Oral Answers to Questions
Martyn Day Excerpts(5 years, 4 months ago)
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Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Guy Opperman)
The overall trend in the percentage of pensioners living in poverty has fallen dramatically over recent decades. Relative pensioner poverty rates before housing costs have halved since 1990 and rates of material deprivation for pensioners are also at record lows. We want to maintain this achievement.
Guy Opperman
It is not the Government’s intention to change the Pensions Act 1995, the Pensions Act 2007 or the Pensions Act 2011. There was a £1.1 billion concession in 2011. The policy was conceived in 1993, continued under the Labour Government for 13 years, continued under the coalition and will continue under this Government. I should also point out that a judicial review is pending. I cannot comment any further than that.
Martyn Day
Does the Minister think it right that the UK has the lowest state pension in the developed world?
Guy Opperman
The reality of the state pension in this country is that it has risen by £1,600 in real terms through the triple lock. It also needs to be looked at in the context of the significant high private pensions that, thanks to automatic enrolment and other reforms, show that this is comparable to many other European countries.[Official Report, 9 July 2019, Vol. 663, c. 2MC.]
Oral Answers to Questions
Martyn Day Excerpts(5 years, 9 months ago)
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Amber Rudd
May I just point out to the hon. Gentleman that, by 2020, payments made under universal credit are expected to reach £62 billion, compared with £60 billion under the previous system? [Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman raised the issue of the amounts, and I am merely pointing out to him that, with the changes in place, the amounts are larger under universal credit than they would have been under the previous system.[Official Report, 14 February 2019, Vol. 654, c. 10MC.]
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
The Minister for Employment (Alok Sharma)
We have now successfully rolled out universal credit full service across the country, with 1.6 million people now claiming universal credit. For the next phase, referred to as “managed migration,” we will test and refine our approach in a pilot, with up to 10,000 people moving from legacy benefits to universal credit. That pilot will start in July 2019.
Martyn Day
It has now been a calendar month since the High Court found the DWP unlawful in its universal credit work assessment periods, yet hard-pressed families are still being penalised for receiving payments on a four-weekly basis. Will the Secretary of State give a commitment to make a statement to this House on how to rectify that appalling anomaly?
Alok Sharma
I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point but, as he is aware, the Department is considering the High Court judgment carefully—I have said this before in the House—and it therefore would not be appropriate to comment further at this stage.
Oral Answers to Questions
Martyn Day Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Guy Opperman
It was a pleasure to visit my hon. Friend’s constituency last summer and see the fantastic work and the jobs revolution that is taking place in Basildon. It was also a pleasure to meet dBD Communications, one of his top companies, which has done a fantastic job in creating new employment and getting new training work done, and has an expanded order book that is enhancing job opportunities in Basildon.
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
Amber Rudd
I can reassure the hon. Gentleman that there has been no change. We are continuing with the plan to have a pilot of 10,000 people, which we will use to ensure that the managed migration in 2020 happens in the most effective, efficient and compassionate way.
Oral Answers to Questions
Martyn Day Excerpts(7 years, 1 month ago)
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Penny Mordaunt
The hon. Lady is right that we have made that change in employment and support allowance. I give her one example: about 84% of people with motor neurone disease are on the highest rates for PIP, but 16% are not. It is therefore perfectly possible that someone will not be receiving the maximum amount of support but that as their condition progresses, they will need additional support. As I said earlier, we are trying to reduce the burden on individuals going through assessments, but some people will still need to have assessments for PIP because their need becomes greater.
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Penny Mordaunt)
Supporting someone to live independently is an essential part of enabling that person to pursue their goals, whether they are personal or career goals. Education and independent living support are the two highest priorities for the Office for Disability Issues.
Martyn Day
Every week around 800 Motability vehicles are taken away from disabled people across the UK as a result of the transition to PIP and, according to the most recent DWP statistic on reassessments, 48% of claimants receive a lower level or no award when transferring from DLA to PIP. Does the Minister really believe that taking money away from disabled people on low incomes will help them to live independently?
