Youth Unemployment

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Wednesday 28th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Olney]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There are groups of young people who are facing specific barriers to entering employment, and we need to do all we can to provide them with sustained support to get into and stay in the workplace.

Much of the UK’s current workforce challenges are due to the mistakes made by the current Government, with perhaps no bigger own goal than the surprise increase in employer national insurance contributions in the Chancellor’s first Budget. Almost every business that I, and I am sure many other Members, speak to tells me that the NICs rise blindsided it and has since seriously damaged its cash flow and ability to hire and retain staff. That policy alone has been so damaging to the business sector and has created an environment in which companies are discouraged from hiring young people.

Recent Government decisions include the devastating business rates hike in the Chancellor’s most recent Budget. This is causing huge damage to hospitality firms, with many now considering whether their business remains viable. Our hospitality businesses, which so frequently provide young people with their first jobs, are now on their knees. They need support from the Government. The Government’s statement yesterday on cutting business rates for pubs was a good first step, but we need wholesale reform of our business rates system. That is one more reason why the business community felt so betrayed by the previous Conservative Government, who promised reform but did nothing to help our struggling businesses.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

My hon. Friend is highlighting two important things. The increases in on-costs for businesses mean that they are not taking on young people. More importantly, they are not then able to support the supervisory roles that give those young people the development they need, because they cannot make the differentiation in terms of salary. I am standing here as a Scottish MP. The Scottish Government did not pass on the business rate relief the last time. They have confirmed that they will do so for Barnett consequentials, but does she agree that the Scottish Government are simply not doing enough in this area and that, in fact, we are in a worse position than what is being debated today?

[Sarah Olney]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her intervention. She speaks very passionately about businesses in Scotland and the situation they are facing. I am sure she is correct to say that it is even more challenging in Scotland.

I am concerned that the Government’s sole focus on pubs and live music venues ignores the other retail, hospitality and leisure sectors which also need support. I therefore urge the Government to adopt Liberal Democrat proposals to cut the rate of VAT on hospitality, accommodation and attractions to 15% until April 2027, which would give our businesses the boost they so desperately need. Our high streets and town centres are in need of urgent help, and I urge the Government to act with all swiftness.

With the hospitality sector struggling to employ new workers, damage is being done to the prospects of our young people who are struggling with unemployment levels, and that will be detrimental to the broader economy. At the heart of this debate is that regular people are finding it incredibly difficult to find a job to support themselves, their partners, their children and their families, and to pay rent, pay for groceries and pay for essentials. That is what must not get lost in this debate.

While the Government seem to be weighing up their options on the EU re-set, they should be reminded that negotiating a new UK-EU customs union is the single biggest step that the UK could take to boost our economy, our businesses and our young people’s job prospects. The appalling agreement negotiated by the Conservative party has been a complete disaster for our country, particularly for small businesses who are held back by reams of red tape and new barriers to trade. So many young people I talk to are simply frustrated that they are the first generation who have to start their career while reaping the consequences of the Conservatives’ botched deal.

It seems evident from the Liberal Democrat Benches that the Government know that the UK must rectify the dismal trade deal negotiated by the Conservatives, and I am yet to hear a compelling reason from the Government as to why Ministers keep refusing to negotiate a new customs agreement with Europe. The steps the Government are taking to rebuild our relationship with the EU are welcomed by the Liberal Democrats, but I urge the Government to be bolder. This House voted in favour of joining a bespoke UK-EU customs union just last month. I urge the Government to seize that momentum, reach out to our European allies and negotiate a deal that would be mutually beneficial, creating countless new jobs for our young people here in the UK.

The Government cannot ignore the difficulties facing our young people anymore. Our young people need to be provided with a pathway for success and fewer barriers to getting on to the career ladder, but I am afraid the Government are failing to facilitate that. I urge Ministers to listen and adopt a joined-up strategy to tackle youth unemployment, invest in young people’s skills, boost apprenticeships and work-based training, and support businesses to create quality jobs.

--- Later in debate ---

[Naushabah Khan]

I will not give way at this point.

We are now left to rebuild what should never have been dismantled. It is promising to see that that is exactly what this Labour Government are doing. I welcome our youth guarantee that will create 350,000 new training and workplace opportunities, supported by 360 youth hubs across the country, and the investment of £750 million in apprenticeships that will equip 50,000 more young people with skills for the future.

