Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Harper and Tony Baldry

Monday 9th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

If the hon. Gentleman is referring to mandatory reconsideration when somebody is found fit for work, he will know that the average length of time taken to decide one of those is 13 days, not 13 weeks. He will also know that if someone is found fit for work, they are able to claim jobseeker’s allowance and they will receive support from the jobcentre to help them get back into work.

[Sir Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

T9. In the past five years, how many people have moved from benefits into work? Is there any comparable five-year period since 1945 when so many people have moved off benefits into the world of work?

Affordable Homes Bill

Debate between Mark Harper and Tony Baldry

Friday 5th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Sir Tony Baldry]

My hon. Friend the Member for St Ives sought to lull us all into a sense of reasonableness by asserting that this was just a Bill to tidy up and amend the spare room subsidy. It is clear, however, from the comments of the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich, that the real intention of those who support this Bill is to remove the spare room subsidy completely, so the purpose of the Bill is not what my hon. Friend the Member for St Ives said; it has a completely different purpose.

My fundamental point is still valid. If this Bill costs £1 billion, then given the welfare cap—which the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and pretty much all Labour Members voted for earlier this year—the consequences of enacting it will mean that £1 billion must be saved from somewhere else in the welfare budget.

[Mr Harper]

I had not intended to intervene, but perhaps I can help to clear up the point. The cost of reversing the removal of the spare room subsidy is around £0.5 billion, as the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) confirmed. I spoke about the cost of the Bill because, whether the hon. Gentleman knows this or not, the Bill as drafted goes much wider than the removal of the spare room subsidy and fundamentally changes the way housing benefit is calculated—for example, it removes deductions for other people living in the household. That adds a further £500 million to the cost of the Bill. Members need to know that when they decide whether they will vote for it.

[Sir Tony Baldry]

May I invite my hon. Friend to intervene on me one more time to clarify and confirm this important point? Am I right in thinking that as a consequence of the welfare cap, whatever this Bill costs, whether it be £0.5 billion or £1 billion, that money must be saved and found somewhere else in the welfare budget?

[Mr Harper]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. Labour Members supported the welfare cap, as did the hon. Member for St Ives (Andrew George). I have yet to hear anyone explain how they will pay for the cost of this Bill and which benefits they will cut.

[Sir Tony Baldry]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The whole House must recognise that when we debate issues of welfare, we cannot pretend that we did not collectively, and by a very large majority, vote for the welfare cap.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Tony Baldry]

I am sure the whole House is grateful to my right hon. Friend for that clarification and confirmation.

I thought it would be interesting to go back and read the Committee proceedings of the Welfare Reform Bill in 2006. Hon. Members might not recall, but, interestingly, when the proposal for limiting housing benefit for those in the private rented sector was first mooted, the original consultation paper also consulted on a proposal to limit housing benefit for those in social housing on exactly the same basis. Nowhere on Second Reading or in Committee did the right hon. Member for Stirling (Mrs McGuire), the then Minister, ever explain to the House or the Committee why the then Labour Government decided only to focus the housing benefit changes on the private rented sector and not to include social housing.

In Committee, various hon. Members sought to make exactly the same proposals and changes as are being proposed today. For example, Members were keen to know whether alterations could be made for under-25s in the private rented sector, and the Minister said that the changes were

“part of a package that is intended to make housing benefit more transparent and more understandable to people….I hark back to our short debate on Tuesday evening: the new local housing allowance applies only to those in the private rented sector.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee A, 2 November 2006; c. 424-45.]

In other words, the changes were being introduced entirely because the last Government thought it necessary to save money.

[Mr Harper]

Perhaps I can help my right hon. Friend. In 2004, my hon. Friend the Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) asked the then Minister, the late Malcolm Wicks,

“for what reasons the local housing allowance applies only to the de-regulated private sector.”

The then Minister replied:

“We hope to implement a flat rate housing benefit system in the social sector, similar to that anticipated in the private rented sector…We aim to extend our reforms to the social rented sector as soon as rent restructuring and increased choice have created an improved market.”—[Official Report, 19 January 2004; Vol. 416, c. 1075W.]

It is clear, despite all we hear from the Opposition, that the last Labour Government intended to do exactly the same thing.

[Sir Tony Baldry]

It is clear they had exactly the same intentions.

In the final debate in Committee on the revisions of the local housing allowance, when asked to make amendments similar to those being invited in the Bill, the Minister said:

“I reassure the Committee that we already have powers to make different provisions for different classes of people…However… adding the qualification suggested by the amendment to the local housing allowance would undermine its main advantages of simplicity, transparency and fairness….As I said during a debate on a previous amendment, the discretionary housing payment scheme is also in place. That flexible system will enable the local authority to target help to those who most need it.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee A, 2 November 2006; c. 434-5.]

May I suggest that this Government’s discretionary payment scheme for tenants in the social housing sector is exactly the same? Indeed, those comments could have been made by a Minister in this Government in exactly the same way as suggested by the amendments and reforms proposed for changing housing benefit for tenants in the social housing sector.