Penny Mordaunt
The hon. Gentleman will know that in spring we announced changes to Motability to enable people to keep their cars pending appeal. We are looking to make changes to Motability, and I am pleased to say that many in this House have supported the campaign led by Together for Short Lives to extend the Motability scheme to under-threes. We have been in discussions with Motability and the Family Fund about extending Motability to under-threes. Individual constituents will not need to apply; they will be referred by the Family Fund. This is a big step forward in enabling families with small children who have heavy equipment to socialise and go out together.
Oral Answers to Questions
Martyn Day Excerpts(7 years, 9 months ago)
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Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Damian Green)
Work is the best route out of poverty, and the benefit cap has been successful in encouraging people into work. Since its introduction, almost 62% of households in Scotland have found work, reduced their housing benefit claim or no longer claim housing benefit at all after having their benefits capped.
Martyn Day
Does the Minister agree with paragraph 90 of the fiscal framework, which states:
“The Governments have also agreed that the UK government’s Benefit Cap will be adjusted to accommodate any additional benefit payments introduced by the Scottish Government.”?
Damian Green
Of course we agree with the fiscal framework—the Government drew it up, in conjunction with the Scottish Government. The Scottish Government already have extensive benefits powers if they wish to introduce them, but the fact that they do not is a matter for the hon. Gentleman to take up with his colleagues in that Government.
Supported Housing
Martyn Day Excerpts(7 years, 12 months ago)
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Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Neil Coyle) for securing this debate. I intend to speak briefly, as this is not the first occasion since joining Parliament that I have spoken on the subject of supported accommodation, and I suspect it will not be the last. However, I have a few points to make.
When I last spoke on this issue back in April, I welcomed the delay in introducing the housing benefit cuts for those in supported accommodation, and I also welcomed the September announcement to further delay applying LHA rates to the supported accommodation sector until 2019-20. However, it is not enough merely to delay them; the UK Government must exempt supported housing tenants altogether from those devastating changes or find an alternative funding model. The change to housing benefit can undermine the ability of such tenants to pay their rent, thereby putting their home at risk and threatening their physical and mental wellbeing, as well as posing a genuine threat to housing associations’ financial stability. It could also end up costing us more money in the long term if those people move on to other forms of housing.
In previous debates, I have illustrated my concerns with practical examples from my constituency, and I will do so again. The Open Door Accommodation Project, based in Bathgate, which operates in my constituency, works with vulnerable young people. It has a number of supported flats throughout West Lothian and can accommodate up to 16 young people between the ages of 16 and 21. The flats are fully furnished, and most are shared accommodation. The aim is to prepare young people for their own tenancy. I was glad to hear that the shared accommodation rate will not apply to those residents.
When a young person joins the supported flat service, they are allocated a dedicated support worker who works with them to give personal and practical support and helps them to develop the self-confidence and skills they need to live independently. The young people being supported are already experiencing issues with the time it takes to receive benefit payments. That wait can have a huge impact on the likelihood of their sustaining their accommodation.
Another major concern is that there is no longer a seven-day run-on between accommodation, which means that young people have to move immediately when they sign up for a tenancy. That gives them no time to set up utilities or apply to the social welfare fund for the most basic of necessities. The uncertainty about the reduction of housing benefit further exacerbates those issues and, worryingly, might even put that vital supported accommodation at risk. How will such organisations plan for the future if they are faced with yet more funding challenges and uncertainty, which can only continue to deter investment in new schemes?
An area of particular concern for projects such as Open Door is the impact of the eligibility for the housing benefit single-room rate rising to from 25 to 35. That could make it much more difficult for young people to find suitable tenancies when they move on from the supported projects due to increased demand on single rooms and the difficulty in finding suitable flatmates in areas such as West Lothian and the Falkirk districts that make up my constituency—I do not believe that my area is unique in that respect. Those areas have a very different housing landscape from large cities such as Edinburgh or Glasgow, where shared living is much more common. An additional knock-on effect may be that a significant number of young people will move out of the more rural and suburban areas in search of shared accommodation, which may potentially have a negative impact on local economies and employers, as they may struggle to find young recruits.