We also recognise that the traditional path that allowed me to succeed—going to university—is not necessarily the right path for everyone. With a growing skills shortage, particularly in sectors such as house building that we need for building the infrastructure of the future, it is vital that we go further in encouraging young people to use their talents and feel confident that such career paths are valued and given the respect they deserve. I have made many visits to MidKent College—which serves my constituency—where young people are learning trades and are really passionate about what they do. They have skills in bricklaying, carpentry, welding, hairdressing and woodwork. Those are skills that my university degree could never have given me, and we must ensure that these avenues are fully supported so that young people can contribute meaningfully to our country’s future.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

The hon. Member is talking about further and vocational education, which is important. Another aspect of it is that it helps young people for whom school has not been a success. It is not just about the skills that they learn; it is about that arm that is put around them. Does she share my concern at the rural agricultural college in Cupar in my constituency of North East Fife effectively mothballing its building and moving a number of its courses online, meaning that young people studying animal care for, for example, are missing out on those arm-supporting opportunities that they desperately need?

[Naushabah Khan]

I completely agree that those routes offer young people an alternative. They offer them a space where they have an opportunity to thrive in a way they might not have been able to thrive in a traditional academic setting. I recognise the need for us to ensure that all those opportunities are protected in whichever way possible, and I recognise the work that the hon. Member is doing in her constituency to promote that.

I know that many of my young constituents in Gillingham and Rainham will welcome this Government’s approach. Jack, a 19-year-old constituent of mine, wrote to me to say:

“I am trying hard to build a future for myself, but without anyone giving me a chance it feels impossible to get started. I want to work, to contribute and become independent, but at the moment, I feel stuck and unsupported.”

My heart broke when I read that. I know that we have a lot of work to do as a Government to get this right, but Conservative Members should recognise their part in creating a legacy that has left thousands of young people living with despair or hopelessness.

We cannot have a generation stuck in limbo, truly struggling not because of their lack of talent or drive, but because the system has been deliberately dismantled. When I was 19, and living a few streets away from where Jack lives today, my future did not feel to me as his does to him. We must recreate a sense of hope and opportunity in this country. I am glad that, through my office and the actions of this Government, we may be able to give Jack the help that he needs, but is a moral stain on our country that we have allowed young people to reach the point of putting those words to paper because that feels like a reality to them. I hope that we get to the heart of this issue. I will back the Government in what they are doing to tackle youth unemployment as a matter of urgency.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 26th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dame Diana Johnson]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the meeting that we had on this very subject just a few months ago and for raising the issue of how important it is to get people back into work. There are lots of good examples of GPs who are doing that around the country, and I look forward to seeing what more we can do to work with him and other GPs to ensure that we get as many people as possible back into work who are not in work at the moment due to ill health.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

T6. I have two constituents who have been awaiting work capability reassessments since July and September 2024. That is more than a year that they have been stuck in limbo, rather than preparing to get back to work. Will the Minister confirm what my team has been told—that extreme waiting times are now normal in the Department? Will he set out what it is doing to break that backlog?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

We are certainly addressing the backlog, but if the hon. Lady would like to send me the details of those two cases, I will certainly investigate.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 12th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alison McGovern]

As I just mentioned, our new jobcentres will create a universal service across Great Britain. We must make those changes to serve young people. My hon. Friend makes an excellent point about the pandemic generation, who deserve much better from us all. I know that his city of Edinburgh is full of chances and opportunities that we cannot let go to waste. Given the role of Edinburgh and Glasgow in our visitor economy, I am sure that he will be interested in the work we are doing with UKHospitality to help more young people to have an opportunity in that great sector.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

Struggling to make ends meet, paying bills, buying work appropriate clothing and paying for public transport all affect someone’s ability to get and keep a job. That is just as true for under-25s as it is for anybody else, but the Government continue to maintain a lower rate of universal credit for young people when there is no guarantee that they have financial support from their families. In looking at universal credit, will the Government consider that?

[Alison McGovern]

As the hon. Member will know, we are reviewing universal credit. I am particularly focused on ensuring that young people have a chance before they reach the age of 25. If they are out of work in those first years after leaving school or college, it is absolutely devastating for the rest of their careers. That is why we are making these changes.

