deliver its work. The desks in jobcentres that will be manned by representatives of the Prince’s Trust should open up the door to such people being able to see jobseekers as they come in. My hon. Friend should advise people to look at using provisions such as the enterprise allowance and, if necessary, to come and see my right hon. Friend the Minister about any other advice they need.

Oral Answers to Questions

Julian Smith Excerpts

Monday 22nd November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Steve Webb]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his question. We believe that a link between what people put into the system and what they get out of it is important, and we are looking at ways of modernising that principle. He will know that the contributory principle, as it currently exists, was invented in the 1940s when the assumption was that men worked and women stayed at home. We live in a modern world and need to modernise the contributory principle.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

T7. What measures will be contained in the Work programme to ensure that the unemployed in rural areas get the help they need?

[Chris Grayling]

One of the benefits of working with smaller organisations as well as the larger prime contractors is that we can get the input of specialist organisations with expert knowledge of the rural community and the rural jobs market. I believe that the contracting structure we have set up maximises the likelihood of prime contractors identifying the right organisations to deliver support in rural areas.

Welfare Reform

Julian Smith Excerpts

Thursday 11th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I am saddened by the hon. Lady’s question. She is wrong. First, the contributory principle still exists. The contributory benefits will run in parallel; we are not getting rid of those. Secondly, she said that we should only ever get people into jobs that their top qualification allows them to get. I think that getting people into work is the most important starting point, and from there they can move on. [Interruption.] Oh, quite the contrary! I have been unemployed, and I would have done anything to get a job.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

My local jobcentre told me last week that many well-paid caring jobs are not being taken up by jobseekers. As well as addressing the disincentives in the current benefits system, do we not need to encourage jobseekers to be less picky about the jobs they go after? Every job is of value.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I agree that all jobs have a value, and that we want people to get jobs, to move on and to be assisted in getting better and better pay and circumstances. Carers will benefit from this system because it allows them to balance their work and caring responsibilities by picking the hours that suit them. Carers organisations have told us that the critical point is that often carers are locked into one set of hours that do not suit them. This system will allow them to take the relevant hours while fulfilling their caring responsibilities.

Work and Pensions (CSR)

Julian Smith Excerpts

Thursday 4th November 2010 Westminster Hall

[Mr Oliver Heald (North East Hertfordshire) (Con)]

The Chairman of the Select Committee has set out many of the arguments that are regularly deployed about the sort of cutbacks that are having to be made given the economic situation that this coalition Government inherited—the largest deficit in the G20 and a doubled national debt. However, she misunderstands, I think, what the Government’s ambition is. The Government have a grand ambition to help people into work and to provide incentives for that and the necessary help.

If we think back over the Labour years, one of the things that was most disappointing about them was that, at the end of the period, we had 3 million households in which nobody worked. Adults of working age may have lived there, but nobody worked. Many of the people concerned had never been approached about working. They had been on benefits for years and had not really had any help to try to get back into work. That is what this ambition and plan is about. The Work programme provides something that the Select Committee has been talking about for years—I am glad that the Chairman has welcomed it—which is a personalised service to help people back into work. I agree that there are some people who would benefit from having that help earlier in their job search than is currently proposed. The worry is that if we start the system at six months, we will not get any of the benefits of deflection. The fact is that many people find work in the second six months of job search.

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend have any ideas for jobcentres? They could take some practical and easy measures before the Work programme kicks in to help people get back into work.

[Mr Heald]

I do have some suggestions. If one talks to providers—the big companies that provide these employment services—young people who are looking for work and employers, the one thing that they all say is that young people are bad at applying for jobs. When the future jobs fund was in operation, the employers’ reaction to it was generally quite favourable, but the one point that they almost all made was that the applications were poor. If one talks to job providers they will say that young people who have been out of work for six months will still not have a CV that they can leave with an employer. That is a classic thing that everybody knows about, and yet young people are not good at it.

The time has come for the Government to work the way that young people work: to put online simple information about writing a CV and how to get into work. Somehow, we are still missing that vital information. A lot of research shows that helping a young person with a job search early on, with simple information of that sort, is extremely helpful. It can be done through jobs clubs, a fantastic big society initiative happening in many parts of the country. That is just one idea on that subject.

It is refreshing to read Save the Children’s briefing for this debate. Although I do not agree with everything in it, it does something that is a model for an organisation. Save the Children, a marvellous organisation, at least starts its briefing with the good news, saying that the Government are doing some things that it strongly supports. If other organisations that send briefings to MPs were more realistic and acknowledged the good—the intent—and then went on to say what they did not like, they might find that they are more persuasive. I notice that the hon. Ladies do not agree. It is important to be realistic in this debate and not to over-state one’s case or make dramatic claims that are not borne out by the facts.

I want to ask the Minister whether universal credit is a big bang initiative, where we will have a sudden launch—with the new system explained to people—or whether it is proposed to have a transition, where a portfolio of benefits gradually moves in that direction, with the withdrawal rates being lowered and the earnings disregards increased. What is the conception behind that process?

Turning to the Work programme, I want to make three points. The first is that at the moment there is a patchwork of schemes continuing. We have got half the country covered by the flexible new deal; we have many cities with employment zones; we have the new deal for disabled people in some places—contracts are just finishing on that; the future jobs fund is running for a bit longer, and so on. It seems that there is a ragged gap in time between the ending of a lot of these programmes and the start of the Work programme. I wonder whether there is any scope for running on some of those schemes, or finding ways of employing the people who work for the big provider companies in that gap. It will obviously be very disruptive if the Work programme starts with quite a lot of people who have not had the help that they would normally have had. Contractors will have to wind down their staffing levels and then crank them back up again over a two or three-month period. I am interested to know if the Minister is at least looking at the gap.

The second point I wanted to make is about the work capability assessment, which the Chair of the Select Committee mentioned. It is concerning that 40% of people affected are now appealing. That may be expected with a system that is starting anew. I think the review is very welcome and I hope that it will deal with some of the problems that have been identified. It is excellent that there is a panel now, with Paul Farmer from Mind on it, which is a very good idea. I wonder whether there is not another problem. I understand that research shows that in some parts of the country, the system works reasonably well and there are not too many problems, but in London there are a lot of appeals and a lot of concern is expressed about the way that it works. Part of the problem may be that adequate attention has not been paid to the needs of minority communities.