Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Monday 7th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

7. What support her Department is providing to women working for longer before reaching state pension age.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Guy Opperman)]

We have extended the right to request flexible working, abolished the default retirement age, and introduced and financed the returner programme. I have seen the success of the returner programme through the company Release Potential, which is based in my Hexham constituency and which I have seen help many people back into work.

[Maria Caulfield]

If WASPI women were successful in appealing last week’s Court ruling, would the Government abide by that judgment and compensate women accordingly?

[Guy Opperman]

I spent 20 years as a lawyer, and my last client was a Mr Ed Balls, when he was Secretary of State for Education. I can assure my hon. Friend that this Government will abide by court decisions and follow the law. If there are any changes—two independent High Court judges heard the case and made the decision— clearly the Government will obey that decision.

Universal Credit Fraud

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Wednesday 10th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Justin Tomlinson]

Be patient. I am answering the questions. I can only address one point at a time.

The legacy benefits system was complex. Claimants had to deal with local authorities, HMRC and the DWP. The majority of welfare issues that led to fraud, error or overpayment related to failing to provide information on changes of circumstances. Under the legacy benefits, there was an increased likelihood that people would fail to report changes of circumstances. Universal credit, however, with a single point of contact on a digital interface, makes it easier for claimants to report changes once, and it is easier for us to proactively identify when there are changes. The Government are still on target to see, with the full roll-out of universal credit, a reduction of £1 billion.

We talk about the principle of advance payments, but remember that under legacy benefits at the end of the claim the payment came too soon. We saw that claimants would in many cases be going into work, having spent a long time out of work, being anxious. They were often paid in arrears at work, so would not have access to funding. People who were desperate to work and do the right thing were financially unable to do so. Under universal credit the wait for the money is at the beginning, but with advance payments to bridge that wait. That is vital to ensuring that claimants can transition into work. As I said in my earlier response, it is the need to balance making advances available to claimants quickly and ensuring that payments are paid based on the correct circumstances.

The shadow Secretary of State raised a point about children. When verifying advance payments, we will verify identity, bank accounts, national insurance and, where they are declared a non-UK national, nationality. However, to make sure we can provide support to those who are often the most vulnerable people in society, there is manual checking of housing and children. That is the bit that can take time beyond when we have issued the advance payment, although it would be checked before the actual main claim. As I have said, by using greater access to real-time information and data matching, we will be able to speed up that process to improve confidence that all claimants for advanced payments are valid.

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

It is vital that we crack down on fraud, but will the Minister reassure us that he will protect the vital advance system, which provides a vital financial lifeline for many, many of my constituents?

[Justin Tomlinson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely spot on. It is absolutely vital that we strike the balance between having absolute confidence that money is being correctly paid out and ensuring that we do not leave vulnerable claimants without access to money. Rightly, the Government have listened to the constructive work with stakeholders to ensure that on the first day of a claim people who need financial support can get it. That is the right thing to do.

Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Monday 7th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Newton]

Well, happy new year to the shadow Minister.

I utterly refute the idea that the Department for Work and Pensions and its staff, who work so hard, day in, day out—well, I will not even dignify those comments by repeating the allegations. The Department is there to make sure that people in our society get the benefits that they—[Interruption.] I am very happy to answer the question if the hon. Lady will refrain from chuntering so distractingly from sedentary position. We are utterly determined to make sure we have a benefits system that is compassionate, fair and fit for purpose. We are proceeding at pace to review the PIP claimant cases to make sure that people get all the benefits to which they are entitled.

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

I have a 31-year-old constituent who has the deteriorating condition cystic fibrosis. With lung function of less than 30%, he is now being assessed for a lung transplant. After a recent medical assessment, his PIP payments were stopped and he now has a 47-week wait for a tribunal date to appeal that medical assessment decision. Will the Minister meet me to discuss my constituent’s case?

[Sarah Newton]

I thank my hon. Friend for bringing up this case, and I will be very happy to meet her. It is really worth reflecting on the fact that, for the vast majority of people, PIP works well. Many more people are benefiting from PIP than they were under the legacy system, but one mistake is one too many and I will of course work with her.

Universal Credit

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Tuesday 13th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Thelma Walker), but I have not heard any real vision at all from Labour Members. It is disgraceful that their only vision for working-class people in this country is to remain on benefits. Universal credit is getting people into work. Some 63% of people on universal credit get into work, compared with 59% who were on jobseeker’s allowance.

No one can tell me that I do not know what it is like to grow up in a working-class family. I grew up in a working-class area of south London, where there was no hope or aspiration for working-class kids like me. We were told that all we would achieve was a lifetime on benefits. Our working-class communities up and down this country can achieve a lot more, and universal credit will help them to do so.