PIP Changes: Impact on Carer’s Allowance

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 27th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Stephen Timms]

I very much welcome my hon. Friend’s testimony to the value of the support that the system provides and the importance of maintaining that into the future. He is right about passported benefits. The availability of blue badges is not affected by anything in the Green Paper, because the mobility component of personal independence payment is not changed by any of the proposals we have made. Access to carer’s allowance, as we have said, certainly will be, and I would welcome a discussion with him about that.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

I declare an interest as an honorary vice-president of Carers UK, and I sit on the board of the Fife Carers Centre. Last September, I had the Adjournment debate on support for unpaid carers. In that, the Minister for Care, the hon. Member for Aberafan Maesteg (Stephen Kinnock), promised that we would

“forge ahead together with the promise of that future in which unpaid carers are visible, valued and supported.”—[Official Report, 3 September 2024; Vol. 753, c. 288.]

That is not how unpaid carers are feeling today. The Minister referred to how the earnings limit for carer’s allowance has increased, but there is still a cliff edge. Are the Government planning to bring forward plans to link the earnings limit to the 16 hours of employment at the national minimum wage? We know that those are some of the things that caused the overpayments for carer’s allowance in the first place.

[Sir Stephen Timms]

Yes, the earnings threshold will in future be set at 16 times the hourly rate of the national living wage, and that will continue indefinitely. In addition, the Chancellor announced in the Budget last year that we will look at the idea of an income taper in carer’s allowance to replace the cliff edge, which, as the hon. Member rightly says, is a feature of it at the moment. We are looking at that assessment.

Women’s Changed State Pension Age: Compensation

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 17th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Dr Savage]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. Now I will make some progress.

As a result of the changes, between 6% and 15% of affected women have fallen into poverty. Recent surveys show that 84% worry about energy bills, 76% worry about their financial future and, tragically, 71% avoid leaving their home to save money. I want to highlight the case of Marion Bond, one of my constituents in South Cotswolds. During a lifetime spent as a teacher, Marion made many sacrifices, including turning down promotions and working part time to care for her children while her husband worked long hours. Despite supporting his career, her divorce settlement was based on the assumption that she would receive her pension at 60. Instead, she unexpectedly faced a delay, losing six years of pension. The small compensation recommended by the ombudsman is a fraction of the £40,000 that she calculates she lost as a result of the lack of communication.

Marion’s story is not unique. A survey on Facebook that asked “What would you have done differently?” yielded over 1,500 heartrending stories as women shared how their lives would have been different with proper notification. The stories include escaping abusive relationships, continuing with much-loved careers rather than taking voluntary redundancy, and fulfilling care responsibilities for grandchildren or other relatives. Although men and women should have equal retirement ages, that is not the issue here. The issue is the communication failure. The mishandled roll-out of the change left many women stranded, facing unemployment and reliant on benefits. That in turn affected their mental and physical health and placed financial strain on their families, impacting childcare and the social and healthcare sectors.

There is a fundamental question about how we value women in our society. We must recognise that women face invisible financial penalties due to gender, including pay gaps and unpaid labour burdens.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

My hon. Friend is giving a powerful opening speech. She mentioned the gender pay gap, which is why we have a gender pension gap of almost 40%. Does she agree that that is another reason for looking again at WASPI women? The lack of notification that they had means that the money means so much to so many of them.

[Dr Savage]

I thank my hon. Friend for a good point very well made. Women such as Marion and the rest of the WASPI women have devoted their lives to raising the next generation, contributing significantly to our economy. Ministers’ claims that women experienced no financial loss are false. Women lost the opportunity to make informed decisions, leading to significant material losses. The compensation sought is not a benefits payment, but redress for an injustice. It should not be means-tested, following precedents set by other Government compensation schemes such as those for the Windrush generation and Post Office sub-postmasters.

This debate centres on a core principle of good governance. When a Department fails to fulfil its own policy, it has an obligation to those affected. The DWP’s refusal to engage with victims or to even consider compensation violates that principle. The DWP has not even provided a reason for refusing compensation, demonstrating a deeply offensive lack of accountability. For many years, the Liberal Democrats have pushed the Government to fairly compensate WASPI women in line with the ombudsman’s recommendations. I know that WASPI will continue to take all actions necessary to help 1950s-born women to achieve justice through compensation, but only Parliament can make that happen.

