Oral Answers to Questions

Naomi Long Excerpts

Monday 1st July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

All those are options. We have put in extra investment in credit unions—some £35 million—to try to increase their scope and to bring them together again. My hon. Friend is right. Local is what this is all about. It is about giving projects in the local area, with local authorities, a chance to obtain reasonable, long-term investment to deliver life-changing results. It is interesting that, at the G8 conference—this is the most important thing—many of the countries said that this is the way for them to go, too. This country has led on this area, thanks to the coalition.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

5. How many people who worked in Northern Ireland and paid national insurance contributions while aged 14 or 15 between 1947 and 1957, which did not count towards their qualifying years for a full basic state pension, fall two years or less short of the years needed to qualify for such a pension.

[The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Steve Webb)]

As the hon. Lady will be aware, state pensions in Northern Ireland are the responsibility of Ministers in the Northern Ireland Executive. Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs is responsible for national insurance matters. However, I am advised by HMRC that the information that she has requested could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.

[Naomi Long]

I thank the Minister for his answer, but some of the people who worked during that period, before the school leaving age changed in Northern Ireland, would be resident in other parts of the UK as well as in Northern Ireland. Therefore, will he undertake at least to raise the matter again with HMRC, in order that it can reconsider its response?

[Steve Webb]

The issue for HMRC is that the records that the hon. Lady is talking about—those of people who left school at 14 and 15 in the 1940s and 1950s—are on pieces of cardboard in a cupboard somewhere. That information could only be gathered at disproportionate cost.

Universal Credit and Welfare Reform

Naomi Long Excerpts

Tuesday 11th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Charlie Elphicke]

Six million second earners will be better off. Importantly, 2.5 million working families will gain in the long run from the introduction of universal credit—again, that is according to IFS figures, not the Government’s figures. The Opposition are normally so keen to use the IFS figures, so it is worth quoting those figures to them and underlining how many people will be better off. That contrasts sharply with the scaremongering that we have heard from the Opposition today.

The other really important thing is that universal credit will help to lift children out of poverty. Universal credit is a transformational change which will affect some 8 million households, and we hope that 900,000 individuals, including more than 350,000 children and more than half a million working-age adults, will be lifted out of poverty as a result. The real question is: why did the previous Government not do it? Why do the Opposition not embrace it and work constructively with the Government on the fine tuning and detailing of this policy to get the best for all our electors, in whichever constituency we represent.

We are also investing an additional £300 million in child care support under universal credit, on top of £2 billion already being spent under the current system. That is worth pointing out, given a lot of the scaremongering we have heard about child care, as it shows the Government’s seriousness about helping out with child care. That will mean that more families than ever before will receive child care support, including 80,000 prevented from doing so by the current hours rule.

Universal credit is the right policy and this is the right time for it. We know that government and IT systems do not make good bedfellows—they do not make happy couples—and that there have been difficulties in the past. However, the previous Government should not judge this Government by their standards, and we should look at the implementation of employment and support allowance, as that was not an IT disaster. The Department for Work and Pensions has a good record, so we should give it the benefit of the doubt. Nevertheless, we should watch carefully to make sure that all goes well and all continues to be moving on time. Universal credit is important because it is very much for the many, with 2.5 million households that will gain. That is an important part of the reform.

Finally, we should trust people. There is too much of a tendency in the House to think that no one can manage, that we have to spoon-feed everyone and that no one can take responsibility. It is assumed that if they find it difficult to take responsibility, they should be spoon-fed rather than encouraged, helped and enabled to take more responsibility for their lives.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

I agree that we want to encourage people to take care of their own affairs, but there is a conflict in that many people do not have the financial capability to do so. The funding for many of the organisations that provide them with advice and support is also under pressure, with the result that they do not have the capacity to support those people through that process. Does not the hon. Gentleman think that this is perhaps not the right time for such an approach and that we need to invest in services to give people financial capability?

[Charlie Elphicke]

Just because they do not have that capability today does not mean that we should write them off for all time. It does not mean that we should be pessimistic or defeatist, as the previous Government too often were.

Let us look at the facts. Some 75% of people in work today are paid monthly and if someone is going to go back into the workplace, they need to get used to monthly payments. When the previous Government moved from weekly to fortnightly payments, all the usual customers, suspects and groups popped up and said that it would be a disaster, but what actually happened? People managed. If we trust people, they often step up to the plate. We need to accept that people are able and responsible and have the ability to be successful in taking responsibility for their lives.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Webb]

As the right hon. Gentleman well understands, the impact on every individual will be different, so we have not used a specific figure for the number of hours worked. However, what I have demonstrated is that the people who face the biggest barriers to working more hours will see cuts in their marginal rates and the people who face the biggest barriers to working at all will get more return for working. So this is good news for work incentives. The right hon. Member for Birkenhead referred to the people facing an increase in their marginal rate, but that increase is by four percentage points, from a median of 41 to 45. That is the trade-off. We give people an incentive to take work and we tackle the most severe marginal rates, while some people face a four percentage point increase. That seems to me to be a good trade-off.

Quite properly, a lot of hon. Members raised the issue of internet access. We want to make it absolutely clear that the proposition is digital by default, so if we can get people in on the internet and online, we will do so. However, as the Secretary of State said at the start, we fully recognise that not everybody is online and not everybody will be, so the core planning for the universal credit contains provision for people who will not be online.

