Universal Credit

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Thursday 5th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ms McVey]

That is what is coming out from the data we are gathering about what real people are saying about how universal credit impacts on their lives. My hon. Friend is right to say that people are getting into work faster, staying in work longer, and looking for work. For those in work, the data shows that on average people are earning an extra £600 a year. Those are the positive effects of this benefit change.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am staggered and disappointed that in answer to the urgent question we have a Secretary of State who is still arguing over the detail of a report. This is an important constitutional issue. The National Audit Office is the independent watchdog of Government spending. In this case, the Secretary of State has come to the House twice and there has been an unprecedented letter from the Comptroller and Auditor General. I have had two letters from the permanent secretary adding information on what was an agreed report on 8 June. Just for the record, will the Secretary of State declare clearly in the House today that she has full confidence in the National Audit Office and the Comptroller and Auditor General?

[Ms McVey]

What I would say is: they do their job. He came forward—[Interruption.] We need to separate this out. We said that we shared information. We agreed on that factual information. What we said is that we had made significant changes at the latter end of that period when information was collected, and therefore the impact of that could not have been felt. Obviously, I am meeting the Comptroller and Auditor General next week. That is what is important.

Under-occupancy Penalty

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2016 Westminster Hall

[Jo Stevens]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. The honourable thing would be to accept the decision of the Court of Appeal, but instead the Government are proceeding to the Supreme Court, where a decision is expected at the end of this month or early next month.

The bedroom tax and the tripling of tuition fees for students are two of the most painful scars left by five years of the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition, and I will take every opportunity to continue to remind the House that the bedroom tax would never have been introduced without the eager help of the Liberal Democrats, including my predecessor. Nearly 500,000 households and almost 750,000 people have been hit by this cruel policy. Two thirds of the households affected by the bedroom tax include a person with a disability. The tax impacts on 60,000 carers—people who undertake demanding and challenging responsibilities and are punished for doing so. Some 57% of those who have to pay the tax have had to cut back on household basics such as food and heating—things that we all take for granted. The bedroom tax has had a corrosive effect on many different households, including the single parent who needs a spare room for when their children visit as part of agreed contact visit arrangements following separation or divorce; grandparents who help with looking after their grandchildren, allowing parents to manage shift working and other working patterns, or following family breakdown; and people with severe disabilities who use their spare room for their medical equipment or care, such as kidney dialysis.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

This issue is big in my constituency of Hackney South and Shoreditch. There is an invidious part to this tax. If two children are of an age when they are supposed to share a bedroom, but one is within reach of their next birthday, when they would qualify for their own bedroom, the family are hit by the bedroom tax. So it is a fluctuating tax that hits people particularly hard.

[Jo Stevens]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point; the tax increases uncertainty. People cannot budget. Their circumstances change and the fluctuating nature of the tax impacts on them more heavily at different times. Then there are victims of domestic violence and rape whose lives are at risk and need the protection of a panic room.

The particular focus of this debate is the regional impact of the bedroom tax, and I want to outline its impact on my constituents in Cardiff Central and more broadly within the nation of Wales, where 31,217 people are affected by the tax. Across Wales, just under 500,000 people live in social rented accommodation. The tax has had a huge impact, affecting proportionally more housing benefit claimants than anywhere else in Great Britain. Some 46% of claimants in Wales pay the tax, compared with 31% for the UK as a whole. In Cardiff, 3,015 households currently pay the tax, and nearly 500 of those live in my constituency of Cardiff Central.

The cost of the bedroom tax to each household affected will be £3,500 during this Parliament. I am sure I do not need to explain to most hon. Members what £3,500 means to the families in our constituencies, especially the poorest families who visit our surgeries every week. That £3,500 would otherwise be spent on basic necessities such as food, heating, clothes and shoes. The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions claimed that the bedroom tax would encourage societal movement. However, when the bedroom tax was introduced, it affected about 3,500 households in Cardiff, and only just over 100 smaller properties were available for people to move into. I readily admit that maths is not my strong point, but even I can work out that that sum does not work.

[Jo Stevens]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, which again shows the iniquitous nature of the bedroom tax.

