Lord Low of Dalston
Main Page: Lord Low of Dalston (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Low of Dalston's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(10 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Freud
My Lords, as my noble friend is fully aware, we are introducing a programme to blend the out-of-work benefits with the in-work tax credits. That is vital because it gets rid of that distinction and makes a smooth transition from being out of work to being in work. That is a vital reform which, as my noble friend knows, I am pursuing with all my energy.
Lord Low of Dalston (CB)
Is the noble Lord able to say when the Government expect unemployment to fall to the level of 7% and we can expect to see interest rates rising again?
Lord Freud
My Lords, that is, of course, a reference to the Bank of England’s target of 7%. Unemployment has been falling pretty dramatically: it fell 0.3 percentage points to 7.4% in the latest three-month period. It is not the job of a government Minister to predict when unemployment will hit any particular rate; all I can say is that these trends are immensely encouraging. We should all look for them to continue to improve and I have no doubt that they will.