Some of the figures we have heard grossly distort the extent to which people of working age in the benefit population are online these days. The evidence suggests that 74% of claimants—not of the whole population, but of claimants—have home broadband and that 41% of claimants do internet banking. To hear the speeches we have heard in this debate, one would not think that these people even knew what a computer looked like. It has been suggested in this debate that we have to avoid patronising people on benefits, and that is absolutely right. We want to support people who are not online—jobcentres will play a part in that and we are talking to local authorities about it—but let us see this as an opportunity to get more people to be internet savvy, online and more employable. Let us not condemn people; let us give them opportunities and training.

The impact of this measure is very important, and the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) asked about the equalities impact. We will publish an updated equalities impact assessment with the final regulations after the autumn statement.

The hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Bain) gave some bizarre figures about the impact of this reform on lone parents, and I do not know where he got them from. Lone parents gain from universal credit: 400,000 lone parents who rent will gain, as opposed to 200,000 who will have lower entitlement; there will be twice as many gainers as losers in that category. This reform will reduce child poverty, because we are spending huge sums of additional money at a time when money is tight. We are doing so because of our priority of making work pay.

We have heard discussion of the real-time information system, the fact that people’s benefit will be based on their current situation and the impact on business. This approach has been assessed as saving businesses £300 million a year. Those figures are signed off not by us, but by the Regulatory Policy Committee, which is a business-led organisation; they have been validated by business. Businesses are doing a lot of these calculations anyway, with the software doing it for them in most cases, but the streamlining of the system will save businesses cost overall. We are working closely with our colleagues at Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs; there has been close working between the two Departments. The Department for Work and Pensions is represented in the governance of HMRC’s real-time information programme at every level, and the DWP and HMRC have jointly presented to Parliament.

The right hon. Member for Birkenhead, in another bizarre, overstated allegation, said that there has been a mass exodus of senior civil servants on the programme. That is completely untrue. The senior responsible officer, Terry Moran, whom he will know from years gone by, has held that role since November 2010. The programme director has been in place since August 2011. At HMRC, the senior responsible officer for the real-time information service has retired—we still allow people to retire, even under our policies—but has been replaced by someone from the DWP. So the suggestion that people are just walking out the door is nonsense and is scaremongering.

[Naomi Long]

rose—

[Steve Webb]

I have got only two minutes, so I had better not give way.

We were asked about the position on domestic violence, an important issue raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood). It is an important issue in respect of provision for splitting payments, for example. The Government are absolutely committed to protecting those who are subject to domestic violence. For example, under universal credit, victims of domestic violence will be exempt from things such as work search requirements for a three-month period. Although shared payments would normally be appropriate, because we know that most households budget together, clearly we will make alternative arrangements in exceptional cases. We have therefore retained powers to split payments between members of a couple, for example, in cases of domestic violence. Details of those exemptions will be included in guidance.

We heard a large number of contributions and I cannot do justice to them all, but the key theme from Government Members has been a unified view that we must make work pay and that we should not listen to the naysayers. Frankly, it is always possible to get a newspaper headline by saying “Big Government IT project bound not to work”, because if it does work nobody will ever remember. That is always the way in which the Opposition conduct themselves, but we are in the business of making things happen. When my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State explained how closely he monitors the programme, he was not exaggerating. This project has probably had more hours of testing, evolution and making things work than any other with which I have been associated.

The hon. Member for Makerfield (Yvonne Fovargue) mentioned the 1988 benefit changes, which were a “big bang” change. Income support, supplementary benefit, family credit, the family income supplement and housing benefit were reformed all on a single day. This is a roll out over four to five years and we will get it right by doing it gradually, testing it, having pathfinders and bringing in groups one step at a time. We all saw what happened under the previous Government to the tax credit system when the changes were done in a “big bang”, but we will make this change gradually, get it right and make work pay, so we should reject the naysayers and reject the motion.

Question put.

The House proceeded to a Division.

Welfare Reform Bill

Naomi Long Excerpts

Wednesday 1st February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Redwood]

Ministers are very capable of setting out their own figures. I do not have, at the top of my mind, all the detailed figures the right hon. Gentleman wants, which are properly things for Ministers to report to the House, but they have detailed the total savings overall and they are trying to live within that budget. As has rightfully been reported to the House today, they have given up some of the savings to accommodate the transitional period. It is entirely fair to ask the right hon. Gentleman, who is a specialist, as is the Minister he shadows, to tell us how much difference there would be in his proposals. Clearly, Labour has not yet thought through what the total should be.

There is another, very difficult, issue to consider with regionalism: there are big divergences in house and flat prices within, as well as between, regions. We should recognise this point, which in some ways makes this policy a bit easier to stomach than some on the Labour Benches suggest. I heard a former Westminster councillor saying that she had done some work on the situation of families who would be caught by the cap in Westminster. Naturally I was worried and wanted to hear what her answer was. She said she had found a considerable number of properties that she thought would be suitable for those families, quite close to where they were currently living, which happened to be rather better value than those in which they were currently living, supported by benefits. That seemed rather good news to me. Members from London constituencies will know that within London there is a huge variety of cost in property—often street by street, not merely borough by borough—so I do not think the proposal is quite as penal as some on the Labour Benches suggest. That makes it quite difficult to set a regional cap because such a cap might be no more appropriate as an average than the national cap.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for making this point, which a number of Opposition Members from Northern Ireland have concerns about. I represent a Belfast constituency and there are massive disparities between rents in the Greater Belfast area and those in more rural constituencies. If this sort of regionalisation was driven down to a very local level, it could distort people’s ability to seek work in the city or outside it.

