Welfare Reform

Tom Hayes Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Liz Kendall]

Yes, we already have what we are calling a collaboration committee on the pathways-to-work funding to ensure that it really meets the needs of sick and disabled people. As I have said in the House before, it really is about a pathway to work—for some people, just getting out of the house, or getting out of bed, is a huge achievement; for others, it might be about going along to a group, beginning to speak to other people and getting their confidence back. It really is a pathway to success. We will be setting out precise allocations of the pathways-to-work funding in due course, but I want to reassure Members that it will be available in every single part of the country.

[Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)]

I grew up caring for two disabled parents. As a kid, I saw at first hand the harms that happen when the British state routinely lets down disabled people. It is why disabled civil rights activists have a phrase, “Nothing about us without us,” and it is why I am looking for genuine and meaningful co-production.

On Friday, I brought together seven Bournemouth support organisations and people with lived experience, and they wanted me to raise two issues. The first is continuing concern about the eligibility criteria. The second is whether the mental health support that the Government are rolling out will be in place in sufficient quantity to support potential new claimants by November 2026.

[Liz Kendall]

My hon. Friend raises an important point about mental health support. This Government are determined to ensure that there is parity of esteem between physical and mental health. We have already recruited 6,700 of the 8,500 additional mental health workers we promised in our manifesto, and we are putting in place new emergency mental health services and bringing in new Young Futures hubs, which will include mental health support. I know that my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary is determined to ensure that that support is available in every part of the country. I am sure we will hear more in the coming weeks and months.

PIP Changes: Impact on Carer’s Allowance

Tom Hayes Excerpts

Thursday 27th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Stephen Timms]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for raising that point, but the Green Paper is very clear about the protections provided for people who are terminally ill. There are special rules in place, and they will absolutely be maintained. She can be very much reassured about what the Green Paper says about that group. If there is a point that I have missed that she has spotted, I would be grateful to hear about it, but we have very robust protections for those people for exactly the reasons she sets out.

[Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)]

I grew up caring for two disabled parents. As I said in my maiden speech, I would not be here if it was not for the sacrifices they made when they had so little in the first place. I have seen both my mother and my father forced out of work by their poor health. I have seen their mental health suffer, because they could not get a foot in the door of the NHS. I have seen the consequences in our family home; they suffered significant bouts of depression. I know the dignity and importance of work to people who want to and can work. When my parents’ health got worse, they could not work, so I know the importance of protections for people like them. I am pleased that the Government are emphasising both parts of the issue. Will the Minister please assure my constituents, who are concerned because of the leak, into which an official inquiry is under way, that the Government are truly listening to our constituents? Will he give the assurance that, through the pathways to work consultation, the Government want to hear from disability groups in my constituency, including the Cambian Wing college, whose representatives I met on Monday, and other organisations? Will he also reassure the public that the Government are committed to closing the disability employability gap? We need employers to support people into work, too.

[Mr Speaker]

I understand that this is a very important urgent question—that is why it was granted—but I need to try to get everybody in; that is what I am bothered about. If we can speed up questions and answers, that would help us all.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Hayes Excerpts

Monday 11th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Alison McGovern]

One person who has never looked the other way when people were facing poverty in this country is my hon. Friend. Through her innovation, she has ensured that household food insecurity is measured properly, and I pay tribute to her efforts. I have listened to what she said about Feeding Britain, and I will take that as an input into the child poverty taskforce. I hope that she and Feeding Britain will meet me to discuss how we can take that forward.

[Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)]

17. What steps she is taking to help support parents who are looking for work.

[The Minister for Employment (Alison McGovern)]

Helping parents to have fulfilling and sustainable work helps our economy and prevents child poverty. As we have mentioned several times, the “Get Britain Working” White Paper will rewrite employment policy and set our ambition for an 80% employment rate, but we will not get there without parents.

[Tom Hayes]

In recent weeks, I have met the DWP in Bournemouth and advice agencies including the citizens advice bureau for Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole. Advice agencies welcome the record increase in carers allowance that was announced in the Budget. They and in-work parents with disabled children have also asked about the transition from child tax credit to universal credit. That may be a matter for the “Get Britain Working” White Paper, but can the Minister say how the Government will further support such parents to work and earn, and flexibly meet their families’ needs?

[Alison McGovern]

I thank my hon. Friend for bringing this matter to the House, and I pay tribute to all those he has worked with to understand the challenge that we face. He is right that we will take this forward through the “Get Britain Working” White Paper. Citizens Advice is playing an important role in supporting that work, and the work of the child poverty taskforce.

International Investment Summit

Tom Hayes Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I am very keen not to do that. That is my point. It is gloom and doom from the Opposition —sorry, I mean the Government; I have to stop doing that—and it is brought on by these significant changes. These are not my comments, but the comments of sensible business representative organisations, which are representing their members. We should listen to the voices of business in this context. Even Richard Walker of Iceland Food, one of the Government’s supporters, says that the changes must happen slowly to avoid a “disastrous impact”.

I realise that we have a lot to get used to these days. I have to get used to calling those on the Labour Benches “the Government”, and I also have to get used to being a backseat driver. It is even more frustrating being a backseat driver when the learner driver in the driving seat does not know the difference between the brake and the accelerator.