Therein lies the truth about the bedroom tax and its impact and the number of properties that are available for people to move to. The Government knew before they introduced the policy that insufficient smaller properties were available for people to move to. That was the picture right across the country. Even if we gave the Government the benefit of the doubt about their motives before implementation, their own interim report on the bedroom tax after implementation revealed that the policy was not meeting its key aim of freeing up larger council properties. Only 4.5% of affected tenants have been able to move to smaller accommodation. At the same time, with just 4.5% of people able to move and be rehoused, 60% of people affected were in arrears within the first six months of the introduction of the tax. The policy is simply not working. People are not able to move to smaller accommodation because that accommodation simply does not exist, so long-standing, reliable tenants who were previously able to budget and pay their rent regularly now cannot pay it and have built up significant arrears.

[Meg Hillier]

In parts of London we are seeing people pushing to get two-bedroom properties because they are frightened they will be hit by the bedroom tax, but that also reduces, if there was availability, the stock for people to move down to, if they have the extra bedroom, so it causes a squeeze in both directions.

[Jo Stevens]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point.

The most vulnerable have been hit the hardest and, in the words of the Lord Chief Justice and his colleagues just a few weeks ago, the Government’s “admitted discrimination” in the judicial review cases to which I referred earlier

“has not been justified by the Secretary of State”.

We now have a farcical situation in which the Government have appealed that decision and the legal costs of pursuing the appeal are likely to be greater than the amount it would cost them to exempt all victims of rape and domestic violence with panic rooms who are paying the bedroom tax. I can conclude only that the Government would rather pay money to lawyers than to rape victims. I challenge the Minister to justify that action.

I think I can predict that, when he responds to the debate, the Minister will say that the Government have made additional funding available to local authorities in the regions and in Wales in the form of discretionary housing payments, but my local authority, City of Cardiff Council, has had its DHP funding cut by more than 26% between 2013-14 and 2015-16. The regional impact of Cardiff losing more than a quarter of its DHP funding has been hard, so it is disingenuous to argue that the DHP system justifies the bedroom tax.

At the same time as imposing the tax and relying on DHP as justification, the Government are cutting DHP funding. Their own report, which they sneaked out in a huge data dump on the very last day of the parliamentary term in December 2015—obviously in the hope that no one would notice—admitted that 75% of bedroom tax victims did not get DHP; that three quarters of those hit by bedroom tax were cutting back on food; that only 5% had been able to move; and that 80% regularly ran out of money.

The policy implementation of DHP has also been called into question. Evidence on its use has raised serious questions about local authorities adopting different practices, leading to allegations of a postcode lottery. There are references to disabled tenants—particularly those living in specially adapted properties—struggling to get DHP in some areas, and needing to submit repeated applications, with the consequential uncertainty and anxiety. That is not to mention the exclusion of people with lower levels of literacy.

This debate is not the first time that DHP and its impact on disabled people has been raised here. As long ago as 9 April 2014, five Welsh Government Ministers wrote to Lord Freud to call for an exemption from the bedroom tax for disabled tenants who had had adaptations made to their homes. They cited issues with DHP as one reason why such a broad exemption was necessary. They said:

“Disabled tenants cannot easily up sticks and move home. They should be exempt from these reforms and should not be left to rely on help from the discretionary housing benefit system…Our analysis of the discretionary housing payments system shows that demand far outweighs the number of applications being approved. In the first half of the financial year 2013/14 demand increased by around 260 per cent compared to the same period a year earlier in 15 Welsh local authorities.”

Cardiff’s 26%-plus cut in DHP funding, coupled with the increase in applications, presents another one of those stark sums that even I can work out. It simply does not add up to have households with disabled tenants having to pay the bedroom tax if that cannot be offset through DHP because DHP funding has been cut. It is another example of the Government’s policy hitting hardest those who can least afford it.

Tomorrow, we have an Opposition day debate on another of the policy responsibilities of the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions: the adverse impact on around 2.6 million women of the speeding up of the state pension age. I know from discussions with constituents that many of those being advised and represented in bedroom tax appeals in my constituency are those very same women who are adversely affected by the changes to the state pension age. They are also women who are disabled or carers, so there is a double, triple or quadruple whammy on women. As with so many of the Government’s policies, it seems that women are bearing the brunt yet again.

It is time for the Government finally to accept that the bedroom tax is a bad policy. In the words of David Orr, the chief executive of the National Housing Federation, it is:

“an unfair, ill-planned disaster that is hurting our poorest families”.

