Romanians and Bulgarians (Benefits)

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I agree with my hon. Friend that it is invidious that areas that I have always believed were outwith the Commission’s normal competences are being sucked in by using other things—this is to do with the free movement. More could have been done and the issue should have been raised at a much higher level. It is quite good that other nations—mostly northern European nations, but also Spain—are now deeply concerned about the ratchet process. We are meeting them and there are the beginnings of a real resistance to it.

On what will happen in any negotiation, I am clearly not in a position to commit my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on whatever may happen in future.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

I welcome the fact that the Government are now tackling the legacy they were left, as far as benefits for foreigners are concerned, but does the Minister not see the contradiction in the Government’s stance at present? We are talking tough at home while—according to Romanian Ministers—giving assurances that those who come from Romania will be given full access to benefits, on the same basis as UK citizens. Does he not see that as an incentive for Romanians to come here and dip into the financial honeypot that they see?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

That is exactly what I am trying to deal with, but not just for Romanians. This goes across the board for what anybody in the European economic area can do when they come here. The problem has been in existence for some time, as the right hon. Member for Birkenhead said. I now have to sweep up after the lord mayor’s show and deal with what has been left behind, after the last Government did nothing at all about the problem. I will do it; I am absolutely determined to.

Welfare Reform Bill

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Wednesday 1st February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Timms]

The Minister has told us that someone who receives an inheritance should lose all their support from the state. Those could be similar circumstances to those that the hon. Lady has just mentioned.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the answer that the Minister has just given is quite astounding? He seemed to suggest that, in order to qualify for independent benefit, a disabled young person would have to leave the family home, where they have the support and facilities that they need, despite all the additional costs that that would entail. That would end up being even more costly.

[Stephen Timms]

To be fair to the Ministers, I think that there is some confusion on the Front Bench over the position on this. The Minister was asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South, who chairs the Select Committee, to give the House a straightforward assurance. He failed to do so—

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[Dame Anne Begg]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. It is not a lifestyle choice to be diagnosed with a progressive, debilitating condition. It is hard. It is difficult. Individuals in that position face enough prejudice in society already, probably from the employers who told them that they could no longer do their jobs. That is why they need to apply for and claim benefit: because they have already faced that prejudice, which the Government may be making even worse. It is hard for those people, and we are making it harder.

[Sammy Wilson]

To a certain extent I agree with what the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) said about lifestyle choices, but surely, in this instance, people who have decided to save, make provision and do the right thing are being penalised for making a lifestyle choice. It is the kind of lifestyle choice of which I imagine the hon. Gentleman would approve, but the measures that we are discussing will punish people for making what he and many other Members would presumably describe as a good lifestyle choice.

[Dame Anne Begg]

Indeed. As I said earlier, the people who will be punished most are those who have done the right thing. They are the ones who have been in work, the ones who have saved, and the ones who have partners who have been in work and remain in work. It would be much easier for their partners to drop out of work as well, because they and their partners would then, as a household, qualify for the benefit. That would probably be the wrong thing to do from the point of view of the family, but given such a benefits system—I was going to say “a benefits system that would make them better off”, but it might not do that—it will become a logical choice for a working partner in those circumstances to give up work. Although it would probably be wrong, it would be logical.

Living Standards

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Wednesday 30th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

That underlines an extremely important point, and I hope that in the Secretary of State’s response he will say a little more about how he reconciles the “Budget” that we heard yesterday with his own honourable intention to ensure that work pays. Right now, in my constituency, I have working parents, especially women, coming to me and saying that they are now giving up work—because the Government are cutting benefits, meaning that it is no longer economic to work. Surely that cannot be right.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

Does the shadow Minister not find it strange that the Government argue that if we were to borrow to stimulate the economy the money markets would go mad and put up interest rates, yet the markets seem to have no problem in lending us money to pay for unemployment?

[Mr Byrne]

And this is a Government, of course, who have brought forward plans to borrow another £158 billion —a bill that, ultimately, will be paid by the rest of us. It is a bill for economic failure.

Pensions Bill [Lords]

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Tuesday 18th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Malcolm Wicks]

That is an extraordinary variation, and one of the implications is that in order to make good policy and ensure good practice in pensions and other areas, we in this Parliament—including those on the Government Benches—need to have some understanding of how people work, and not just think of our own circumstances.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

The right hon. Gentleman is making a powerful point given the current economic circumstances, but we do not know what the employment circumstances will be in 2016 or 2020. Does he agree that the more essential point is that because people see investing in their pensions as a long-term decision, it is the short-term way in which these changes are being introduced that is creating all the unfairness? People had certain expectations and had made contributions, but the benefit from those contributions is now being denied them.

[Malcolm Wicks]

Yes, hence my introduction, when I argued that pensions policy in this country has always been at its best when it goes with the grain of how people live and makes long-term decisions that individuals can plan around. It is the acceleration of the process that we are now discussing. It is extraordinary that, having taken so much money out of the pensions system, the Conservatives—and, I suppose I have to say, the Liberals—now want credit for putting some of it back. That is a bit of Tory arithmetic that I am not terribly impressed by.

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I also welcome other aspects of today’s announcements, particularly the move to simplify the single-tier pension system, which will significantly benefit women who have had to take time out of the labour market because of their caring responsibilities, as many hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg), have pointed out. I should be grateful if the Pensions Minister could also say something about that.