[Mr Redwood]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady.

I am conscious that others want to speak so I shall not extend my argument further. I just want to make the point that in order to consider fairly what is an interesting proposal from Labour, the minimum we would need to know is the overall cost in comparison to the Government scheme and how these difficult problems of judgment within areas or regions would be settled. That is an important consideration.

Oral Answers to Questions

Naomi Long Excerpts

Monday 24th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. It is always a pleasure to listen to the hon. Gentleman, and that is, indeed, a topical question, but it suffers from the notable disadvantage of bearing absolutely no relation whatsoever to the responsibilities of the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. I will give a seminar to the hon. Gentleman later, further and better to explain the point, but there is no requirement on the Secretary of State to respond to that question.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

Given the relatively small employment market in Northern Ireland, does the Secretary of State believe, based on his discussions with Northern Ireland Ministers, that enough jobs can be created for those leaving employment for the Work programme financial model to be effective in Northern Ireland?

[Chris Grayling]

As the hon. Lady rightly says, all these issues are devolved to Northern Ireland. We have regular contact with the Northern Ireland Administration, and my colleague, Lord Freud, has regular meetings with them on behalf of the Department. We all, of course, want to see growth and employment in every part of the United Kingdom, including Northern Ireland, and to see all our welfare-to-work policies, both devolved and otherwise, bear fruit.

Oral Answers to Questions

Naomi Long Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on the support that she has been providing to young entrepreneurs in her constituency. It is not simply the new enterprise allowance that will provide support for young people on benefits to set up businesses; many of the Work programme providers are also introducing specialist support, including one that is setting up a microfinance fund for new entrepreneurs. Self-employment is an important route out of unemployment, and we will continue to do what we can to support it.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

Over the last 15 months I have been dealing with a constituent who has raised a complaint against the Child Support Agency about a flawed calculation that it made of payments due. Can the Minister say what the Government will do to address both the opaqueness of the CSA’s processes for dealing with such complaints and the length of time that they take?

[Maria Miller]

I thank the hon. Lady for raising that issue. As she and many other hon. Members will know, the Child Support Agency has administration problems. That is why we are looking at fundamental reform, particularly of the computer systems, which we hope will address the problems that her constituents are still having to endure.

Welfare Reform Bill

Naomi Long Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

The national payments on account will be dealt with on a national basis in the same way in any part of the country and the regulated part of the social fund will continue as it is. The hon. Gentleman is talking about how local assistance will be dealt with and I am sure that he, like all hon. Members, will know that local authorities want to do their best by the vulnerable citizens we are talking about. That is certainly my experience of most, if not all, local authorities.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

Will the Minister give way on that second point?

[Maria Miller]

Will the hon. Lady forgive me if I make a little more progress? As I have said, we really need to move through this quite quickly.

Another reason why the status quo is not an option was highlighted only this week when community care grants were referenced in a “Dispatches” programme, which showed that an ex-offender who had received a community care grant for resettlement had spent the money on drugs. We should all be concerned about the lack of checking on how money is used and we should look at how to improve the system.

The hon. Member for Westminster North took a great deal of pain to talk about people who claim crisis loans having some degree of mobility and disengagement from the democratic system. I am not sure what evidence she has to support those assumptions, but we do not have that evidence to hand. The three elements of the discretionary scheme that I have talked about have very different and distinct client groups.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon]

I am not against the principle of welfare reform, but I am against how it affects those people who regularly come to see me. Not a week passes in the offices that I look after in which we do not see people who need crisis loans, and we hear from people who are under financial pressure all the time. With respect, I sometimes wonder whether some hon. Members have ever seen a social fund or crisis loan form. Do they know what it is like to be in financial crisis and under pressure?

I support the amendments for a number of reasons, and I hope they will be put to the vote. What happens in the House today will be sent to the Northern Ireland Assembly for its endorsement. On the principle of parity with the rest of the United Kingdom, I expect the Northern Ireland Assembly to endorse the decision of the House. The measure will then become the law for Northern Ireland as well. So if we feel concerned about it, we must oppose it here today. That is what the people I represent tell me.

Most of us are probably affluent enough to be able to borrow money from the bank if we are under financial pressure, but the people who come to me in my office seeking crisis loans through the social fund cannot do that. They do not have the option of the credit union either, because of the credit union methodology. I fully support credit unions. Everyone on the Opposition Benches who has a particular knowledge of credit unions would support them 100%, as we have in the past, but they are not an option for people in financial crisis, as the Government have suggested.

[Naomi Long]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that part of the difficulty is that in circumstances where people’s finances are very stretched and they are very vulnerable, the crisis loan system stands between them and lenders with extortionate interest rates and loan sharks, which can impact not only on their financial welfare, but on their health and well-being more generally?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Clarke]

I hope to come to that point later. I welcome the fact that hon. Members from Northern Ireland have played such an excellent part in these debates, both on 30 November and since. The hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) made an intervention on that occasion, and his arguments were as sound then as they are today. The Minister has virtually no support for her position. In a moment, I shall discuss the disability organisations.

[Naomi Long]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that one of the huge disappointments of the process is that, despite the fact that hon. Members as well as people outside the House and local charities initially supported the principle of welfare reform, they are still unable to support the Bill, even at this late stage, because of the lack of detail and assurance that it offers?