It does not work, it causes severe hardship and it hits the most vulnerable, so I say to the Minister: please, listen to the public. It is time for the bedroom tax to be binned.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gerald Jones (Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Dorries. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff Central (Jo Stevens) on securing this debate.

The spare room subsidy, or the bedroom tax as it is more commonly known, is causing stress and hardship across the country. It is the most unfair and pernicious tax since Margaret Thatcher’s poll tax. We are here to debate the regional impact of the tax, so I will outline some of the issues it is causing in my consistency and in the south Wales valleys more generally.

The principle of providing larger properties for families and smaller properties for single people and couples is understandable. People often decide for themselves to move to a smaller property when their children leave home or their circumstances change, but that is a choice. Unfortunately, there are not many one and two-bedroom properties in many communities in my constituency, so people affected by the bedroom tax must decide either to stay in their property—thereby incurring a financial penalty that places great strain on their ability to manage—or move to a smaller property in a village or community some miles away.

Before being elected to this place, I was cabinet member for housing at Caerphilly Council, which covers a third of my constituency. In that role, I met a number of people who wished to remain in the homes they had lived in for many years. They did not want to move to a smaller property miles from their family and friends. Unfortunately, the strain of paying the bedroom tax in addition to their utility costs and household bills meant that they often had little money left to put food on the table.

[Meg Hillier]

My hon. Friend is rightly highlighting the practical difficulties and the unfairness of the policy. Does he think that the fact that there is not a single Government Back Bencher present suggests that there is not widespread support for its implementation, even if it is Government policy?

[Gerald Jones]

As my hon. Friend says, the vacant chairs on the Government side of the Chamber speak volumes.

I know that the Government will say that they have provided discretionary housing payments, but that is only a temporary fix to an ongoing problem. I would like to reiterate the practical difficulties of moving miles away from family and friends. Many communities in the south Wales valleys are geographically isolated, which, coupled with public transport challenges in semi-rural areas, means that people often feel very lonely and isolated if they are moved to unfamiliar surroundings away from their families.

Last week I spoke to representatives of voluntary organisations that work with people affected by poverty and the welfare changes. I was told the story of a lady who, after being affected by the bedroom tax, was forced to move from her home village to another village some miles away. The isolation caused her to become depressed, which led to her taking her life. Tragically, that is not an isolated case. It is the reality of what can happen and is happening as a result of this unfair tax.

I have talked to the local authorities and housing agencies in my constituency, and I have heard about a number of situations that are causing great concern, not least to the tenants themselves. In one such case, a couple who are joint tenants of a two-bedroom house are under-occupying by one room and are thus affected by the bedroom tax, which reduces their housing benefit entitlement by 14%. They are on the transfer list and are eager to move to any one-bedroom property. They both have health issues and have lived in the same close-knit community all their lives. Staff at the council housing department have visited and have applied for discretionary housing payments to assist the tenants in the short term. The tenants are concerned about how they will pay the charge, because they are trying to repay rent arrears that have accrued on their account. They would like to stay in the same area, but, as I outlined earlier, the local authority have few one-bedroom properties in their areas of choice.

I recently spoke to staff at my local citizens advice bureau in Merthyr Tydfil who told me about the many people who come through their doors on a regular basis. People have nowhere else to turn. Such clients often have several other significant issues going on in their lives and, to add to that, they are now in rent arrears due to the bedroom tax. These people could lose their homes, leading to massive consequences. For those who are physically or mentally disabled, it could bring about even more severe issues, such as homelessness, suicidal thoughts, substance misuse or further debt. It just becomes a downward spiral.

In parts of my constituency, the demand for three-bedroom properties is not great. The local authority often advertises them for rent in the hope of getting tenants, yet people are being forced out of these properties and into smaller homes, creating more vacancies. I appreciate that that is not the case everywhere—certainly not in larger cities—but today we are considering the regional impact of the bedroom tax, and that is the reality in parts of my constituency. Of particular concern in my area is the view that the disability living allowance and personal independence payments should be disregarded when considering DHP applications. A recent court case resulted in a ruling of indirect discrimination when DLA or PIP is taken into account as income. It specifically quoted section 29(6) of the Equality Act 2010 and article 14 of European convention on human rights. The DWP’s discretionary housing payment guidance manual of February 2016 also refers to the court case. My local citizens advice bureau feels strongly that DLA and PIP should not be treated as income for DHP applications.

