Youth Unemployment
Nigel Evans Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I now have to announce the results of Divisions deferred from a previous day. On the Question relating to immigration, the Ayes were 474 and the Noes were 23, so the Ayes have it.
On the Question relating to the terrorist finance tracking programme, the Ayes were 484 and the Noes were 5, so the Ayes have it.
[The Division lists are published at the end of today’s debates.]
Welfare Reform
Nigel Evans Excerpts(14 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Duncan Smith
I believe that the programme that we have set out and the timings that we have set for it—it starts next year in the summer—will help all those who need support to get back into work. We can debate or argue about the gap, but my general view is that as employment rises and as we start that process, we will see more people going back to work, and we will be able to support them in a better way than through the previous programmes, which we believe actually cost more money than they returned.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Before we move on to the next statement, it might be convenient to remind the House that only those who are here for the statement can ask questions about it, and, just as before, I ask for single questions and pithy answers please.
Housing Benefit
Nigel Evans Excerpts(14 years, 1 month ago)
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Glenda Jackson
I am intrigued to know how the hon. Gentleman thinks it will benefit low-paid hard-working families who are not claiming housing benefit if we make low-paid hard-working families who are on housing benefit both unemployed and homeless. They will then have to move from where they are currently living—and, I hasten to add, where they provide services that the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends would never dream of providing for themselves. We are all dependent on those services, and on the people who provide them. I know the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues do not like it, but when that happens in the centre of London we are going to see—
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
Will the hon. Gentleman comment on my local authority, West Lancashire borough council? It wanted to build a new civic centre, and in so doing said that it would build affordable houses and in the process knock down four good homes. While he is speaking about that—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. I call Bob Blackman, who has four seconds left.
Yasmin Qureshi
I promise to allow the hon. Gentleman to intervene in a moment.
On average, the impact of the local housing allowance on my constituency of Bolton South East will be £52 per month for a two-bedroom flat, with an average loss of £39 on properties that have more than two bedrooms. That may not seem like a vast amount of money to some hon. Members here—
Jobs and the Unemployed
Nigel Evans Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Nadhim Zahawi
I have to come back on that point. Your policies have mortgaged and remortgaged the future of those young children, so for you to stand up and say that without borrowing you cannot sustain the recovery is inaccurate. You have to admit that borrowing £500 million a day—not a week or a month—is unsustainable.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. May I remind Members to use the third person? When Members refer to “you”, it means me. I have just been accused of a few things that I do not own up to.
Yvette Cooper
The hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi) should learn a few lessons from economic history. He should look at what happened not just in the 1980s, when there was not the same scale of world recession, but in the 1930s and at the orthodox views being put forward then by Bank of England Governors and senior politicians and the devastating consequences that they had. Keynes was led to write his general theory because of the deeply destructive approach that so many people in senior positions took and the consequences that devastated the lives of millions of people who were pushed into unemployment and poverty. Businesses were destroyed for many years as a result of that approach—the approach that the Conservatives seem to want to go back to.
I agree that borrowing needs to come down, and of course we need to ensure that the deficit comes down in a steady and sensible way as the economy recovers. However, by cutting an extra £40 billion for ideological reasons in a way that will hit jobs and the economy, the Conservatives are turning their back on the unemployed. Ministers need to tell us what they will do to help young people this summer. What are they going to do to reassure parents that their sons and daughters will not be stuck on the dole for more than a year? All that they promise is a Work programme sometime in the future, with incentives for private sector companies to help people find work but no guarantees to young people or anyone else that they will actually get work. There are no jobs for them to go to.
Ministers also want people to move house to help the labour market, but it is not clear where they want them to move to. The Secretary of State has said that he wants the unemployed to move to more affluent areas where there are more jobs. In fact, if they do not and they are out of work for a year, their housing benefit will be cut. At the same time, the Government are telling working people on housing benefit in affluent areas that they have to move to cheaper areas because their rents are too high. If they do not, their housing benefit will be cut, too. The Secretary of State is telling my constituents that if they do not move south to get a job he will cut their benefit, and his own constituents that if they do not move north to get a cheaper home he will cut their benefit too. Presumably they can wave at each other as they pass somewhere along the A1.
The Secretary of State wants people to give up cheaper housing to find work, but he also wants people to give up work to find cheaper housing. He is telling people to get on their bikes, but with no clue about where they are supposed to go. That is the same Secretary of State who said last year that he wanted to maintain community ties. He said:
“It is getting more and more difficult for parents in some poorer backgrounds…that extended family link is often severed by the fact that they can’t get living near their parents.”
Yet those are the very same community ties that the Government’s policies on employment and housing would rip up right now. They are cutting help for people to get jobs and cutting their benefits too.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. This is an important Opposition debate, and I want to give some gentle guidance. Hon. Members will be horrified to learn that we cannot go on until half-past 2 in the morning today, and that we intend to call the winding-up speeches at about half-past 6. If everyone wants to get in, and if people speak for wildly longer than 12 minutes, not everybody will be satisfied.
Also, I love interventions, which I think help the debate, but if they become mini speeches fewer people will get in. So, if we show some restraint, that will be very welcome to the entire House.
Nadhim Zahawi
And your point is? At the end of the day, you only have to look at the facts. The facts are that you have left us with a legacy of £500 million a day—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. I did not leave anybody with a legacy of anything.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. There are still several Members who wish to catch my eye. The Front-Bench speakers will be called at half-past 6, so the House will see that we have only 40 minutes or so. I hope, therefore, that hon. Members will show restraint and try not to go over six minutes, although the one maiden speech that is to be made may be slightly longer.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. Five Members are trying to get in; if they restrict themselves to five minutes, everybody will do so.
Capital Gains Tax (Rates)
Nigel Evans Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. Considerable numbers of Members wish to take part in this debate, as I am sure you can all see. Therefore, the Speaker has imposed a limit of seven minutes during the debate.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. We are expecting a few maiden speeches this evening, and I am sure the House will want to ensure that it complies with the associated conventions.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. This might be an appropriate time to remind Members that, when they use the word “you”, they are addressing me, and I have been accused of many things for which I was not responsible. I call Helen Grant.