[Mr Clarke]

The hon. Lady makes a very good point.

The people who know the most about DLA know that it is very difficult to secure. Claims have been made, if not by Members on the Government Benches then certainly by newspapers that support the Government, that the system is being abused, but the people who know about abuse are those who experience DLA for themselves. It is not a question of not dealing with that. As a result of the Government’s proposals, people who live in residential homes have experienced uncertainty, inconsistency and pledges being reneged on. Today, when we are being asked to make a specific decision on a Bill that will impact on those people, we have yet again heard a series of vague statements from the Minister that mean absolutely nothing.

To be fair to the Minister, she is not alone. The Secretary of State is equally culpable, as is the Prime Minister.

Welfare Reform Bill

Naomi Long Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

One second. Would the hon. Lady forgive me? I have been asked to answer a question and I shall try to answer it. We have already made some very substantial change to support people in cancer treatment. The concerns of Macmillan and others relate to oral chemotherapy. I understand that. We have already asked Professor Harrington, in his second review, to undertake to give some advice on that. We have a slight problem with that from the start, because it is a fairly new form of treatment and a limited number of people are on it. So far, much of the medical evidence suggests that it does not affect people in the way that intravenous chemotherapy does; it is not as debilitating. We remain open to that evidence.

Although there is no provision for oral chemotherapy right now, my right hon. Friend the Employment Minister has made it clear that Professor Harrington will review the subject and take evidence, and we have asked the cancer groups to offer up their thoughts and advice, in addition to the medical fraternity. We will take account of what Professor Harrington says. As the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) knows, last time we adopted all the recommendations in the professor’s report in their totality. So we are not in the business of trying to harm or affect cancer patients; quite the contrary. We made some very serious changes to what we inherited from the previous Government—I would like to think that they would have done the same—and we will continue to do so. I hope that answers the hon. Gentleman’s question. If he will let me get on with the rest of the Bill, I will.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way on that point?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I would like to make a bit of progress, if the hon. Lady does not mind. I think I have been pretty generous on that aspect. I will return to it.

The key is that I hope the Bill in general—we shall get to the more specific elements later—represents a whole new concept: a contract with people who are in need of support. For those who are able to work, work should pay, and for the most vulnerable in society we will continue to provide the support that that they need. I think it is our duty to do so. We can debate the levels of that support, but it is our duty none the less.

The Bill says to the taxpayer, “Your hard-earned money must be spent responsibly.” We sometimes forget, in our debates on welfare, that the taxpayer is also a player in this, because taxpayers—many of them on low and marginal incomes—are constantly being asked to pay in taxes towards support for others. That is fair, but we have a responsibility to ensure that taxpayers too are properly supported. I shall now outline some of the principles of the Bill, and then I will try to get through the various clauses.

--- Later in debate ---

[Harriett Baldwin]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, there are many provisions in our welfare system for exactly that sort of situation. I do not think that anyone is suggesting that people with no capacity for work should get out and work. We should have a generous safety net, as we do for people in those situations.

However, the system as currently constructed has many barriers that send the message that taking on full-time work is not worth while. With single parents facing a withdrawal rate of 96%, what kind of message does that send to people about the sense in going to work? We have all met people who work 16 hours a week. As we know, the way that working tax credits work gives people an incentive to find a job working 16 hours a week. At the moment, those working 15 or 17 hours a week find themselves financially worse off. That is why it is so important that the Bill tackles those cliff edges, ensuring a much smoother process and a linear relationship between the time that people work and the amount that they take home. At the end of the day, we all respond to the financial incentives that are inherent in the system.

As we heard earlier, the current benefits system also pays couples more to live apart than to stay together. I believe that I am right in saying that 2 million people in this country would identify themselves as being in a relationship but living apart. No one can deny that, in large part, that is down to the messages and the financial incentives sent through the welfare system, which will be reformed by this Bill.

I am sure that Opposition Members will welcome the fact that the distributional analysis of the universal credit shows that the vast proportion of additional money in the system will go to those in the lowest income deciles, with 85% going to those in the four lowest-paid deciles.

I should point out, however, to the Secretary of State that it was still a shock to realise that even under the changes that we are discussing today, the benefit withdrawal rates for those going into work will still be 65p in the pound. That is still a shockingly high marginal deduction rate, when our higher-rate taxpayers are on 51% or 52%. The Child Poverty Action Group, the Centre for Social Justice and Family Action have all argued for a withdrawal rate of 55%, with Save the Children arguing for a 50% withdrawal rate. I hope that everyone in the House will welcome the fact that the Bill gives the Chancellor in future the ability to stand at the Dispatch Box and say that he is making a change in the marginal withdrawal rate, because we would all like it to be reduced over time.

[Naomi Long]

I acknowledge what the hon. Lady says about the Bill giving the Chancellor the freedom to do that, but it does not require him to do it. Would it not provide people with more certainty if the Government indicated that that were the intention?

[Harriett Baldwin]

I think that we have heard the Secretary of State put that on the record on a number of occasions.