As we debate this petition, we must consider the role that the Government play in providing a safety net for the most vulnerable members of our society. I am sure we will hear many stories today of inspirational women who have served their community, family and country, and then been fundamentally let down by the British Government. The clock is ticking. More than 300,000 women born in the 1950s have died since this campaign began, with another passing away every 13 minutes on average. The solution is clear: the Government must act now to compensate WASPI women fairly and swiftly. These women have served their community, family and country, and it is time that we served them.

Women’s Changed State Pension Age: Compensation

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Wednesday 15th January 2025 Westminster Hall

[Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered compensation for women affected by changes to the State Pension age.

It is a pleasure to be able to speak in this Chamber and, as I often do, to draw a very substantial crowd. The genesis of betrayal is trust—the kind of trust that underpins the democratic legitimacy of Parliament and on which the authority of the Executive is founded, and the kind of trust that our constituents, when they send us to this place to exercise our judgment on their behalf, rely upon. Their faith in us is that we will honour what we say we will do and that when we make pledges, they are not empty pledges but are meaningful. When trust is breached and broken, the whole of that legitimacy is undermined.

That is precisely what has happened in the case of the so-called WASPI women—the Women Against State Pension Inequality Campaign. I will use the acronym, because it has become a familiar one to any of us who have taken an interest in this matter, as I have over some time, and as have the public. This campaign is a campaign for no less than justice, to restore trust.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

The right hon. Member is speaking eloquently about trust. Does he agree that it is really important for the Government to help us to have trust in institutions such as the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman by adhering to decisions made by it?

[Sir John Hayes]

Although that intervention was not orchestrated by me or choreographed by either of us, it leads me neatly to my next point, because there is an ethical case to be made of the kind the hon. Lady describes, there is a constitutional case to be made, and there is a practical case to be made. In the short time available to me—I know that many others want to contribute to the debate—I will try to make all three.

First, the ethical case is, exactly as the hon. Lady said, about honouring the pledges that were made and fulfilling rightful expectations. Not all expectations and hopes are well founded, but when people have worked all their lives and been told that at the end of their working life, they will be paid a pension at a particular time, it is not unreasonable for them to believe that that will come to pass.

Women’s State Pension Age Communication: PHSO Report

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Tuesday 17th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Liz Kendall]

I believe that this is a difficult decision, but the right and fair one. We accept that there has been maladministration. Once the Department had reached its decision, those letters should have been sent out. For the reasons that I have explained, we do not accept the ombudsman’s approach to injustice, remedy or compensation. We have to take difficult decisions in government, but this is about what I think is right and fair. I am happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss the matter in more detail if he so wishes.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

It is a gross understatement for the Secretary of State to say that 1950s women will be disappointed, especially given that this new Government are setting a precedent by ignoring an independent resolution process. I signpost constituents to the ombudsman on a regular basis; we all do. It is one of the ways that we hold the Government and Government bodies to account, and it is a core part of our democracy. Can the Secretary of State explain how we can have faith in that process if the Government choose to ignore the ombudsman’s findings? Given the fact that, as a constituent MP, the Secretary of State herself supported the WASPI campaign, can she advise whether the £22 billion black hole has had any consequence on her decision making?

[Liz Kendall]

We did campaign against the acceleration of changes to the state pension age brought forward by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Government, but that is not what this decision is about. The decision on the state pension age has already been taken. I do value the ombudsman’s role; I refer many cases myself. We accept his findings on maladministration, but we do not accept his view on injustice. None the less, the ombudsman continues to have an important role to play for many constituency MPs, and I for one will continue to refer cases to the ombudsman, as I always have done.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 16th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Sir Stephen Timms]

I can assure my hon. Friend that advances of up to 100% of potential universal credit entitlements are available urgently during the first assessment period of a claim, but she is right to raise concerns about the five-week wait. I commend to her the excellent report on this subject published by the Work and Pensions Committee in the last Parliament. The point she has raised is definitely one that we need to consider.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

Some of the farmers who work so hard to put food on our tables find it difficult to put food on the table themselves, and need additional Government support. That used to happen via tax credits, but the transition to universal credit has been hugely challenging for farmers, given the seasonal nature of their work. Will the Minister meet me to hear some of their concerns, so that we can incorporate those concerns into the Government’s review?