Another example involves a single tenant living alone. The tenant does not want to move, as he has lived in the property all his life and classes it as not only a council house, but a home. The property has three bedrooms and the tenant is affected by the spare room subsidy charge, which reduces his housing benefit by 25%. The tenant has to pay an additional £23 a week out of his welfare benefits to cover the charge, leaving him with £50 a week to buy food and pay for all other essentials, including utility bills. The tenant also has support needs, which are provided by his family, who live in the same area. Staff from the council have visited and applied for discretionary housing payments to assist the tenant in the short term. They also arranged for a food parcel to be delivered because the tenant was cutting back on food to pay the shortfall. The property was cold when the visit took place in late December because the tenant could not afford money for the prepayment meter. That is the reality of what is happening across our country.

Organisations such as Citizens Advice and others want to make a difference to their clients’ lives. There is a feeling that people are being penalised unfairly. With further reforms in the pipeline, many people’s ability to cope will become increasingly uncertain. I urge the Minister to take on board the real concerns about the bedroom tax policy and to recognise the hardship that this pernicious charge is causing. This charge—or tax; whatever you want to call it—is discredited, indefensible and should be abolished.

--- Later in debate ---

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Dorries. I had not expected to speak today, but I felt moved to do so because of the huge impact of the bedroom tax on my constituents. In Hoxton, on the Wenlock Barn estate alone, 74 households out of several hundred are affected.

We have heard from colleagues about the practical issues, so I will touch on some of those. Any policy that starts life with discretionary money provided by the Government as a workaround fund clearly does not stack up in the first place. The invidiousness of a discretionary housing payment when local government budgets are being slashed, and are expected to be slashed further in coming years, is an extra burden on the people affected. People speak to me about the bedroom tax with uncertainty and fear. Even if it does not affect them now, they worry that it will affect them in future.

In my constituency there is no housing stock to move to and no smaller homes that do not already have a huge waiting list. I have been elected in different roles for more than 20 years, and now is the worst time that I have ever seen for housing. My surgeries and those of my council colleagues are full of people desperate to find a home, but unable to afford one in the private rented sector in Hackney. Private rents are now unaffordable. In fact, in the private sector in my constituency, not a single three or four-bedroom property can be rented to meet the housing benefit cap. There is no alternative, and there is a huge waiting list for all social housing. The likelihood of being able to move to a smaller property in the same area, even through mutual exchange, is very slim.

While we are on the subject, will the Minister clarify an issue that came up in a Public Accounts Committee hearing a couple of years ago? Apparently, income from lodgers has no negative impact on universal credit and is completely disregarded. Will he clarify whether that is the case? On Wenlock Barn estate, were people minded or able to have a lodger—this might shock my colleagues from south Wales—they could charge £200 for a room on an estate so close to Old Street and the City of London. Having a lodger might be a solution for some of my constituents, but it is invidious for them to be able to do that because they are in Hoxton, close to Old Street and Silicon Roundabout—I suspect there is not the same opportunity for people in Swansea, Merthyr Tydfil or Cardiff. I am interested in the Minister responding on that point in particular.

As I said, the private sector provides no alternative, and even paying some social housing rents is impossible for many of my constituents on the minimum wage, even with the increases due in it. I remember a man who was a kitchen porter coming to one of my surgeries. He was not very skilled—we all want to see people more skilled up in their jobs, but let us face it and be honest, a kitchen porter will probably not have an employer who gives someone a significant amount of training and development opportunity. He was on the minimum wage and was asked by the Department for Work and Pensions to look for work in zones 5 and 6. That is not unreasonable, and he was certainly willing to work. His wife worked part time to help support the bringing up of their two young children. His extra journey time, however, meant difficulties with childcare times, and the extra cost of travel outside zone 2 to zones 5 or 6 was beyond him.

That grown man, who found dignity in work and wanted to find work again, was in tears in front of me in my surgery. He is only one example of the many others who have come to me hugely distressed. At the time he was not hit by the bedroom tax, which can be another worry for such people, but my point in mentioning him is to hammer home to the Minister that the Government need to see all their policies in the round. Many of my constituents have no financial resilience and do not have the opportunity to turn to friends and family for it, because their friends and family are in a similarly difficult position. They have nowhere to turn. They might be poor, but there is no poverty of ambition in my constituency. Many people want to do well, to get jobs and to improve their lot, but those sorts of things keep them down, hammering them into difficult roles.