The second reason I am particularly angry with Labour Members is that they are spreading fear. I think they underestimate the fear they are causing in this country. When I was growing up, my family were poor. My dad worked as a labourer, and he did not often know when his next job was coming. If his job finished early, he did not get paid. If the subcontractor did not get paid, he did not get paid. There is a sickening, gnawing feeling in your stomach when you are not sure where the next penny is coming from. To tell 1 million families in this country that they will lose free school meals when that is absolutely wrong is scandalous, and Labour Members should be ashamed.

Let me reiterate the facts. All children in reception, year 1 and year 2 will continue to get free school meals, thanks to this Government. No existing recipients of universal credit will lose free school meals, thanks to this Government. Some 50,000 extra children will get free school meals who currently do not, and that is down to this Government. The means testing will not affect those who are earning just over £7,000, but those who are earning around £19,000 to £24,000. I do not think that Labour Members understand the impact they have when they spread this fear—and it is not a genuine mistake; it is political point scoring and using working-class families in this country as a political football. They should be ashamed of themselves.

I will be supporting the Government. I will be supporting 50,000 vulnerable families getting free school meals. If Labour Members vote against those working-class families, they need to look at themselves in the mirror, because it is the same thing they did a few months ago when they voted against 60,000 young people in this country benefiting from the abolition of stamp duty for first-time buyers. Labour Members talk about supporting working-class families in this country, but it is the Conservative Government who are actually delivering for them.

Universal Credit

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Thursday 23rd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

The flexibility of the advance system means that nobody is left without any financial support at all. Compared with the legacy systems, such as JSA, universal credit will provide more support to people earlier. I will consider a large-print version of the documentation and, perhaps on another occasion, I would happily debate the tax credits system with him at some length—not only the disincentives within the system but the huge difficulties that its roll-out caused back in 2003, which were still reverberating when I entered the House in 2005.

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

I welcome the statement, in which the Secretary of State said that there will be extra support for tenants in the private rented sector. Will he expand on that? Will it include private landlords having access to the portal available to social landlords?

[Mr Gauke]

We have to remember that, since the reforms in 2008, most tenants in the private rented sector receive their housing benefit directly, rather than the benefit going to landlords, but about 30% of tenants have alternative payment arrangements in which the money goes directly to the landlord. Once we change the guidance, the presumption will be that such alternative payment arrangements will continue and that the money will therefore go to the landlord, rather than to the tenant. We are constantly considering ways in which we can ensure there is support, and let us not forget that housing benefit transitional payments will provide two weeks of support—the payments are not recovered, they are additional support—to help people as they migrate on to universal credit.

Supported Housing

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Wednesday 25th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

I was very pleased to hear the Prime Minister announce this afternoon that there will be no housing benefit cap for tenants of supported housing. Many Members in all parts of the House have drawn attention in earlier debates to the difference that supported housing can make to individuals. I look forward to the announcements next week and hope that there will be some more positive news then.

In the short time that I have, I want to highlight one example in my constituency of the difference that supported housing can make to the lives of young people. Newhaven Foyer, which is run by the Salvation Army, looks after young people who have either been in care or have been at risk of homelessness because they come from difficult family backgrounds. I have had the privilege of meeting some of those young people, who have told me their stories. I spoke to one young man who said that before he went into Newhaven Foyer he had intended to commit a crime to be arrested and be sent to prison, so that he would have a roof over his head and some food of an evening. That cannot be a future that we want for any young person in this country.

Not only is the rent paid for the young people at the Foyer, but the service charge pays for support workers to help them to make a fresh start in life. Those workers help young people to learn how to budget and pay bills, ensure that they get to college in the mornings when they do not particularly want to go, help them into apprenticeships, help them to learn how to write CVs and help them to learn to live with other people.

One young girl told me about her family. Her mum was an alcoholic who was often drunk, so she had to bring herself and her sister up on her own. For her 16th birthday, her mum bought her a bottle of whisky, and drank it before lunchtime, so she got no birthday present at all. This is the sort of background these young people have come from, and supported housing is giving them that fresh start.

In a way, supported housing is a Conservative policy, because it gives people a fresh start regardless of their background, or where they have come from, or how difficult an upbringing they have had. Supported housing can give them the tools to get on in life and allow them to make the most of their talents and aspirations. It is a philosophy that I passionately believe in.

The Minister was right to say in his opening remarks that it is also of net fiscal benefit to the country. For some people, it can make a difference overall of £940 a year in benefits, and if there was no supported housing, we would be paying a lot more than that. For the country, the net benefit is over £3.6 billion a year. It is money well spent and, more importantly, it transforms lives.

I could cite numerous examples from my constituency. BHT Sussex provides addiction services and supported housing for people with alcohol and drug addiction, through many years of an abstinence-based approach. I have met people whose lives have been transformed and who have beaten addiction and are now contributing to society. That is not just rescuing their lives; it is rescuing their families’ lives, too, and is making a big difference to the country as a whole.