“Get Britain Working” White Paper

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Tuesday 26th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Liz Kendall]

It is hugely important that we deliver these new opportunities in every part of the country, including to people of all ages in Scotland. We will work with the Scottish Government on that, but also, really importantly, with local councils, who have a huge role to play. Our jobcentres really need to change. They need to meet the needs of employers and future employees in every part of the country. I look forward to working with my hon. Friend, to get his ideas on what will work best. Perhaps we could do a joint visit to his jobcentre.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

It is all very well us talking about the Department for Work, but a challenge is often that we fail those in employment who are interacting with the benefit system. I have a number of constituents in North East Fife who are paid on a four-weekly basis but who also claim universal credit, which means that, one month a year, they lose their universal credit. Simply telling them to try to put money aside to bridge that gap is not, I think, a professional way for us to support those people. I know that has been an ongoing challenge, but will the consultation look at such issues?

[Liz Kendall]

The hon. Lady raises a really important point. We have a clear manifesto commitment to review universal credit, tackle poverty and make work pay. That issue has been raised a lot with me and the Minister for Social Security and Disability. I am sure that he will look closely at that. We need our benefits system to match the reality of people’s working lives today.

Carer’s Allowance

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mel Stride]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point, and of course the motion states that there should be an increase—an unspecified amount, but it is there none the less. I think the answer to his question is that it is a balance, because the higher we put up the earnings limit and the more generous we are to carers, which of course is something we all want to do, the more people can earn and the longer they can work. Potentially, therefore, if this is acting as a proxy for the amount that people are working, they might not have the real time to spend 35 hours a week caring for a loved one. So it is inevitably a balance. I certainly accept that this is worth reviewing, and I note that the Minister for Social Security and Disability, the right hon. Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms), when he chaired the Work and Pensions Committee, called forcefully for a significant increase in the level of carer’s allowance.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

The right hon. Gentleman has obviously set out a number of the adjustments that need to be made, but in doing so he has outlined just how complex the system is and therefore exactly why we have had the scandal in the first instance. Does he agree that we should be asking the Minister to ensure that in the carer’s allowance review we simplify this process? I can assure him that many unpaid carers are not doing 35 hours a week.

[Mel Stride]

Indeed. What we want, ideally, is a system that is as simple as possible. The motion suggests that we bring in a taper, but that would be a complication of the system. I will come to why there are problems with that. It is easy to suggest these things, but the detail often makes them really quite complicated.

The last Government made it clear, when someone applied for this particular benefit, exactly what the arrangements were. When uprating occurred every year, we wrote to everybody to explain the uprating and to inquire as to whether any changes in their circumstances or earnings might impact their entitlement to benefits. And it was we, not this Government, who in our May update to our fraud plan brought in the pilots for texting to alert those on carer’s allowance that they may—I say “may” because the Department will not know—be close to exceeding the earnings limit. I am pleased that the Minister has indicated that the Government will continue with our fine work, but let us be very clear who it was that started those particular measures.

--- Later in debate ---

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

I declare an interest as I am in the process of joining the board of Fife Carers in an unpaid capacity; it is a privilege to join the organisation. I have worked with unpaid carers throughout the past few years, as constituency MP for North East Fife and through the passage of my private Member’s Bill that became the Carer’s Leave Act 2023. If hon. Members want to learn more widely about carers, they may wish to read my Adjournment debate on the subject, which took place in the first few weeks of this Parliament, where I talked about the need for a strategy on carers to ensure that carers get the cross-cutting governmental and departmental support they need.

I will not touch on the overpayments scandal specifically, but I welcome the announcement of the review after months of campaigning by my dear friend the Leader of the Liberal Democrat party, my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Ed Davey), as well as by the Liberal Democrats, carer charities and journalists. However, I want to raise some points about the carer’s allowance more generally.

I recently asked the Minister responsible for carer’s allowance, the right hon. Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms), a written question about a review of how carer’s allowance is working. The response said:

“This government will keep eligibility criteria and processes of Carer’s Allowance under review, to see if it is meeting its objectives.”