People who get jobs in local supermarkets, for example, are often restricted to 15 or 16-hour contracts. A number of them have expressed the concern to me, which I have passed on to one of the Minister’s colleagues, that they can never increase their hours to full time, although more people are being recruited part time. Many were pleased, some in their first job, and excited to be able to say to their children, “I’m off to work now”—real pride, doing all the right things and doing all the things that Government want them to do and that we know work for people—but then they could not get the extra hours. That causes real problems for them, including paying their housing bills, which is certainly completely impossible in the private sector anyway.

I have practical examples to show how the bedroom tax is simply not working. One constituent who came to see me was temporarily unemployed. Her eldest son had left home, so her three-bedroom social rented property was deemed too large. Her landlord was an active manager in trying to get her to reduce the size of her property, persuading her to move to a nearby two-bedroom property with a different social landlord. She thought that that was the right thing to do to avoid the bedroom tax. What she had not really clocked until she started thinking about work again was that the rent for the two-bedroom property is higher than that for the three-bedroom property, which is not unusual in the sector. She has struggled to find work that can cover the rent. She does not want to be reliant on housing benefit, but she will be costing the taxpayer in housing benefit partly because she has moved house. Had she stayed in the other property, it would have been cheaper for the taxpayer and better for her.

Another constituent, a single mother, is ambitious to get into work and training and to improve herself, but is at the moment unemployed. She has 15-year-old and 10-year-old boys. Under the rules, they are deemed to share a bedroom, so her three-bedroom property is considered too large. What does she do? Does she wait six months for the 15-year-old to reach his 16th birthday and accrue the arrears, or does she try to downsize in that time?

Those are the choices—if we can call them that—that people are having to consider day in and day out. They are not good choices. I have worked and campaigned on housing for more than 20 years and one thing I am passionate about is that a stable, secure home is the absolute basis for getting on in life. Without that it is hard to concentrate on studies or securing a job and that causes stress and strain to the individual and family’s mental and physical health. I suspect that those of us in the Chamber do not have that worry. I know that I can go home to my flat and that it will not be ripped away from me. I am not reliant on anyone but me to ensure that I can keep my home, but that is not the case for so many of my constituents.

An additional factor in London is that many households are reluctant to move into properties that meet their needs. Over the years I have had an increasing number of overcrowded families, but increasingly people, even those in two-bedroom properties, do not seek to get a three-bedroom property. It is true that it is hard to get one, but they know that if they got such a property and a child leaves home or their circumstances change, the threat is that they will be hit by the bedroom tax and that fear stops people from looking to move into the right sized property. There is not a hope of doing that in the private sector and the risks in moving to a larger property in the social housing sector are also an issue.

The Minister must remember that fluctuating employment is a real concern. Many of my constituents are on zero-hours or short contracts and their work and pay fluctuate. Many of them are in arrears because while they have been working, they cannot be sure that every week they will get the hours they need to pay the rent. They are so delighted when they do get a job. I had one woman at a surgery on Monday who had got a good job, but she was still paying off a couple of thousand pounds of arrears from when she had uncertain employment.

That is the reality of people’s lives. If the Government are really keen to promote social mobility, they need to give people at that moment in their lives a leg up to help them fulfil their proper ambitions of wanting to work and support themselves, but instead the Government are pulling the rug out from under people’s feet. I hope the Minister has considered the bedroom tax’s value for money and practicality and that he has asked his officials to look at the cost to the Exchequer, let alone the human cost. My fear is that the bedroom tax is ideological, dog-whistle-based politics that appeals to certain people in parts of the country where it is a distant, remote and probably unheard-of policy, but I am stopped on the streets of my constituency by people who want to talk about it, both those directly affected and those whose children are at school with people affected by it or those who live next door to people affected by it. There is general concern overall.

The poorest and most vulnerable are being hit from all directions and those without the financial resilience to cope have nowhere to go. The despair and depression that comes through my surgery door is the worst it has ever been. I hope the Minister is really listening and that he will go back with the concerns of hon. Members, which were made in a measured way. This is about not just ideological party politics but people’s lives, futures and opportunities. If he believes in opportunity, he needs to have a radical relook at this invidious tax.

