Oral Answers to Questions

Stephen Timms Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Russell (Congleton) (Lab)]

3. What assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of the rate of statutory paternity pay on household financial resilience.

[The Minister for Social Security and Disability (Sir Stephen Timms)]

Parents should be able, without undue financial pressure, to spend time off work in their child’s vital early months. Our review of parental leave and pay, which is due to report early in the new year, is considering how working families can best be supported, including through statutory paternity pay.

[Sarah Russell]

My constituent got in touch with me after she had had an emergency caesarean section with twins. It was a traumatic experience. Her husband had to go back to work when she had been out of hospital for only a week. Does the Minister agree that this is not how we should be looking after parents in a civilised society, and that both the mother and the father in that situation would have been better served by longer periods of paid leave?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

I am concerned to hear about that experience. The Government recognise the vital role of fathers in supporting mothers and new-born children, particularly after difficult births, such as the one to which my hon. Friend has referred. Our parental leave and pay system is complicated. The review that is under way is looking at how paternity leave and pay and all the current entitlements are supporting working families. Across Government, families’ experiences, such as the one that she has brought to the House, are informing our future policy.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

Statutory paternity pay and paternity leave are important things for the Government to be looking at, and I support them in what they are seeking to achieve. In the investigation that the Minister is undertaking, will he look carefully at the status of those who are self-employed? One in four people in the workforce in Westmorland and Lonsdale works for themselves, including the 1,600 people who farm. It is so important that those families too are protected, is it not? How will the brief be extended to ensure that those who work for themselves, or indeed for small employers, are protected too?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, and I am pleased to be able to confirm to him that self-employed parents are explicitly covered in the terms of reference of the current review.

[John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)]

4. What estimate he has made of what the total welfare budget will be at the end of this Parliament.

[The Minister for Social Security and Disability (Sir Stephen Timms)]

In March, the Office for Budget Responsibility published its official forecast, predicting that at the end of the current Parliament, in 2029-30, UK welfare spending will be about £390 billion. The OBR will update that forecast in the Budget, which will take place on Wednesday fortnight.

[John Lamont]

The Minister has just confirmed that the benefits bill will continue to grow. He also seems to have confirmed the Prime Minister’s position that national security

“cannot come at the expense of social security.”—[Official Report, 9 September 2026; Vol. 790, c. 1036.]

Is that correct?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

The hon. Member will be relieved to know that spending on working-age adults’ and children’s welfare is forecast to be 4.9% of GDP at the end of the current Parliament, as it is now. Overall welfare spending is forecast to rise by less than half as much in this Parliament as in the last, by just over 0.3 percentage points by 2030-31 compared with 0.7 percentage points in the last Parliament. This Government are putting right the problems that they inherited.

[Deirdre Costigan (Ealing Southall) (Lab)]

According to a recent report from the Good Growth Foundation, 50% of disability claimants would swap up to £1,000 of benefits for help such as employment support, therapy and physical aids. Does the Minister agree that giving disabled people tailored support could both reduce the welfare bill and stop those who want to work being written off by the system?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

I do agree with my hon. Friend, and, as she has said, we inherited a system that wrote people off. We are pleased with the early results emerging from our Connect to Work programme, which is providing exactly that kind of tailored support for disabled people and others faced with complex barriers to work. We recently published the second set of quarterly outcome statistics, and the news is very encouraging.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Joe Robertson (Isle of Wight East) (Con)]

The number of children between the ages of six and 11 with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder has grown sixfold, which means that in the years ahead there will be a surge in the number of applications for personal independence payment as children become adults. Even the Secretary of State accepts that owing to the growing number of children receiving disability living allowance, most will be transferred to PIP. Does the Minister agree that it is time to end a cash payments benefit system for people with more minor conditions, and ensure that those with genuine needs receive the therapeutic support that will enable them to learn, work and contribute to the economy?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

The hon. Gentleman will have seen Professor Peter Fonagy’s recent report about the incidence of ADHD, autism and other conditions. He will also know that I am co-chairing a review of PIP which is looking into how we can ensure that the system meets the very real needs of many disabled people, and that the benefit is on a sustainable financial footing for the future. The report of my review will be published before the end of the year.

[Torcuil Crichton (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (Lab)]

5. What steps he is taking to support employment in rural areas.

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[Steve Darling (Torbay) (LD)]

Whether it is processing access to work claims or reassessing sickness benefits, the Department for Work and Pensions has a culture of dither and delay when processing such matters. Can the Secretary of State advise us when the Department will get a grip on this?

[The Minister for Social Security and Disability (Sir Stephen Timms)]

We are getting a grip. The hon. Gentleman will be pleased to know that we are recruiting 500 extra staff to process access to work applications. Those staff are being recruited and trained at the moment and as a result of that, we will eliminate the access to work backlog that we inherited from the previous Government by September next year.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

T5. I am delighted that North Kensington will soon be opening a youth hub to support young people back into work. One challenge that people tell me we have locally is hidden NEETs—those who might be enrolled in college and not attending, or not claiming universal credit—so can the Minister explain what expectation there will be for the youth hubs to reach this hard-to-reach cohort of young people?

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[Sir Stephen Timms]

I am happy to check that point with the team doing the work, and will drop the hon. Lady a line to confirm.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

T8. The Government’s recent investment in Connect to Work and the youth hub in Newport is welcome. Will the Minister assure my constituent, who raised with me the struggle her son, who is neurodiverse, has had in finding support into work, that these initiatives will be long-term, meaningful commitments?

[Aphra Brandreth (Chester South and Eddisbury) (Con)]

T6. I recently met Lesley and her adult daughter Alice, who has profound disabilities and requires two carers around the clock. Lesley loves caring for her daughter, but she is finding it increasingly difficult to recruit skilled carers, leaving her filling exhausting gaps and unable to earn a living. What is the Minister doing to ensure that families like Lesley’s receive the support that they desperately need?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

We owe an enormous debt to carers right across the country who carry the kind of burden that the hon. Lady describes. We are doing some important work at the moment on carer’s allowance, which is the benefit that provides support in these circumstances, and have consulted on some ideas for change. We particularly want to make it easier for people to combine work and caring. That may well help in the situation the hon. Lady describes.

[Tom Rutland (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Lab)]

Young workers are facing real challenges in their living standards, particularly because their housing costs dwarf those faced by the generations that came before them. That is leading many to reduce the contributions they make to their workplace pensions, or even to forgo making them entirely, at the risk of having inadequate pensions when they retire. Will the Pensions Commission make recommendations on how to address those challenges?

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[John Cooper (Dumfries and Galloway) (Con)]

In Scotland, benefit crime has effectively been decriminalised, and the Scottish Conservatives have raised the case of people being coached on how to fiddle the system. When I have asked the DWP about it, the reply has basically been, “Nothing to do with us, guv.” Is there not a moral imperative to do something about that issue?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

Yes, there is. We are looking at some of the developments in social media and at the kinds of coaching, including where people are being charged for advice that they could obtain for free and without difficulty. We are looking at all of that at the moment.