There are a few debating points that have arisen in this debate, particularly from the Opposition, that I would like to address in my few remaining minutes. On savers, we can have a debate about whether someone with £16,000 in savings ought to be in the benefits system, but we should all recognise that the welfare system should focus on those on the lowest incomes and with the lowest savings. That is one of the difficult decisions that it is worth tackling, and the Bill does that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Julian Sturdy]

I agree that this Bill offers an important pathway back to work. We have to get more jobs in the private sector and restore the balance between public and private sector jobs, which was skewed by the previous Government—certainly in my region and in the north especially. The measures that this Government are introducing—I hope we will see more of them in the Budget—will incentivise private sector growth and job creation which, alongside the Bill, will get more people back into work.

It is a sad but well-known fact that the current system discourages those in low-paid jobs from increasing their hours, as rates of tax and benefit reductions often leave them worse off. This ridiculous situation helps only to dampen aspiration while increasing dependency in the benefits system as a whole. In addition, hard-working, taxpaying families, who are feeling the squeeze in these difficult economic times, should not subsidise the small but still significant number of people in our society who see the welfare system as a career choice. That must stop. By annually capping benefits, withdrawing support from those who refuse to work and increasing the financial incentives for those who do work, the Bill includes specific measures that will make work pay.

[Naomi Long]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman on the need to change the system to ensure that people do not aspire to live on benefits, but is that not more about changing people’s aspirations and their pathways to opportunity, rather than simply setting caps and putting difficulties in the way of those claiming benefit when they are in difficulty?

[Julian Sturdy]

It is about changing aspiration, which is what the Bill does. As my hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (George Hollingbery) said, it is about taking a carrot-and-stick approach. It is important to have certain caps on benefits, but we must also encourage aspiration to get people back into work. The current system did not do that. Instead, it dampened aspiration, which is why it is fundamentally important that we change the system. As many hon. Members have said, it is a case of now or never—we must grasp the nettle. The DWP estimates that the reforms could reduce the number of workless households by as many as 300,000 and that about 700,000 low-earning workers will be better off as they keep more of their earnings.

Administrative reform to our welfare system is long overdue; it is simply wrong that taxpayers’ money should be squandered recklessly as often happened under the previous Government. The creation of the universal credit, which will bring together various and often overlapping elements, such as jobseeker’s allowance, income support and housing benefit, and pay them in a single lump sum will cut administrative costs and reduce the risk of fraud. It is predicted that, as a result of the universal credit, just over 2.5 million households will receive higher entitlements, with more than 350,000 children and 500,000 working-age adults being lifted out of poverty altogether, as the shadow Secretary of State acknowledged earlier. That was the only thing he said that I agreed with, but it is important to mention that acknowledgement.

Lastly, and returning to my initial comments, the overriding objective of the Bill must be better to protect, equip and support the most vulnerable in our society. Too many of this country’s welfare resources have been diluted and too little has been directed at those in most need. To maintain the status quo would be to champion the cycle of dependency and despair that Britain’s welfare culture, as constructed by the Labour party, currently promotes. I know that many welfare claimants are apprehensive about the Government’s changes, but let the message go out loud and clear that those who are truly in need will receive more support, better targeted assistance and higher standards of care. I truly believe that is the motivation underlying the reforms and I strongly urge all Members to support this important Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

I welcome the opportunity to participate in the debate, because this issue will have profound implications for the welfare and benefit system, and will impact on all our constituents.

Time is limited, and the scope of the Bill is extensive, so I shall focus on a few key issues, the first of which is the proposed changes to disability living allowance, particularly the work capability assessment. The Government appear to place more emphasis on the independence of those who judge someone’s fitness for work, rather than on their expertise, which is of concern to many people, particularly those who suffer from hidden, complex and often poorly understood conditions with variable symptoms, including autistic spectrum disorders, mental health issues and multiple sclerosis.

A medically qualified assessor may be independent, but not necessarily an expert in a particular condition. The single point assessment is unlikely to give a comprehensive view of an individual’s fitness to work that is more reliable than that provided by an expert in the field who has treated and monitored the patient over a long period. The clinician will also follow professional ethics in making judgments about a patient, which provides a safeguard for the Government. If expert written evidence is available, it should be used and should carry more weight than the opinion of a benefits assessor, who may not have detailed expertise in dealing with those matters.

[Dr Whiteford]

As someone who represents a constituency that was part of the work capability assessment pilot, one of the biggest concerns was that the evidence of I know that someone’s GP or consultant was not taken seriously by the medical assessors. Will the hon. Lady comment on that?

[Naomi Long]

That is a fundamental concern. One of my constituents recently came to Parliament, on behalf of the mental health charities Rethink and MindWise, to give evidence to the Select Committee on Work and Pensions about the impact of the assessment proposals on people with mental health problems. Members who met her at the round-table session would agree that she presented her evidence in a professional, competent and effective manner, as one would expect of someone with a medical degree. However, her evidence carried weight not because of her degree, but because she receives disability living allowance. She is not fit for work, and is not permitted to practise as a GP as a result of serious mental health issues, which developed in her final year of study.

If a benefits assessor, even a medically qualified one, witnessed her performance in Committee, they would doubtless assume that she was fully fit to work. However, her condition is unstable, and in periods of ill health, she is unable to leave her home or interact with people at all. Even when well, she is reluctant to take on additional stressful responsibilities because of her history of instability.

[Chris Grayling]

It is important, as people are listening to this debate, that the actual situation is placed on the record. Will the hon. Lady confirm that the system that she is describing is the one that we inherited from the Labour Government, which we have taken steps to change through the Harrington review? In cases where we have made changes to the assessment, the work was done by the previous Government, whose recommendations we accepted. Finally, does she accept that, at the end of all this, there is a collective desire to make sure that the system works as well as possible and that there is a commitment to continue to improve it where possible?