I welcome today’s news, and am optimistic about next week’s announcements.

DWP Policies and Low-income Households

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Tuesday 17th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

I thought the title of the motion was supposed to centre on the impact of Government policies on helping low-income households, but all Scottish National party and Labour Members have focused on is benefit provision. Not one of them has mentioned getting people into work and increasing the wages they earn once they are in work. As my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff North (Craig Williams) said, the “Child poverty transitions” report showed that 74% of workless families that went into work exited poverty. This has to be the focus of the Government’s agenda.

The Government have done more than any other Government in living memory to help low-paid workers, through measures such as those my hon. Friend the Member for Weaver Vale (Graham Evans) mentioned: the national living wage; giving a pay rise to more than 6 million people; and enabling people to keep more of the money they earn by lifting 4 million out of tax altogether. I disagree with the shadow Minister that the jobs created are on short-term contracts; some 70% of all new jobs are full time, so people can earn more and be in work for longer.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said that ours is the fastest-growing economy in the G7, which means that businesses up and down the country have been able to give workers a pay rise of 2.6% in the last year. It is this Government who are helping low-paid workers. The way out of poverty is through work, not benefits. As has been mentioned, research shows that if someone is on benefits, their life chances are increasingly suppressed, that they will live 15 years fewer than someone in work and earning a good wage, and that they will have more health problems, as will their children after them.

The route out of poverty is through work. The Government are helping people not only to get into work, but to earn more while they are in work and to keep more of the money they earn by reducing the amount of tax they pay. They are helping people into work by creating full-time jobs and transferring them to universal credit, which has seen an 8% increase in the number of people finding work. The Scotland Act 2016 gave the Scottish Parliament powers to ensure that welfare provision could be tailored to local needs. The SNP should get on and use the powers it has, instead of blaming the UK Government for Scotland’s benefit problems.

Under-occupancy Charge

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Monday 14th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I appreciate that the hon. Lady has campaigned very effectively with the Rutherford family for a long time. As she said, they received discretionary housing payments, and such payments are the main tool that we are using to make sure that people are given appropriate help. Obviously we are still looking at the number of people who may be affected as a result of this case, but I can only repeat that we will take steps to make sure that we comply with the Court judgment.

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

Does the Secretary of State find it strange, as I do, that Labour Members are protesting, given that in 2008 they introduced exactly the same changes in the private rented sector? [Interruption.] Does he agree that there should be equality for tenants receiving housing benefit, be they in social housing or the private rented sector?

[Damian Green]

I do agree with my hon. Friend about that. The fact that Opposition Members tried to shout her down rather than listening to her question suggests that she has hit the mark.

Supported Housing: Benefit

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Wednesday 20th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Grahame M. Morris]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point in a very concise way. [Interruption.] A member of the Government is saying from a sedentary position, “They don’t know,” but the situation is absolutely clear. The point I am trying to make is that housing providers need certainty over their income streams before they can plan for new provision—that is a reasonable point, which I am sure is not beyond the understanding of Ministers with a financial background.

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

Is it not important to do this review, with housing benefit being rolled into universal credit? There is scaremongering that there are going to be cuts, but people do not actually know what the outcome is going to be, so let us have a constructive discussion during the review and give some certainty to the sector.

[Grahame M. Morris]

With respect, I must point out that Government decisions should be based on evidence. Before embarking on a plan and a policy, it would be sensible to look at the evidence objectively and scientifically. If the hon. Lady wants expert opinion, I am happy to give her that and to quote the chief executive of the National Housing Federation, David Orr, who met the then Housing Minister on 18 December last year. He said—this is an expert in the field—that the impact of the local housing allowance cap will be

“stark and make it extremely difficult for any housing associations to develop new supported housing.”

He also said:

“providers across the country will be forced to close schemes.”

There is plenty of evidence of that, and I am sure that Members on both sides of the House have had representations from housing associations and housing providers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this important debate, and it is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass).

Let me start by saying how disappointed I am by the wording of the Opposition motion. Supported housing is such an important issue that prejudging the outcome of the review, with words that are inaccurate at best and aimed at scaring vulnerable people at worst, is just plain wrong. It is wrong to say

“that the Government intends to cut housing benefit for vulnerable people in specialist housing”,

when what is happening in reality is that a review of supported housing is taking place, and that while that review is taking place, supported housing is exempt from housing benefit changes and exempt from rent reduction changes that are coming in for general needs housing.

Opposition Members do not have a monopoly of being supporters of supported housing. I have seen at first hand the difference that such housing can make to people’s lives. As a board member of BHT Sussex, I saw teams on the ground that were supporting people who were going through rehab for alcohol and drug addiction. The supported housing they were provided with not only turned their lives around, but gave them their independence and gave their families their lives back too. Having that supported housing with the input of specialist staff helping to get them clean makes such a difference. It is indeed life changing.

