Universal Credit Roll-out

Nick Thomas-Symonds Excerpts

Wednesday 18th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House calls on the Government to pause the roll-out of Universal Credit full service.

I am delighted that we have secured this vital debate on universal credit, given the concerns across the country and among Members on both sides of the House. I am aware that some 90 people have put in to speak, so I will take only a few interventions from both sides of the House. I will try to get through my key points as quickly as I can.

Our motion calls on the Government to pause the roll-out of universal credit while the issues associated with this key social security programme are fixed. I genuinely offer to work with the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to fix the many and varied issues associated with universal credit. To understand what needs fixing, we need to understand how we got here. When universal credit was first introduced in 2012, it had the underpinning principles that it would simplify the social security system, bringing together six payments for working-age people in and out of work, and that it would make work pay.

[Nick Thomas-Symonds (Torfaen) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend talks about the underpinning principles. Surely, one of those should be that our social security system should not drive people into debt, yet that is precisely what is happening to my constituents who are waiting months for payments.

[Debbie Abrahams]

Absolutely, and I will go on to make those points in a moment.

Getting back to the principles, we supported those then and we support them now. The Government wanted to pilot the implementation of UC, so they introduced a number of pathfinder areas, including my Oldham constituency, and planned a phased roll-out between 2013 and 2017.