Importantly, stability is one of the key levers that the Government have at their disposal. Winston Churchill once said that some people see “private enterprise as a predatory tiger to be shot. Some see it as a cow that they can milk. Few people see it for what it really is—the strong horse that pulls the whole cart”. It is hugely important that we get behind private enterprise in this country. It is hugely important that we get that stability in tax policy, workplace policy and the employment relationship. It is hugely important that we continue to level up this country. I note that levelling-up seems to have disappeared as a departmental aim, but that is still hugely important to all parts of this country, not least to the part of the country that I represent. It is also hugely important that we control energy costs. We know that that is a key concern to many businesses around the UK. Another key concern is that we cut the red tape for our larger companies.

The area that I focused most on as a business Minister was SMEs, which are the backbone of our economy. The No. 1 area that they struggle with is access to finance. I would really like to see some different measures in that area.

[Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)]

On that point about finance, I was pleased to see that JP Morgan, which has its headquarters in my constituency, joined other big banks in the world to back the push to invest in the UK ahead of the summit. Does the hon. Member agree with JP Morgan and those banks that we should be optimistic about the future of the British economy following the election?

--- Later in debate ---

[Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)]

I start by noting that we have on the Government Front Bench two Ministers who split their time between Departments. One is at the Treasury and the Department for Work and Pensions, and the other is at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and the Department for Business and Trade. That just goes to show that we have a joined-up, mission-led Government who are trying to move away from working in silos and to have a shared ambition, and that is to be commended.

We are here today to talk about investment, which is obviously about money, but it is also—I would not want to lose this—about people. It is about skills, expertise, experience, opportunities for learning, better jobs, dignity at work, feeding families and enabling the maximum amount of prosperity. We should hold on to those things, because they are what our constituents want and what they send us to this place to deliver.

That said, investment is also about the money. The £63 billion truly is a record-breaking amount, and I commend our mission-led Government for securing it. It is the clearest sign that global businesses are backing the British economy and working people under this new Labour Government. That money could have gone elsewhere, but it is coming to our country, for all the reasons I just described. It is coming here because the country voted for change to achieve stability. In the last 14 years, we have had little to no growth, with billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money wasted and a huge black hole in our finances. The country was left vulnerable to the worst cost of living crisis in a generation, and our Government was forced to spend £94 billion on household support because we were so exposed to fossil fuels.

That is why I am particularly pleased that so much of this investment is going towards clean energy. For example, some of the £2 billion from Octopus Energy will be used to build four new solar farms across Bristol, Wiltshire, Essex and the East Riding of Yorkshire, powering up to 80,000 homes. Those investments will improve our local economies and communities.

I feel sad and wrong saying this, but we have been talking about Elton John, and nobody else has made the inevitable point: sorry seems to be the hardest word, but we are not hearing it said, either in jest or in sincerity. As I look at the Opposition Benches, which are deserted, I wish that Conservatives could speak up on behalf of British business—[Interruption.] I do apologise to the hon. Member for Grantham and Bourne (Gareth Davies). Perhaps he will find the hymn sheet to sing from—the one about being in favour of British business and investment. Perhaps he will also say sorry, much as it is the hardest word—I have said that twice now.

As I said, neither this debate nor these investments are just about the money. Hopefully, nearly 38,000 people across the UK, including in my home of Bournemouth East, will begin new jobs as part of the green transition that our country so desperately needs and that our industrial sector has been crying out for. To that end, I very much welcome the publishing of the Government’s Green Paper on their 10-year industrial strategy, which we have already heard about.

In the short time I have been a Member of Parliament, the Government have committed to strengthening Britain’s industrial base—in both the service and manufacturing industries—to create good, well-paid jobs in not only the green sectors we have today but those of the future. With the right policies, the Government can supercharge investment in clean energy industries across the UK, from the industrial heartlands of the north to the thriving finance sector in Bournemouth. This is about more than just creating green jobs; it is about the revitalisation of entire regions and ensuring that every corner of our country benefits.

I have been fortunate this week to spend time with investors, businesses and working people at three events in London, and the relief is palpable. I have listened to investors talk about how they have been holding on to money because they have been craving regulatory certainty; planning reform; the building of homes for their workers; an NHS that can fix those workers, who they need at their workplaces but who are at home unwell, because of mental ill health, musculoskeletal problems or worse; and the certainty from Government that would remove the barriers to growth, so that the investments they make extract a dividend for not just their companies but our wider economy. When Members hear that the investment we are talking about was lined up before the general election, they should not believe it. It came forward after the general election, because businesses now have a Government who are committed to putting in place the infrastructure and changes needed for our economy to grow now and into the future.

We know the benefits of action, and we know the costs of inaction, because we are bearing those costs now. Working together, Government, investors, working people, our trade unions, and businesses will achieve energy independence and security. We will achieve falling and lower bills. We will achieve good jobs and pride in our communities. Together with our mission-led Government, we will achieve a growing and improving economy and way of life.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I now call the shadow Minister, Gareth Davies.