--- Later in debate ---

[Justin Tomlinson]

I will make some progress and then take more interventions.

Members ask whether this is a popular policy. I can tell them that it is a very popular policy with the people on waiting lists. Some 820,000 bedrooms in social housing were sitting empty while being paid for by the taxpayer. Those rooms were being looked at enviously by families in overcrowded accommodation.

[Meg Hillier]

rose—

[Justin Tomlinson]

I promise I will take more interventions, but let me make some other points first.

A small issue that will not generally have to trouble Opposition parties—that is the advantage of not being in government—is the financial aspect. Members asked whether this policy is saving money. It has saved about half a billion pounds a year, which is a significant amount of money.

Research has shown that social landlords are altering their allocation policies and are no longer putting single people into family-sized homes. In the first six months of the policy, around one third of developing landlords altered their build plans, and that figure is now up to 51%. There has been a reduction of more than 100,000 in the number of households seeing a reduction in their housing benefit award due to the policy since May 2013. There are a number of possible reasons for that. Landlords are not wrongly allocating single people to family homes. There are more one-bedroom properties—I will come on to the numbers on that—and there are people who have downsized. There are also more people either increasing their hours of work or finding work, and we are seeing around 200 people a week come off housing benefit as they are able to do that.

The evaluation report published last December showed that 20% of people affected by the policy had, as a result, looked to earn more through work. Some 63% of unemployed people affected said they were looking for work as a result of the policy, and 20% of people no longer affected said that that was because someone in their household had found work or increased their earnings. As I said, 200 people a week are coming off housing benefit completely.

We believe—I say this as someone who was a local councillor for 10 years—that local authorities remain best placed to ensure that discretionary housing payments are targeted at those most in need, based on local circumstances and working with a number of other agencies, so that there is a multi-pronged approach to providing support.

Since 2011, we have provided £560 million to local authorities and have already committed a further £870 million for the next five years. Since 2013-14, we have also allocated £5 million each year to help the 21 least densely populated areas across Great Britain, which addresses a point made by the hon. Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson). This additional funding aims to avoid any disproportionate impact on those affected by the removal of the spare room subsidy in remote and isolated communities.

Of the £150 million of discretionary housing payment funding that is being allocated to local authorities for 2016-17, £60 million is allocated by reference to the removal of the spare room subsidy. Local authorities are able to top up the Government’s contribution by an additional 150% in England and Wales, and there is no limit in Scotland.

The title of the debate on the Order Paper refers to regional effects, and there is clear evidence that regional areas are now adjusting to the removal of the spare room subsidy. Across all regions of England and Wales, the number of households subject to a reduction has fallen by between 14% and 26% since May 2013. In both the north-west and London, where the biggest change can be seen, there has been a 26% fall in the number of households subject to a reduction since May 2013. However, in Scotland, where discretionary housing payments have been used to buy out the policy, only an 8% reduction has been seen over the same period, and over the past year it has been the only region to see an increase in caseloads.

[Justin Tomlinson]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that point, because it links nicely to the next part of my speech, which is about housing numbers. However, I gently remind him that Scotland is the only region that has seen an increase in caseloads this year. That is hardly a record of success. I urge him to think very carefully about that, because those are the people who are on the waiting list looking to get appropriate family homes, and the ones who support this policy.

On the supply of housing numbers, 700,000 new homes have been built in the past five years, including 270,000 affordable homes. Housing starts are at their highest annual level since 2007. More council housing has been built since 2010 than in the previous 13 years. The number of empty homes across England is at its lowest since records began and, crucially, we are broadening opportunities for people to access housing through schemes such as Help to Buy and the right to buy, along with a number of other measures.

[Meg Hillier]

The Minister made a point earlier about people being allocated oversized properties to start with. He has also talked about under-occupying by people whose children have left home. However, they are different from people whose life circumstances are fluctuating—their income has fluctuated; their children’s ages are changing. They are living in the home that they will want to continue to live in, and yet they have to go cap in hand to the council for these discretionary housing payments, which in my area are severely squeezed. Does the Minister not acknowledge that this policy really hits people at a point in their lives when they are trying to move out of that situation and get stability?