[Naomi Long]

I would like to confirm, on the first issue, that I am not making these points as a member of the Labour party or of the previous Government but as a member of the Alliance party, reflecting the concerns of my constituents. Furthermore, I would hope that there is a collective will to ensure that people are dealt with fairly in the system. However, the doubts that I am expressing to the Minister have been expressed to me by my constituents.

A problem with single point assessment needs to be taken into consideration, and I urge the Minister to look carefully at the issue. The young lady in question, for example, had a dual point assessment by the British Medical Association on her fitness to practise. One doctor said that she was fit to practise, and the other said that she was not, because of the complex nature of her condition. Neither of them was wrong when they dealt with the person in front of them, but her complex mental health condition prevented them from seeing the same individual in the same way.

I do not believe that the problem arises solely with mental health issues, but with many other conditions. People can have good days and bad days, and they may need additional support. As the Bill progresses through the House, it is hugely important that we address that issue.

Much has been said about the removal of the mobility component of the disability living allowance for those in residential care, so I will not rehearse the arguments, but I have corresponded at length on it with the Under-Secretary, and from her most recent correspondence I am aware that there is a valid concern about the inconsistent way in which the needs of some of the most vulnerable people in society are being met.

There is ambiguity and considerable variation in the way in which local authorities take the DLA mobility component into account when making financial assessments, and organisations such as Disability Alliance acknowledge that point, but having identified the problem it is incumbent on the Government to ensure that the solution does not end up disadvantaging the benefit’s recipient, who did not create the difficulty in the first place. Independent mobility is crucial to well-being and to social cohesion, and it must be protected more clearly than it is in the current proposals.

Finally on DLA, I am concerned about the change to the qualifying period, and its move from six months to three months, which could have profound consequences for those who develop sudden onset conditions, such as stroke, or experience the debilitating effects of treatment for an illness, such as cancer. It could also affect those who give birth to a child with a severe disability.

At a time when people are genuinely in need, when their energy rightly needs to be focused elsewhere on coping with diagnosis, treatment and recovery, and when additional stress should be avoided, the financial pressure of dramatically increased outgoings to cover expenses, such as travel to hospital and so on, could push them into poverty if that issue is not adequately addressed. I urge the Government to look again at that unintended consequence of reform, and to take action to ensure that the personal independence payment is available to support people at a time of genuine need.

I welcome the Secretary of State’s assurance on employment and support allowance for those taking oral chemotherapy. I trust, however, that he will also consider those who receive radiotherapy, which, although not as debilitating as chemotherapy, can nevertheless be exhausting and preclude people from holding down work.

Another concern that I want to touch on briefly is the abolition of some discretionary aspects of the social fund. Often, families who are trying to make ends meet on a day-to-day basis find themselves pushed into financial stress or even crisis by significant, unexpected and unavoidable expenditure. The replacement of a heating boiler, a cooker or a fridge, or the need to purchase a school uniform, for example, will often leave low-income families in a situation where only those discretionary elements of the social fund, such as interest-free crisis loans, stand between them and being forced to engage with alternative high-interest and often unscrupulous money lenders. There is an ongoing consultation on that and I urge Ministers to await its conclusion before proceeding to legislate to remove those discretionary elements.

In conclusion, and as I said at the outset, these are far-reaching reforms with far-reaching consequences. The Bill is arguably the biggest change to the welfare state since its inception, and it warrants careful and detailed parliamentary scrutiny. Despite that imperative, much of what is intended remains poorly defined and will be ultimately defined not in this Bill or in any subordinate legislation, but in regulations that the Minister will lay, which in turn will reduce the parliamentary scrutiny of their effects. That extensive reliance on unpublished regulations will make it incredibly difficult for people to make a detailed assessment of the cumulative impact of these broad and sweeping changes. The Secretary of State was clearly frustrated, too, because he felt that at times people had misunderstood the thrust of his proposals. Were there more substance to the Bill, that would be less likely.

Furthermore, the inclusion of clauses relating to child maintenance, when that matter is still the subject of public consultation, and the as yet undefined provisions on child care costs, creates uncertainty in an area—the employability of lone parents and second earners in households—that strikes at the very heart of the Government’s objective to make work pay.

One of the most remarkable yet disappointing things that struck me on reading through the briefings that Members received in the run-up to the debate is that, almost without exception, those organisations that actively support and lobby in this area support the principle of the Bill. Disappointingly, however, we have not had the detail that would give people the confidence to commit to the Bill itself.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (LD)]

Given the breadth of the Bill, I intend to focus on the work aspects.

The right hon. Member for Croydon North (Malcolm Wicks) is no longer in the Chamber, but I trust that he will not mind if I, too, quote Beveridge, who famously said:

“Want is one only of five giants on the road of reconstruction; the others are Disease, Ignorance, Squalor, and Idleness.”

As we all know, those words were written at a time of real poverty for many people in the United Kingdom. How do they apply today, in the 21st century? Indeed, do they apply today? My supposition is that they do. Today, 10.4 million people of working age in the United Kingdom are not working, 5.9 million are claiming out-of-work benefits, and more than 2 million children live in households in which no one is working. It was the great Nye Bevan who said:

“There is no test for progress other than its impact on the individual.”

Yet, today 3.9 million children still live below the poverty line. Some progress! Surely it is time to do something different.