I have seen from my time as a local council cabinet member for housing how sheltered housing with specialist help allowed older people to live independent, healthier lives, which is a view shared by the much proclaimed National Housing Federation as well as the Homes and Communities Agency. In fact, the HCA found that supported housing provision has a net positive benefit of £640 million for UK taxpayers because it reduces hospital admissions, speeds up discharges and improves health outcomes.

Supported housing can transform the lives of young people, too. In my constituency, the Newhaven Foyer is there for young people who have probably had the worst start in life that could be imagined. These are young people whose families have either put them in care or are no longer around to support them. They live in very challenging times, and many have been excluded from school. Being in supported housing means that they not only have a roof over their heads, but that for the first time many of them feel that they have some stability. They have someone there who will make sure that they get up in the morning and go to college or to work, someone who will teach them how to cook and how to maintain a tenancy, and someone who helps them to budget so that when they leave the foyer, they can start an independent life.

I attended one of the Saturday coffee mornings at the Newhaven Foyer and met a young person who told me that if it were not for the foyer, she would actively go out and commit crime to get into prison so that she could have a roof over her head and a hot meal every day. That is the difference that supported housing can make; it transforms lives.

I welcome this review, but the fear—real or unreal—of potential housing allowance caps being applied to residents in supported housing or of the application of the 1% rent reduction is causing unease in the sector. If these were to happen, it would create doubt in the sector about building new provision. As a country, we cannot afford not to provide the extra support that goes with keeping an elderly person living in sheltered housing or a young care leaver or a person going through rehab as a recovering alcoholic or ex-drug addict.

I am optimistic that we will find a solution. I believe that the reply to the Adjournment debate secured by my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) by the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton (Mr Jones), was excellent. He said he saw

“a very positive future where high quality supported housing is there to provide the right support at the right time”.—[Official Report, 12 July 2016; Vol. 613, c. 272WH.]

I urge Ministers to ensure not only that funding is secured for supported housing, but that we reach a timely conclusion when the results of the review are revealed.

This has been a wasted opportunity. If this debate had been about supported housing and the available options to be fed into the review, I might have been able to support the motion. It has, however, provided an opportunity for scaremongering, so I shall vote against it.

Disability Employment Gap

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Owen Smith]

Let me give the hon. Gentleman the facts. I welcome every job provided for a disabled person, and I welcome every opportunity for disabled people to get into work, but the facts are that the Government have gone backwards on the target for disabled people. When our Labour Government left office, the disabled employment gap stood at 28%; today, it is 34%—an increase in the size of the gap between ordinary able-bodied people in work and disabled people. That is the truth of these circumstances. [Hon. Members: “Ordinary?”] What a ridiculous point. I mean the gap between able-bodied people without disabilities and disabled people. That stands at 34%— increasing on the Secretary of State’s watch and under this Government.

I will give this Secretary of State and his Government credit where it is due. I credit them for setting this difficult target to halve the disabled person’s employment gap. It was a clear pledge in the Conservative manifesto at the last election. On page 19, it said that the Conservatives would

“halve the disability employment gap…transform policy, practice and public attitudes, so that hundreds of thousands more disabled people who can and want to be in work find employment”.

That is a genuinely laudable aim. Labour fully agrees that if disabled people can find work and want to work, we should do everything we can to encourage and assist them in doing so. It would be good for all of us: good for them to be in work; good socially for our workplaces to be more integrated and rounded places; good economically, as reducing the gap by 10% would add £45 billion to our gross domestic product by 2030.

Unfortunately, a year on from that promise, the Government are either reneging on it or just failing to take the action needed to meet it. The volume of people currently employed who are not disabled stands at 80%, but the figure for those who are disabled stands at 46%—a gap, as I said a few moments ago, of 34%. The House of Commons Library, the Resolution Foundation and the TUC have all carried out analysis to show that the Government are making little or no progress towards the target. To hit it, they will need to get 1.5 million disabled people into work.

On the basis of the current state of activity by this Government, I cannot see how they are going to achieve it in a month of Sundays. I cannot see how they are going to get it back even to where it was at the end of the last Labour Government at 28%. It is a worse performance by this Government than that of the last Labour Government. What is even worse is that it is becoming more difficult for disabled people to get into work and stay in work because of the cuts that the Government are making. That will be my next theme.

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

Is it not true that under the last Labour Government, by the time someone was 26, they were four times more likely to be out of work as a disabled person than they are under the current Conservative Government?

[Owen Smith]

I have repeatedly said that the last Labour Government were performing better in terms of the disabled person’s employment gap than this current Government, and I shall say so again in a few moments.