I conclude by saying that this Parliament has to be grown up about the issues. If the House introduces a cap by an overwhelming majority, we cannot gaily come along, turn up on a Friday in September and seek to spend £1 billion of public money without making it clear to the House and to the country where the consequential savings are to be made elsewhere in the welfare budget. This will happen whether it be under this Government or any other Government. It behoves the Labour party, Labour Front-Bench Members and the shadow Minister when he gets to the Dispatch Box to tell us in terms where he intends those savings to be made. If he cannot do that, it would be irresponsible to support the Bill in the Lobby today. There is no justification for a Labour party and a Labour Government who introduced reforms and changes to housing benefit for those in the private rented sector to think that tenants in the social housing sector should be treated any differently.

UN Syrian Refugees Programme

Debate between Mark Harper and Tony Baldry

Monday 20th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

First, Ministers speak at this Dispatch Box for the Government and set out the Government’s policy. We do not have different policies in different Departments. The hon. Gentleman ought to go away and have a look at that, because we have a collectively agreed policy and I am setting out the Government’s response to the question asked by the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper). The reason why I do not want to agree to the proposition the hon. Gentleman puts is that the Government do not think it is the right solution. We think that the solution we have set out, which is to provide the UK’s largest ever response to a humanitarian crisis, will be more effective in helping in the region, and I think that is the right thing to do.

[Sir Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to have some policy coherence here? It is not coherent policy to call for the United Kingdom to admit refugees from Syria if one is not also simultaneously going to be calling for the UK to admit refugees from Darfur, South Sudan, Central African Republic and other jurisdictions. One cannot pray in aid just one country and say that the UK should admit refugees from that country. That simply is not a coherent position.

[Mr Harper]

My right hon. Friend makes a very good point. Our usual asylum rules are in place, and as I have said we have already granted asylum, in the year to last September, to 1,100 Syrian refugees and will continue granting asylum where someone has a claim that meets the rules on providing international protection. My right hon. Friend makes a very good point about the various crises around the world where we apply our normal asylum rules. In this case, I think we have more than stepped up to the plate. The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) said this was an enormous humanitarian crisis: it is, and that is why we have delivered our biggest ever humanitarian response.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Harper and Tony Baldry

Monday 28th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

The hon. Lady will know that we make decisions on asylum on a case-by-case basis and very carefully. We look at the country information we have and use the best available data. Everyone whom we determine does not have the right to our protection has the opportunity to have their case heard by an independent judge. We only return people to countries where we do not think that they need our protection, and we always keep the situation in the country under close review, working with our international partners.

[Sir Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

Is there any possible reason for a chief constable or another warranted police officer not to respond to a reasonable request or recommendation from the Independent Police Complaints Commission?

Border Force

Debate between Mark Harper and Tony Baldry

Wednesday 4th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

Having gone through the report very carefully, I think that it is probably fair to say that not all the national newspapers over-egged the pudding in how they reported the report. I thought that the report was very balanced. The interviews that the National Audit Office did this morning were very balanced. It made the point that Border Force is doing lots of things very well, but it recognises that there are still challenges. I think that I echoed that tone in my remarks. We have made significant improvements, but there is still more work to be done. That, in a nutshell, is what the NAO said in its report, and we are grateful for the work that it does.

[Sir Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

My hon. Friend said that last year Border Force detained some 6,000 people at Calais trying to enter the UK. Presumably, all of them were already illegal immigrants in France. Following on from the comments of the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), can my hon. Friend tell the House what the French are doing to remove from their jurisdiction illegal immigrants who are intent upon entering our jurisdiction?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend asks a two-part question. The first part was whether everyone trying to enter the UK illegally is necessarily in France illegally. That is not necessarily the case. France is in Schengen, of course, and there are people who are entitled to be in France but who do not have the right to enter Britain illegally in the back of a lorry, so we stop them entering. Some of them are, of course, in France illegally, however, and we work with our French colleagues by doing what we can to help them to make sure they are removed from France. Not all of them will be in France illegally, however, and I reiterate what I said in response to the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee: partnership-working with our colleagues in France is very important and works very well, and we want to make sure that that strong relationship continues because it is how we keep our border secure.

Individual Electoral Registration

Debate between Mark Harper and Tony Baldry

Wednesday 15th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Lady makes a good point. One of the reasons for the data-matching pilots is to enable electoral registration officers to identify people who may be eligible to vote but are not on the register. They can then focus their efforts on that. As I have said, there is evidence that specific procedures to target younger voters and others who are not currently on the register have been very successful in Northern Ireland.

[Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

A significant number of United Kingdom citizens living overseas are entitled to vote, but at the last general election a not particularly significant proportion registered or, indeed, voted. How will my hon. Friend ensure that more of them are encouraged and able to register? Could UK embassies, high commissions and consulates be better used to encourage them to register individually?