Supporting Disadvantaged Families

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Thursday 12th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Stedman-Scott) (Con)]

My Lords, I will respond first to the points raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Sherlock, and then cover the points from the noble Baroness, Lady Janke. I am sorry that the audio of the noble Baroness, Lady Janke, was not at all good. If I do not answer all her questions, I will go through Hansard tomorrow and make sure that she receives a written answer.

I am grateful that both noble Baronesses welcomed the Statement. Let me say right at the start that the Government much admire Marcus Rashford’s passion and commitment and are proud to have provided this invaluable support. I note the hopes of the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, for Marcus Rashford’s next campaign.

She also mentioned the comments about parents who use their benefits for purposes other than we would wish. We do not associate ourselves with those remarks. We are only too aware and appreciative of the difficult circumstances in which some parents find themselves at the moment. We are delighted that the hospitality industry came into its own and are glad that it was in a position to give extra help.

I am well aware that earlier at Questions, the noble Baroness was underwhelmed by my response about legacy benefits. I will try to be a little more helpful. Back in March, when there were no arrangements such as the furlough in place, UC had to take the strain until those schemes came online. The Government were trying to cushion those who had had a fall in income because they were made unemployed, or their earnings dropped, due to Covid-19. They were not trying to provide a general uplift in benefits. Those who were newly signed on to universal credit did so because they had seen a significant drop in their income, whereas those on legacy benefits had not seen the same fall.

Moving on to what we have done, we have announced a £170 million Covid winter grant scheme, to make sure that families get the help they need. We are giving this to councils because they are best placed to understand their communities. They know the most vulnerable children and families who need this money. As the noble Baroness, Lady Janke, said, this is being done on a per-head-of-population basis, according to the deprivation indices.

We are also investing £220 million more than existing funding allocated to the programme. This will mean that children eligible for free school meals will have the option to join a holiday time programme that provides healthy food and funds activities during the summer, Christmas and Easter holidays. I am afraid I am not able to comment on more than that timeframe. I will write to the noble Baroness about why the Healthy Start payments will not start until April 2021.

On the holiday activities and food programme, much has been said about the speed at which it has been introduced and whether it was a reaction, but I will say that we have been piloting this initiative and trying to work out how best to deliver it. This was not a knee-jerk response or something we thought we had better get on and do; it was something we piloted and tested. We made sure that, when we announced it, we knew that it would work. Since the summer, 50,000 children have benefited from the holiday activities and food fund, and a further 2,500 additional breakfast clubs have been started.

Will all children in England be eligible for a place on a HAFF programme? The programme will make free places available to children eligible for free school meals in their local authority for a minimum of four hours a day, four days a week, six weeks a year. This will cover four weeks in the summer and a week’s worth of provision in each of the Easter and Christmas holidays. As I have said before, local authorities have the flexibility to decide how to do this and how to use the money.

As I expected and I understand, there has been a call for the £20 uplift to be extended to legacy benefits, and I have been very clear about the Government’ position on this. The noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, raised the issues of the savings threshold, the two-child limit, the benefit cap and advances into grants. I have made clear that the Government do not have any plans at the moment to change those things, and, as my Secretary of State said in the other place,

“advances are actual grants to people—they are just the phasing of universal credit payments over the year”—

and they are repayable within a year—

“and soon to be over two years if that is what claimants want.”—[Official Report, Commons, 9/11/20; col. 642.]

We are listening and extending the time.

Where we have been doing the local pilots, there has been extensive discussion on interfacing with local authorities. I understand that the Government have written to all the chief executives of the local authorities, and, at this stage in the proceedings, the announcement and commitment have gone down very well. I am afraid I cannot tell the noble Baroness, Lady Janke, how much it is per head because it will be up to local authorities to say where the money goes and spend it most effectively.

Understandably, the noble Baroness, Lady Janke, raised the point about local authorities and underfunding. We are giving councils unprecedented support during the pandemic: a package of £6.4 billion so far. We recognise that there will be individual councils with unique circumstances, and we encourage them to approach MHCLG to discuss their future financial position.

Before I close this part of the questioning, I will make the point that Covid has certainly made life very difficult for people—nobody is trying to ignore that—but, underlying this, we believe that parents are responsible for their children. It is not the state’s job to take that responsibility, other than in these very difficult times, where we are trying to do everything we can. One of the areas I have responsibility for is the Child Maintenance Service. You would not believe the extent to which people try to get out of their responsibilities to pay for their children. We are working very hard to get this money back. As it stands, there are 130,000 children who are owed £381.3 million, and I am doing everything I can to get that money to children because it would make a huge difference to their lives.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

We now come to the 30 minutes allocated for Back-Bench questions. I ask that questions and answers be brief so that I can call the maximum number of speakers.