Universal Credit: Managed Migration

Stephen Doughty Excerpts
Tuesday 8th January 2019

(5 years, 10 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Lord Sharma Portrait Alok Sharma
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Different countries will have different welfare arrangements. It is important for us to have a welfare system that not only provides support but is sustainable and ultimately helps people into work. That the employment rate now is at a joint record high is testament to the work the Government have done, including on welfare reform.

Stephen Doughty Portrait Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
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The problem is that the individual cases keep coming and coming because of the Government’s failures on universal credit. A constituent contacted me because of an issue about early payment from her employer before Christmas. She was forced to go to a food bank—over Christmas! Surely, the Minister does not think that that situation is acceptable.

Lord Sharma Portrait Alok Sharma
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As I have said, we want to get this right for everyone, and where there are individual cases, of course we will take them up, but the hon. Gentleman seems to imply that, under the legacy benefits system, the world was entirely rosy. He and I know, as Members of Parliament, that the legacy benefits system is inferior to universal credit.