That response poses more questions than it provides answers. What are the Government’s objectives for carer’s allowance? Are they ever reviewed? How do they know if they are meeting them? What metrics are being used? What would happen if it was found that the objectives were not being met?

I assume that the objective of carer’s allowance is to keep unpaid carers out of poverty, given the additional barriers they face to working and the additional costs they face through their caring. I also assume that we want to help unpaid carers to stay linked to the workplace, if possible, through part-time work or training. On any assessment, carer’s allowance is failing these objectives. It is a failure when a third of households in receipt of carer’s allowance are classed as food insecure, compared with 10% of households as a whole; when Carers UK research from 2019 found that 600 people per day who were caring were giving up work; and when the rate of poverty among unpaid carers is 50% higher than among non-carers.

One immediate remedy that could be considered, as is set out in our motion, is an increase in carer’s allowance. It may not seem much in the big scheme of things, but during the pandemic we saw the impact of the £20 uplift to universal credit, which delivered an immediate and marked fall in food bank use.

We must do all we can to support people into work and to stay in work, so that they are not relying on carer’s allowance to get by. That point refers to the earnings allowance, which stops carers from working more than 13 hours a week on the minimum wage before losing carer’s allowance. As has already been discussed, there is no taper rate, so as soon as carers earn a penny more, the allowance goes.

Bizarrely, yearly increases to the allowance are not pegged to changes to the national minimum wage. Historically, people could work for 16 hours before they lost carer’s allowance; some of the scandal we have seen could be because people have continued to make those assumptions. We need to take the complexity out of the system. It is completely reasonable for people to assume that if they are earning national minimum wage and receiving carer’s allowance in one financial year, they can continue to do so in the following financial year, as long as they do not increase their hours, but that is not how the system works. The national minimum wage went up by 9.8% this year, but the earnings allowance did not go up at all. That sounds to me like a system set up to make people fail.

Should we not be enabling people to take on more hours and to progress in their jobs if they can? We know that often people—especially those who are below or near the poverty line, as too many unpaid carers are—are scared to risk losing their benefits in case that does not work out. One of the unseen outcomes of the scandal is that people are simply not looking for work or to get into employment because they are scared about the consequences.

Many young carers have high levels of absence from school and there are barriers to them accessing education. Potentially, if we do not help them to claim carer’s allowance when they are entitled to do so, they will never go into work and be able to make a contribution. Fife Young Carers, in my constituency, supports people up to the age of 25. We want to encourage young carers to complete their education so they have the best possible options later.

To return to my cross-cutting strategy, the Department for Work and Pensions may think that it is for the Department for Education to support young people. However, as the hon. Member for Salford (Rebecca Long Bailey) said, under the under-21 rule, doing a vocational qualification could preclude somebody from receiving carer’s allowance, as T-levels are one of the qualifications that falls into that trap. She is right that we need to think about how we are potentially inhibiting those young people in employment and training from moving forward. We need to ensure that we improve young people’s outcomes.

The Minister will know that employment among unpaid carers is about more than just benefits. We welcome her reference to the Carer’s Leave Act 2023 in her opening remarks and the fact that the Government are looking for that leave to be paid, which has long been a party policy of the Liberal Democrats. However, I do have to express my disappointment that there was no sign of paid leave in the Employment Rights Bill, because there was a real opportunity there to move the matter forward. I would appreciate it if, in her closing remarks, the Minister provided an update on the likely timescales in relation to the Carer’s Leave Act. I am concerned that, since the implementation of the Act, we do not actually know what the take-up of carer’s leave is. I am hearing worrying anecdotes that, six months after the legislation was fully implemented, some companies are still not aware of, or properly recording, carer’s leave. Part of that is because the communication from the then Government was not good enough. Unless somebody was starting a small business, or actively looking for these details, they would not find anything on carer’s leave.

I would like to raise one final point with the Minister. Again, the hon. Member for Salford highlighted this. I am often contacted by constituents who are upset to find that, having retired, they have lost their carer’s allowance—or, in Scotland, the carer support payment—because they are claiming their state pension. We know that female pensioners are more likely to be in poverty because of the working life that they have had—or not had—as a result of raising their families, and that unpaid carers are more likely to be female and older. I would like the Minister to pick up on that point, because too many pensioners are in poverty this winter as well as carrying caring responsibilities.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

I call Gill German to make her maiden speech.