Welfare Reform and Work Bill (Second sitting)

Neil Coyle Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2015 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Order. I have four people on my list. There will be time.

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

That is not what the evidence says at all.

[The Chair]

Order. This is not a discussion; this is evidence taking. We will now call Paul Scully, followed by Hannah Bardell—you have let me down slightly there, Hannah, if I may say so. Then we will move to Peter Heaton-Jones and Corri Wilson. Neil, you can come in after that.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Any takers?

Tony Wilson: There is a good argument to exempt them. The groups we most focus on exempting from the cap would be those that are least likely to be able to respond by moving into work or moving home. In particular, those are parents with very young children. We would not expect parents with a child aged one or nought to be moving into work or moving home in response to the cap. Therefore, their only option is to see their income reduced. Focusing exemptions on those groups where a labour market or housing response is not possible or feasible is critically important. Some of those may be widows and carers, yes.

[Neil Coyle]

Q 58 Apologies for my lateness. I was unfortunately unable to change another meeting, because we only got these days late. In response to a previous question from Hannah Bardell, Charlotte, you mentioned that there was evidence that any job was better than no job, with specific reference to someone who was given only one or two hours per week. What evidence is there specifically about those on zero-hours contracts and those who are unable to work more than a few hours a week or who are given few hours a week—specific evidence?

Charlotte Pickles: As you said, you came in a bit late, so you may have missed the start of that conversation. The discussion was about the type of—

[Neil Coyle]

I am referring to the specific question, in answer to which you said there was evidence.

Charlotte Pickles: May I finish? [Interruption.]

[The Chair]

Order. Let Charlotte finish, please.

Charlotte Pickles: The discussion—this is why I wanted to contribute to that particular question—was about Octavia saying that we need to make sure that lone parents are moving into quality jobs. I was saying that, yes, we want to make sure they progress, and there is definitely a training and skills issue. It is about making sure that we are supportive and making sure that there is enough funding to do that. My point was that there is evidence that moving into a job is good for your wellbeing, above not moving into a job. I also said, which again you may have missed, that it is important to help those people to progress upwards once they have moved into a job. That could be about working with employers and skills. It could be all sorts of things.

[Neil Coyle]

Q 59 With specific reference to the question, is there no evidence to suggest that someone working just a few hours would benefit?

Charlotte Pickles: I have no comments on zero-hours contracts, if that is what you are asking me.

Octavia Holland: I think that what Charlotte is saying is perhaps not as applicable to single parents as it might be to some other groups, because single parents are much more likely to get stuck in low-paid work with no prospects. I am not aware of any evidence that shows that it is beneficial for a single parent family for that single parent to be in a low-paid, unskilled job with no prospects, leaving their child in informal childcare and still struggling to make ends meet. I am not aware of any evidence that demonstrates that that is beneficial.

Kirsty McHugh: I am not going to comment on zero-hours contracts specifically. However, there is evidence that you are more likely to get a better job—a better-paid job—if you are in work or have been in work. That does not necessarily even mean paid work. The work placements are really important. Work experience gives you far more in relation to that, and entry-level jobs are important because then you are more likely to progress up the ladder.

Octavia Holland: But much less likely if you are a single parent.

Charlotte Pickles: I entirely agree with the point about being stuck in low-paid work, to quote Octavia. Clearly that is not what we want for anyone, and we need to look at it. At the moment there is lots of discussion on whether the new version of the Work programme might incentivise progression. There is all sorts of work being done by various charitable organisations on how you incentivise progression. I absolutely agree that we need to do that.

There is very strong evidence—if you look, for example, at the Burton and Waddell work or at lots of work internationally—that work is good for people’s health and wellbeing. There is also a lot of evidence that it is good for children. Children in workless households do worse than children in households where somebody is in work, so it is actually not just about the adult’s outcomes but about the child’s outcomes. I disagree that it is better for a lone parent not to be in work and to be waiting for a high-quality job than moving into work and hopefully progressing towards a high-quality job.

[Neil Coyle]

Q 60 Has Reform done any specific research on the knock-on costs or on this specific issue of those on very limited hours of low-paid work?

Charlotte Pickles: We have not done anything on zero-hours contracts.

[The Chair]

Colleagues, we are approaching the end of our time for this session, and you have all been fairly well behaved. Are there any final questions?

