Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Austin of Dudley Excerpts

Wednesday 29th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

Q4. I have held a dozen public meetings on immigration over the past few weeks, and it is absolutely clear that my constituents in Dudley do not think it is fair that people should be able to come to the UK to be unemployed. They do not think that people should be able to claim benefits as soon as they arrive, or, as the Prime Minister proposes, after a few short months. They think that people should have to work and contribute and pay into the system first. They certainly do not think it is fair that people should be able to claim child benefit for children living abroad. When will he be able to sort out those things?

[The Prime Minister]

I do not want to be uncharitable to the hon. Gentleman, who put his question in a reasonable way, but I long remember the years when he sat behind the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown) as his Parliamentary Private Secretary, and I do not think that he whispered any of those things into his ear—he whispered quite a lot of other things into his ear by the way. I absolutely agree that we need to deal with this issue about sending benefits home, and we will . We have already lengthened the amount of time that people have to be here before they claim benefits, and we want to go further on that. But we must be frank about this: the British people are our boss, and they want this issue sorted. It is not simply about people coming here to claim or to abuse the system, but about the pressure on our health and education systems and on our schools and communities. The people want it addressed and they know that, with this party, we will address it.