[Justin Tomlinson]

That was exactly the same thought process and debate that went on when the Labour Government introduced the policy in the private sector. They faced exactly the same challenges, and it was intended, had there been a general election win for Labour in 2010, for this to be done under that Labour Government. We have done it, but the difference is that when the Labour Government introduced the policy in the private sector, they did not give any additional discretionary housing payments. We are providing £870 million over the next five years and entrusting local authorities and local communities to shape and deliver what they feel is the appropriate support. In the hon. Lady’s constituency, it could be that the local authority wishes to support those with fluctuating conditions, or they may wish to target the money on other areas, but £870 million is being provided.

A number of points were raised, and I shall do my best to go through as many of those as I can. The hon. Lady asked about how income from lodgers would have an impact. Income from lodgers is fully disregarded in universal credit, so there is certainly an opportunity there. I accept that that is an easier way to generate additional income in certain parts of the country than in others.

The hon. Member for Cardiff Central raised an important point about payday loans. I am very proud to have served as part of an incredibly important cross-party campaign that delivered significant changes in the regulations protecting vulnerable consumers. In summary, we secured the delivery of financial education and support through parts of the national curriculum. All loans have to be displayed fully in cost rather than with complex annual percentage rates, which I discovered even Treasury Ministers could not calculate. Crucially, there has been the capping of costs, the ending of rip-off rates and relentless roll-overs, the freezing of debt and compulsory credit checking to protect vulnerable consumers who should never be lent the money in the first place, as well as signposting to external and, crucially, independent advice for those consumers. It was something that we all welcomed.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Monday 22nd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Ah! We are graced with the presence of the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, from whom we will now hear.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister has just extolled the virtues of his Department’s support for people with mental health problems, but in reality we know that too many people with mental health issues are coming through the Work programme and not getting work. Is it not time that, for the benefit of those people and of the taxpayer, some of his Department’s money was devolved to local areas so those people can get better support and get into proper jobs?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Like Mr Speaker, I welcome the hon. Lady to her post. This is absolutely an area where we want to take things further and do more work. Mental health conditions are one of the big issues stopping people getting into work. We want to do more on that, and have more treatment and more support through jobcentres. I am happy to discuss that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

As ever, my hon. Friend puts it succinctly—but that does not stop me answering his question. He is right. There are three figures that are really important. The Minister for Employment, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey), talked about bringing down unemployment. Under this Government, the International Labour Organisation 12-month-plus employment rate for 16 to 24-year-olds—the hardest to help—is down 59,000 on the year and 16,000 on the election; the 24-month-plus rate is down 30,000 on the year and 2,000 on the quarter; and of those in social housing, never, since records began, have we had so many households in work. That is the real reason for the Government’s long-term economic plan.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Those on both sides of the House agree that it is important to encourage and support people into work, but under the new benefit cap announced by the Prime Minister, there is not a single three or four-bedroom property that somebody could rent when they need that safety net.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I think the hon. Lady is talking about the Conservative manifesto proposal—I am not sure what other cap she could be talking about.

[Meg Hillier]

indicated assent.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

She is nodding, but that proposal only brings the benefit cap back in line with average earnings, which are £23,000.

Through the cap, the Government have delivered fairness to the system and an incentive to go back to work, and as a direct result, more people are going back to work than ever before. We are asking people to take responsibility for their lives, just as those who are working and are not within the cap take responsibility for their lives.

Universal Credit

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West, and others have not made mistakes. We have been crystal clear about this matter. I stand by the words that have been used and the statements that have been made, as I said earlier. The hon. Member for Rhondda normally does not listen, but just says what he was going to say, regardless of the answer. I suspect that a conversation with him is a very one-way process.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I have been absolutely staggered to hear the Secretary of State defending a system that, as I have heard repeatedly at the Public Accounts Committee, has had very poor planning from day one and at subsequent stages. We are glad that there is a plan to get it back on track, but let us get back to the real question. The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, the right hon. Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey), came to this House and said that the business case had been signed off. Either she is not on top of her brief or she was misleading this House, neither of which inspires confidence.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I will give two answers. First, the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West, stated what is factually correct: that the strategic business plans for this Parliament have all been approved. That is an absolute fact. Secondly, it was I who was not happy with the way the development was taking place nearly two years ago, and who instigated the first process through my red team report. That is correct and I stand by that. Working with the Cabinet Office, we changed the plan. The plan is now being delivered exactly as the Public Accounts Committee, on which the hon. Lady sits, wanted us to deliver it, with all the necessary checks and balances. I would have thought, therefore, that she would congratulate us.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Thursday 13th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