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Gentleman has rightly said that the Government have listened to the case that has been made, that they have made additional money available and that they will give people some notice of the changes in the pension age. Does he accept, however, that for many people who are carers, for example, or who are in part-time work or in and out of work for other reasons, the time horizon that is now being made available to them will not give them much chance to plan for their retirement?

[Richard Graham]

In a perfect world, everyone would have liked the changes to have gone further, but I believe that capping the additional waiting period at 18 months represents a significant step forward in providing time for preparation. We are not, alas, living in a perfect world—

Housing Benefit

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Tuesday 9th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I want to make some constructive comments, and I hope that the Minister will take on board some of the issues I raise. I will ask some questions from a Northern Ireland perspective, because the housing benefit changes will affect us as well—we cannot divorce ourselves or walk away from them.

I should set the scene, because Northern Ireland has some very particular circumstances: the Department for Social Development has responsibility for social security benefits, and the Department for Employment and Learning has responsibility for training and employment programmes, in contrast with the rest of the United Kingdom and the Department for Work and Pensions. DEL has significant differences with its steps to work programme, as against the job guarantee fund here. There are issues to be clarified, therefore, and I want to ensure that the changes in benefits will not impact adversely on the people of Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland has had the local housing allowance since 2008, but it has not been formally assessed. I had hoped that it would be, because it would have given us an idea of how successful it has been. I am concerned, however, that the proposed changes to the allowance lack a firm evidential base. Will the Minister comment on that? I think that the proposals will adversely affect recipients in Northern Ireland.

I am gravely concerned about the Budget plans to reduce the initial award of the benefit by 10% in April 2013 to those claimants who have been receiving jobseeker’s allowance for longer than 12 months. I make that comment because the unemployment rate in Northern Ireland between April and June was 6.6%. Worse still, the working-age employment rate remained well below the UK average, and was the lowest of all the 12 UK regions. The changes put forward tonight will adversely affect the people of Northern Ireland because of our position in relation to benefits.

I have concerns about the introduction of a measure that utilises sanctions that are neither helpful nor beneficial. The proposal appears to be based on the assumption that a reduction in housing benefit will motivate working-age claimants to find work, but it is clear that even if every working-age claimant was so motivated, there would still be significant numbers of long-term unemployed people in Northern Ireland beyond 2013. Perhaps the Minister will comment on that. We have to find a balance. How do we distinguish between those who are genuinely seeking employment and those who perhaps are not?

I mentioned earlier that the focus of housing benefit has to be on providing low-income families with access to good-quality housing. The housing benefit cap rates may have a knock-on effect on the social housing sector, as private rented accommodation becomes harder to access for those on low incomes and the demand for social housing increases. A great many people are in a Catch-22 situation: they do not have enough money to rent a house privately, yet there is not enough social housing for them.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, but does he accept that in the absence of cap rates—or, sometimes, where the rates are fairly generous—private sector rents become inflated? Landlords simply look at what the rate is, and if it goes up they put their rents up. It is almost like a perpetual cycle: the rates go up, so rents go up, and then the rates are pushed up again, and the only people who gain are the landlords.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank my hon. Friend for his information, which is helpful in focusing attention on what we are trying to aim for.

Members have mentioned fuel poverty. One of the spin-offs of losing housing benefit will be fuel poverty. In my former position, I sat as a Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly. One of the inquiries that we undertook was on child poverty. Fuel poverty and housing benefit both came up in that inquiry into child poverty, but all those things were part of the jigsaw of how people survive. Take away one part of it and we have a problem. I have some concern about that.

One Member mentioned the discretionary housing payment, and I would certainly be keen to find out from the Minister what he intends to do if the pool of funding that is set aside runs out. He said that it was impossible to separate housing benefit from housing and social development policy in general, and there are some examples of that in Northern Ireland where housing has been designed to bring mixed communities together, such as in Loughbrickland in County Down and Ballynafeigh in south Belfast, which are also examples of how we have moved forward. I would like to express some concern over the removal of housing benefit from people where it will drive them towards poorer areas. For some people who are already in poorer areas, they will not move beyond them, and I have concerns about that.

I am conscious of the time, but another concern of mine relates to applications by carers for disabled people—I do not think that the issue has been mentioned fully yet, although some Members may have partially touched on it. A carer for a disabled person might want to apply, but the only person who can do so is the claimant’s spouse or partner. Would it not be more beneficial to ensure that the rest of the family members, who are perhaps those who are more affected, may also apply? I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response to that. I also believe that some consideration needs to be given to single parents who have shared custody of children. I am not sure whether that issue has been addressed, so I would ask the Minister to look at that, too. Where custody is established, benefit entitlements should be granted to the parent to support the family unit. I do not believe that the proposals do that. Again, I ask the Minister to consider that point.

Other Members have touched on the issue of large families. It would not apply so much in the area that I represent, but I believe that it none the less applies right across the United Kingdom. Has particular consideration been given to ethnic families in other parts of the United Kingdom, where larger, multi-generational households are perhaps more common? I ask the Minister to consider that as well. There should be more innovative and positive incentives, which are far more preferable in making housing benefit entitlement reflect family size in the social rented sector from 2013. The Government position is bereft of detail, and I ask the Minister to consider my points.