I am also aware that the age increase to 35 could mean that a huge range of young and youngish people will be living in shared accommodation, which will lead to a new range of challenges. In particular, I worry about the vulnerability of teenagers who go through projects such as Open Door and then have to move on from supported projects to share accommodation with effectively middle-aged adults of 35.
There is much that concerns me about the UK Government’s proposals. I am, however, glad that there are plans to devolve funding to the Scottish Government for supported accommodation. In my opinion, that is a step in the right direction. It will help to ensure that supported accommodation is supported in a secure and sustainable way for the long term. I just hope that, as with the bedroom tax, Scotland will not have to mitigate the effects of yet another botched Tory attempt at savings that simply moves an increased cost burden on to Holyrood.
Oral Answers to Questions
Martyn Day Excerpts(8 years, 1 month ago)
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Penny Mordaunt
I am sorry to hear of the circumstances of the hon. Lady’s constituent. Enormous numbers of decisions are made on ESA, PIP and on all sorts of other benefits. In some cases, the wrong decision is taken and it is overturned on appeal. We need to concentrate on ensuring that we arrive at the right decision in the first place. That has been our focus over the last few weeks, and we are doing a lot of work to ensure that medical and other evidence is submitted earlier in the process so that such circumstances do not arise. I would be very happy to look at the situation of the hon. Lady’s constituent.
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
John Nicolson (East Dunbartonshire) (SNP)
The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Penny Mordaunt)
Our policy is developed by utilising service user panels. Provision is strictly monitored and measured by independent audit, and the provider is held to account through the contract that we have with them.
Martyn Day
For the fourth year in a row, the Infrastructure and Projects Authority has said that the roll-out of the personal independence payment project is
“in doubt with major risks…apparent in a number of key areas.”
What action is the Minister taking to address the urgent problems with the PIP assessment, which is causing further hardship to disabled people trying to access vital support?
Penny Mordaunt
I start by pointing out that PIP is a vast improvement on what went before. It is a more targeted benefit and it takes into account a whole raft of other conditions, such as mental health and sensory conditions, not just physical disability. It is a vast step forward in that respect. We cannot rest on our laurels, however. We must continually improve, and there is a robust improvement process, based on user and claimant feedback, which looks at the assessment and also at record keeping and a raft of other areas.
Oral Answers to Questions
Martyn Day Excerpts(8 years, 9 months ago)
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Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
1. What support his Department has made available to women born in the 1950s who are affected by recent changes in the age at which they become eligible for the state pension.
Ms Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh (Ochil and South Perthshire) (SNP)
2. What support his Department has made available to women born in the 1950s who are affected by recent changes in the age at which they become eligible for the state pension.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Shailesh Vara)
Working-age benefits are available for those who have not yet reached state pension age. A concession of £1.1 billion was made, and 81% of those affected will see a delay of one year or less. For the rest, the delay will be no more than 18 months. There are no plans for further transitional arrangements.
Martyn Day
In 2005, the Pensions Commission said that
“a policy of significant notice of any increase (e.g. at least 15 years) should be possible”,
to mitigate the impact of any such changes. I would argue that the start of that 15-year process should be the beginning of the changes in 2010. In effect, the retirement age for women will be 63 from April this year, so will the Department look again at smoothing out to 2025 the increase in pensionable age for women aged 63 to 66?
Mr Vara
The equalisation measures of the Pensions Act 2011 were introduced, and the matter was expedited, to ensure that we covered for the fact that there had to be a sustainable pensions budget. It is also important to remember that people are living a lot longer. We have to take that into account, which is why we had to accelerate the issue.
Housing Benefit and Supported Housing
Martyn Day Excerpts(8 years, 10 months ago)
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Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
Let me start by saying that I agree with many of the contributions already made from the Opposition Benches and I am happy to speak in support of the motion today.