I understand that the Scunthorpe Telegraph has made that move and that, as a result, its circulation has gradually risen by a small amount. The Government have restricted the amount of local papers that councils can put out, relaxed media ownership rules, and continued to have statutory notices in local papers, so we do want to support local papers where we can.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Is not one of the big tragedies resulting from the loss of local newspapers the impact on journalistic training and the quality of scrutiny of our councils? Is the Minister having discussions with colleagues in the Department for Communities and Local Government about this important matter?

[Mr Vaizey]

I acknowledge the hon. Lady’s point that we rely very much on the quality of local journalism to hold local councils to account, and it is important that, where possible, savings are made and money continues to be invested in local journalism. My local newspaper group, which publishes the Oxford Mail and the Herald, tries to invest as much as it can in local journalism because it recognises that that is what sells its papers.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Monday 24th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mike Penning]

Of course, as we roll out PIP, this is a really difficult situation and we must make sure we get the quality right. I will look into that individual case for my right hon. Friend and make sure we get it right in his area.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

T9. Further to the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee West (Jim McGovern), a number of my constituents have been on the employment and support programme for two years, or nearly two years, and have had not a sniff of a work opportunity. Do the Government have a solution for how to get people with complex needs into work, because clearly the Work programme is not delivering?

[Esther McVey]

The Work programme is working. For those people who are on employment and support allowance, it is about getting closer to the job market and that is what we are doing—putting provision in place. I remind the hon. Lady that, under her Government, those people were not supported in any consistent way whatsoever.

Universal Credit

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

There is no money lost to fraud, error and overpayment under the universal credit system. As we roll it out, the system itself will save a huge amount in fraud and error on the current system, which is a mess. The level of overpayments and clawbacks of tax credits every single year is a scandal; the scandal is that the policy and the programme left to us by the Opposition, which has been failing every year, is costing huge sums of money.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State has been very keen to talk about what the previous Government did, but he is in charge now and he was in charge of one of the worst possible procurement processes in government. He has not yet told the House what will happen to the employment support group. It is batted off into the long grass. They are a very vulnerable group of people. Will they have to live through a similar shambles when he comes up with a solution for them?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Quite the contrary; I have made it very clear that by 2016 universal credit will be the benefit that people go on when they apply for employment and support allowance. The people who were on it—we know them as the stock—are the most vulnerable. [Interruption.] Well, that is the term used—those are people who are on the benefit at present. [Interruption.] How pathetic is that? The Opposition used the term themselves when they were in government, and now they try to pretend that they have discovered a new way of referring to such people. Those who are on employment and support allowance will be migrated to universal credit over a period so that we can bring them in safely, securely and to their benefit. Would the hon. Lady want us to rush them in, or does she think we ought to take care over how we do it?

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Monday 14th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

How can the Secretary of State continue to defend the bedroom tax when there are not enough smaller properties for people to move into, even if it were the right thing to do?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I keep reminding the Opposition—and this may be the real reason why they got in such a mess over the economy—that a subsidy is not a tax. They need to understand that a tax is something that the Government take away from people, but this is money that the taxpayers have given to people to subsidise them to have spare rooms. We simply cannot go on like that. I remind the hon. Lady that the Government she was a member of nearly doubled the housing benefit bill in the 10 years they were in power, and that is why we have to take action.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Monday 20th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

The Minister can always have a cup of tea with her right hon. Friend if any further clarification is required.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Many of my constituents rely on the sub-prime lending sector to manage from day to day and to build their credit record. What conversations has the Secretary of State’s Department had with the Financial Conduct Authority in its efforts to improve that sector and to make sure that my constituents get a good service rather than, in some cases, being driven into the hands of illegal moneylenders?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

That is a very good question. My noble Friend Lord Freud is conducting those discussions, which are in line with all his discussions with the banking and finance sector in advance of universal credit coming in. The hon. Lady makes a very valuable point, and she is absolutely right. I will ensure that we press people very hard on this.