(13 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberMay I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his statement? My constituents in Kettering will be right behind him. Often the difference between making more money in work and lounging around on benefits at home is the travel costs to and from work. How will they be taken into account in the calculations?
My hon. Friend is right about travel costs. The key point is that if someone going to work retains significantly more money, their travel-to-work costs become much more affordable. Therefore they are able, as other people in work do, to make decisions about travelling to a job over a slightly longer distance. That will be wholly beneficial to those who are out of work.
(13 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberThe hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point. The only answer I can give is that during the past 10 years we have had between 4 million and 5 million people permanently parked on some form of out-of-work benefit. The reality is that it became easier and cheaper for most employers to employ people who were not on benefits than to go to the pool of people who were on benefits. I hope that our reforms will make work pay for those who are on benefits and thus release that pool of talent, so that demand can be met from here in the UK, and that only those who are really skilled and necessary will have to come from overseas.
My constituents will be horrified to hear from the Secretary of State that Britain has the highest rate of jobless households in Europe. Which country in Europe has the lowest rate, and what is it doing that we are not?
Perhaps I should not say this, but I think that it is Holland—I read that in a note. Some 20% of all households in this country have nobody in work, which is a staggeringly high number. We also have the highest number of children born to workless households. By and large, every other country is Europe is doing it better than we do—and that is the shame of the previous Government.