I support the Bill’s Second Reading because I believe that, in the main, it approaches this intransigent issue intelligently and constructively. The nation has got stuck, and it has got stuck because of the system. I do not think that anyone in the Government is particularly at fault, because the problem has built up over the past 40 years. A key part of breaking the system, which I believe the Bill is doing, is making work pay—a concept that the Secretary of State has championed for some time—and that means changing the tax and benefit system.

I will not go into all the details, because I am sure that everyone in the Chamber is well aware of them, but, as some Members have already pointed out, more often than not there is no point in people coming off benefit and going into work because they will be worse off as a result. A constituent of mine, a single mum with three kids who is on housing benefit and the rest, has not worked for 15 years. The rational option for her is to stay on benefit, and if I were her that is what I would do. It would be insane for her to come off benefit: she would probably lose out under the system that we have had for years, and what would happen if she lost her job in a few months’ time? The system is insane, and the Bill attempts to transform it.

[Naomi Long]

Another potential benefit of removing the limit on the number of hours that can be worked by claimants—currently about 16—is that employers would be more likely to take on people part-time, such as lone parents, because they would have more flexibility.

[Stephen Lloyd]

I agree with every word that the hon. Lady said.

How are we to help people back into work when they have been receiving incapacity benefit, jobseeker’s allowance or a similar benefit? As I said when I intervened on the right hon. Member for Croydon North, the Bill will provide much more money for training providers to give them an incentive to focus on people who have been on benefit for a long time, and make it worth their while to spend extra time and resources helping those people back into work. The right hon. Gentleman said that the Bill copies measures taken by the previous Government in that regard. That is true to an extent, but it does a great deal more than that.

In the past 24 hours, I have been in touch with the National Audit Office, according to which the average payment from the DWP to training providers for pathways to work was £1,003 per job. Under the current proposals, providers will be paid a minimum of £3,800 and a maximum of £13,700. What lies behind the Bill is our recognition of the fact that people have been “parked” for years, which is outrageous. Whichever side of the Chamber we are on, we know that if the many people who have been out of work for a long time are to be helped, they will need that extra effort, extra mentoring and extra time. The only way in which we shall persuade training providers to do that is by stuffing their mouths with gold, as Bevan said in the ’50s in respect of the British Medical Association. The Bill attempts to achieve that by making training providers feel it is worth their while expending the extra effort to get people back into work, which is tremendous.

The previous Government introduced the black box concept, and I am glad that we are building on that to start using subcontractors’ imaginative ideas. That is all good and very rational, and it is a simple solution, too. Members on both sides of the House know that, where possible, work is the best route out of poverty.

There are downsides, however. The economy is challenged—that is the best word I can use. I spoke to a senior disability spokesperson the day before yesterday. I said, “Well, it’s obviously very hard for us to get all these extra people into jobs when we’re faced with such a difficult economic situation.” She replied, “Stephen, you’re absolutely right, but at least if we start doing the spadework now it is just possible that when the economy turns in a couple of years the foundations will have been laid and a lot of people who might have seen themselves as never working again could, through the mentoring, be in a position to be able to be swept along with the upswing in the economy.” I certainly hope so, because it is very difficult to achieve such radical reforms now when we face an economic crisis.

I want to give a message to the Minister, and I am sorry that all his colleagues are not present, as this applies to the entire ministerial team. The Bill is tremendous; it is a glass-half-full Bill and it recognises that we have to spend money, which is why I appreciate the Secretary of State getting the £2.5 billion from the Treasury. We have to pour money into this problem to transform the situation, but we must change the language if we are to get people who for years have been on IB or other benefits back into work.

The Bill is clearly designed to do that, which is why it approaches the issue in such a constructive way. I was in Burnley with the Work and Pensions Committee a couple of days ago. A training provider who is very successful in getting people into work said, “If there’s one message to give to the Government it is this: respect. Use the right words, and treat people who have been on IB and on benefits for a long time with respect.” I therefore say that we must use the right words.

The Bill is fit for purpose. I think it will transform the situation, and I will support it on Second Reading.

Social Security

Naomi Long Excerpts

Thursday 17th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

I begin by welcoming the Government’s change of mind on housing benefits. If that had not happened, there would have been a disastrous effect on constituencies such as mine which have high unemployment rates and slim prospects of people finding a job within a year. There will be a general welcome for that. I wanted to say that because I have campaigned about it in the past, as have many of my constituents.

I should like briefly to refer to correspondence from pensioner constituents who are concerned about the change from RPI to CPI. At the very least, there is a problem of perception. People see that RPI for the third quarter of 2010 was 4.6%, whereas CPI was 3.1%. They see that the current rate of inflation under RPI is 5.1% and that it is 4% under CPI. Clearly, people are worried. People have made long-term financial decisions on expectations that might not be realised. I raised the triple lock in an intervention and I do not want to discuss it in detail, but I worry about its longevity because of concerns that have been expressed many times in the past.

I have received correspondence about CPI and RPI from the Public and Commercial Services Union, the Civil Service Pensioners Alliance, Age UK and my constituents. My attention has been drawn to some statistics and I would like to read them into the record. The PCS states that using the base of 1988, had CPI been used to uprate a £10,000 pension, its value now would be £18,035, compared with £20,935 under RPI—a difference of 16%. A pensioner on the median public sector pension of £5,500 who has been retired for 20 years would now be on £4,845—a loss of 12% or £655. It is those sorts of figures that worry people.