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[Helen Whately]

Q 72 We have been talking about the trade off in that these are successful programmes but they cost money. I am interested in your view. When you have a choice, do you keep paying somebody a slightly higher benefit or use some of that money instead to enable them to get closer to work, which is the situation we have here? Is it not better to support someone with that money, so that they can get into work? That is what most people with mental health problems who I know want. Is that not important?

Sophie Corlett: It is really important that it is both. What we know about mental health problems is that—perhaps obviously—stress and depression are very common, and increasing somebody’s anxiety, particularly around their financial sustainability, is not a great place to start. To go back to the point that I made before, if people are in the WRA group, they have been assigned to a group of those not yet fit to work, so work-related activity is to get them towards work and to support them towards work. However, that is not necessarily going to make them well. There is a health aspect to this, to which a financial incentive or a timetable is not conducive; it will take the time that it will take. Work-related activity might help, but it might be nothing to do with it, and to require people to live on less, because they might get a job at some future point, is inequitable.

[Neil Coyle]

Q 73 My questions follow Helen’s quite neatly and are primarily for Sophie, Gareth and Elliot. The Government have a commendable target to reduce the employment gap for disabled people. There are opportunities in the Work programme, where it is supposed to be changing to focus in on that. Some of that has been touched on. A bit more information and specific recommendations from you on disability employment advisers, apprenticeships and Access to Work would be useful. It should be noted that although Access to Work costs money up front, it saves money in the longer term, not just in reducing benefits, but in income tax and national insurance contributions.

Secondly, Laura, you mentioned the impact of changes on disabled people and how they had not been taken into full consideration previously. Can you say a bit more about what measurements and reporting you would like to see in the Bill, including knock-on costs if the Government are potentially getting things wrong, if you have recommendations now?

Thirdly, a wider question: disabled people are known to have higher costs of living and fewer opportunities and the Government have repeated the statement that disabled people have been protected from previous cuts. Would you like to see an exemption for disabled people from benefit and tax credit freezes in the Bill to ensure that that statement is accurate?

[The Chair]

You are asking Gareth and Elliot—is that right?

[Neil Coyle]

The first question is to Sophie, Gareth and Elliot, the second one is to Laura and, for the third, take your pick.

Sophie Corlett: I do not remember the first question because you went through them so quickly. I would be grateful if you would repeat the first question.

Elliot Dunster: I think I remember, so I can start. I think the point you are making, Neil, is the importance of specialist employment support. I think it would be really helpful in the course of the Committee’s deliberations for the Minister to commit to a future specialist employment support service for disabled people.

The Work programme, while it has been effective for some groups, has not been effective for disabled people in the way that we would have liked to see. Work Choice has done some very good things in supporting disabled people into work and it has a much better success rate than the Work programme.

We would like to build on some of the good things that Work Choice does: for example, the ability for small, specialist organisations who know local employers and the barriers that disabled people face, to work with them individually to make some of those adjustments with employers that I think Sophie was talking about earlier. That has a much higher success rate, so let us build on some of the success of Work Choice. I think that we will need to change some of the nature of the contract so that small organisations can take them on. We would like a bit longer to work with disabled people, to get some of those outcomes that we all want to see. So we think there are some good things with Work Choice that we would like to see built on with a new specialist employment support programme going forward.

You asked a bit about apprenticeships. Absolutely, they have got to be part of the picture for getting disabled people back into work. We have to start as young as possible and make sure that disabled people have all those opportunities. That is something that the Government should look at.

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[The Chair]

I have Corri Wilson, Peter Heaton-Jones and Hannah Bardell. Ask your brief question now, Neil, then Corri can ask hers.

[Neil Coyle]

Q 74 I am intrigued by the point made by Laura and Matt: you are saying it is nonsensical to exclude disabled people from this, and “Make sure that the Prime Minister, when he next says disabled people are protected, is telling the truth.” Have you suggested, Laura—when you have heard Ministers say disabled people are protected—and have other charities you are aware of communicated that disabled people have been affected by previous changes, and that this Bill will also directly affect disabled people? Have you made that communication to DWP, so that Ministers and MPs know that disabled people are not protected under previous changes and will not be protected by this?

[The Chair]

Brief answers, please.

Laura Cockram: I believe so.

Sophie Corlett: Yes, I am sure,