Welfare Reform Bill

Part of Orders of the Day – in the House of Commons at 5:25 pm on 24 July 2006.

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Photo of Philip Hammond Philip Hammond Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions 5:25, 24 July 2006

What the hon. Lady says is self-evidently true. There are real as well as financial constraints, but we can deal with one of the largest constraints—the financial resource constraint. I suggest to the Secretary of State that it can be done. The resource constraints boil down to a lack of imagination—I will not say in the Secretary of State's Department; it might be in the Treasury or elsewhere—rather than a lack of cash. The benefits of the programme could be made more widely available more quickly through such a transfer of risk. As the Secretary of State knows, a faster roll-out will produce medium-term fiscal savings as well as greater economic and social benefits in the short term.