Obviously, CPI has been higher than RPI in some years—1991, 1993, 1996, 1999 and 2008—but the Treasury itself reckons that over the next five years, RPI will consistently be higher than CPI. Perhaps that is because of the predicted steeper rises in housing costs. I refer the House to table C2 in the Budget Red Book, which puts the overall change to 2016 of CPI at 13.7% and of RPI at 22.1%. That is a substantial difference. Of course, a gloss has been put on, but I will not go into that at the moment.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

One argument for the change to CPI is that many of those in receipt of a pension are insulated from fluctuations in housing costs because they are not paying a mortgage. However, does the hon. Gentleman agree that they often have other private housing costs that are not reflected in CPI, such as insurance costs and the depreciation of their properties?

[Hywel Williams]

That is a valid point. Of course, the variation across the country is quite substantial. I refer again to my own constituency, where there has traditionally always been a very high level of owner-occupation. There are older people who own their houses, but in other areas people are still paying off their mortgages. The figure of 7% has been mentioned—that is a lot of people who will be hit.

Jobs and the Unemployed

Naomi Long Excerpts

Wednesday 7th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

I can say very clearly to the right hon. Gentleman that my view was always that it would be unacceptable to increase benefits in line with CPI. I wish to make that very clear, and I am sure that papers will testify to that effect. It will be unfair on people such as those who are severely disabled or on the lowest incomes, who will see the real value of their support cut by hundreds of pounds over the next few years. For the Minister to try to defend the Budget as “progressive” when it will hit people who are severely disabled and cannot work, people who are on carer’s allowance and some of the most vulnerable people in the country who may be struggling to support their families, is a distortion of the meaning of the word.

Welfare to work does not work anywhere in the country if there is no work for people to go to. That is the real tragedy of this new Government. At a time when growth is fragile and too many people are out of work, they have introduced a Budget that cuts growth and jobs. It is shocking.

Even on the assumptions of the Government’s own appointees in the Office for Budget Responsibility, this emergency Budget means that there will be more than 100,000 fewer jobs in the economy, and not just this year. There will be fewer jobs every year for the lifetime of the Parliament as a result of the Budget. The Budget cuts consumption, through the VAT hike and benefit cuts; it cuts Government spending; and it hits private and public sector jobs. The Budget will also push up the bills of unemployment. Even on the optimistic assumptions of the Office for Budget Responsibility, the taxpayer will fork out around £2 billion on unemployment over the course of this Parliament as a result of the Budget. That is £2 billion that we could have spent on the future jobs funds, school buildings or other support to help people into work.

[Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)]

Does the right hon. Lady agree that that is merely the thin end of the wedge? Many of the young people who find themselves unemployed and many of the communities where unemployment is ingrained are also more reliant on other benefits and public services such as health. The mental health and well-being implications for those communities are enormous, but they have not been factored into those calculations.

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Lady is right. We are having this discussion in the light of the Budget measures and the initial cuts in support for jobs, but we know that there are spending cuts to come as part of the spending review, to which the Government have added £17 billion to the amount to be cut from Departments. The consequence is that the Government’s policies will keep more people on the dole, not fewer, and more people out of work, not fewer. That is what the Budget does, and that is on an optimistic reading, because we know that the Treasury’s real assessment is worse.

The only reason why the Government think that employment will be growing at all is that they are counting on around 2.5 million net jobs being created in the private sector over the next five years. However, that is something that John Philpott of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and other respected economists have said is simply unrealistic. The Government are living in cloud cuckoo land. In fact, the Financial Times survey of major private sector employers found that none was planning to increase recruitment on a large scale just because the public sector was cutting back. Arriva said:

“We are not planning a recruitment drive any time soon. Everybody is watching their costs at the moment.”

Today’s KPMG survey found that the number of new recruits is at a seven-month low, just at a time when it should be increasing. Business confidence has been hit by the Budget and the austerity approach that the Government have been pursuing.

The Government have abolished the regional development agencies, which were supporting jobs in the regions, and cut Building Schools for the Future and other capital projects that were supporting construction jobs. The Government are hitting jobs in the public sector and the private sector, all at a time when the economy is still weak. They say that this is unavoidable, but that is simply untrue. They do not need to cut £40 billion extra from the economy; they have chosen to do so, even though that will cut jobs and hurt the unemployed. The Government do not need to cut the help for the unemployed that is getting them into jobs; they have chosen to do so, even though it will increase long-term unemployment. They do not need to push up the costs of unemployment; they have chosen to do so, even though that will cost us more. They do not need to scar young people for years to come; they have chosen to do so, just as they did in the ’80s and ’90s.

Why are the Government doing that? It is because they say that they have to get the deficit down. Why are they introducing a savage Budget to cut the number of jobs in the economy? They say that that has to be done because of the scale on which they want to get the deficit down and the pace at which they want to do it. In the 1990s, the Conservatives said that unemployment was a price worth paying to get inflation down. Now they are saying that unemployment is a price worth paying to get the deficit down. However, unemployment is not a price worth paying; unemployment will stop the deficit coming down. This year’s school leavers will pay the price, our young people will pay the price, and we will all pay the price for many years to come. Unemployment is not a price worth paying. It is time that the Government ditched the failed ideology of the 1980s and the 1930s, and supported jobs for the future. That is what our party will do, and I commend the motion to the House.