Surely the mark of a civilised society is that it looks after its most vulnerable, yet here again we have a Government seeking to remove some of the support mechanisms for the most vulnerable in our supposed civilised society.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (SNP)
Does my hon. Friend agree that supported housing provides the support older people need to maintain their independence? It also helps homeless people with complex and multiple needs to make the transition from life on the street to a settled home and education, training or employment. Surely any change to housing benefit could undermine the ability of such tenants to pay their rent, and threaten both their physical and mental wellbeing.
Martyn Day
I agree wholeheartedly with my hon. Friend, and not only does it affect the individuals; it can have a devastating effect on the organisations providing the services.
What is the purpose of the reforms? Is it to save money? According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, any initial savings would be “small”. Indeed, not only will there be little saving to the public purse, but expenditure could rise as a result of the unintended consequences of this poorly thought out measure. This is a classic case of robbing Peter to pay Paul: a small saving on the housing benefit bill might be massively outweighed by the rise in costs associated with providing institutional care, funding an increase in hospital stays, the higher cost of private landlord housing and, in the worst case, the increased costs of imprisonment. This must surely be the very definition of fiscal irresponsibility.
The Scottish Federation of Housing Associations has identified that associations in Scotland could lose between £5 million and £14 million per year. This is completely unsustainable and will inevitably lead to the closure of accommodation that supports some of the most vulnerable in our society. Top-ups from discretionary housing payments will simply not provide the security that accommodation providers require to continue even the current level of specialised accommodation, let alone plan for additional provision in the years to come.
I am concerned about the potential effect of these changes on vulnerable young people. Open Door Accommodation Project, which operates in my constituency, has nine supported flats throughout West Lothian that can accommodate up to 16 young people between the ages of 16 and 21. The flats are fully furnished and most are shared accommodation. The aim is to prepare young people for their own tenancy. When a young person joins the supported flats service, they are allocated a dedicated support worker who works with them to give personal and practical support, helping them to develop the self-confidence and skills needed to live independently.
The young people being supported are already experiencing issues with the time it takes to receive benefit payments, and this wait can have a huge impact on the likelihood of them sustaining their accommodation. A major concern is that there is no longer a seven-day run-on between accommodation, meaning that young people have to move immediately when they sign up for a tenancy, which gives them no time to set up utilities or apply to the social welfare fund for the most basic of necessities. The uncertainty about the reductions in housing benefit can only exacerbate these issues and, worryingly, might even put this vital supported accommodation at risk. How will such organisations plan for the future when faced with yet more funding challenges?
I come now to one of the most serious of the unintended consequences: the impact on the funding for supported accommodation for people with substance abuse problems. Many such organisations are doing amazing work, especially with ex-offenders, helping people to rebuild their lives and rejoin society. Threats to funding for this type of supported accommodation are intolerable. There is a young offenders institution in my constituency. On leaving it, young people will be dependent on the very supported accommodation that is at risk if these draconian funding proposals are implemented.
Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)
Might the reforms not be a false economy, given that prison often costs more than £30,000 per year per prisoner?
Martyn Day
My hon. Friend makes her point very well. It is a completely false economy, and I believe it will end up costing the public purse far more than the Government are trying to save. Again, we must look at the fiscal implications of a saving in housing benefit that leads to a lack of supported accommodation for young ex-offenders. How many of these vulnerable young people will end up back in prison—the point she just made—at a higher cost to the public purse?
It is my firm belief that the Government must halt the continuing assault on housing benefits, or at least ensure that supported accommodation is exempt from these future changes. Scotland has already had to mitigate the effects of the unfair bedroom tax—a tax that, given today’s court ruling, might be illegal. Will this reform to housing benefit be yet another botched Tory attempt at savings that simply moves an increased burden on to Holyrood? Only with full power over social security can we fully protect those in need from future housing benefit cuts.