Welfare Reform Bill

Part of Orders of the Day – in the House of Commons at 9:07 pm on 24 July 2006.

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Photo of Greg Clark Greg Clark Conservative, Tunbridge Wells 9:07, 24 July 2006

Natascha Engel —and indeed the Secretary of State—referred to William Beveridge. I should like to refer to that other great titan of the 20th century, Sir Winston Churchill, who summed up the vision for our party's involvement in social policy with two images: the ladder and the net. That has served us well during the 20th century, but it is an outdated vision for the 21st. People get tangled up in nets, and our purpose in this age must be to propel people upwards, not to leave them languishing in a net, however humane the intention behind its provision.

Nothing could better illustrate that problem than incapacity benefit. We know that once someone has been on IB for a year, they are likely to spend an average of eight years on it. The reasons for that are complex. People have special needs that can be difficult to deal with. When setting targets for reforming welfare provision to alleviate poverty, it is appropriate to tackle the difficult cases as well as the easier ones, and I urge those on my Front Bench as well as the Government to take that on board.

I applaud the Government's achievements in reducing child poverty, but when we look at the construction of that target and at how progress towards it has been made, we realise that it has consisted largely of increasing the income of people just below the 60 per cent. poverty line to just above it. However, the number of people on less than 40 per cent. of median earnings—those in more severe poverty—has increased. Some 800,000 more people are now in severe poverty than 10 years ago. Many of those people are disabled. In a very good lecture to the Fabian Society, the Secretary of State pointed out that 25 per cent. of all children in poverty have at least one disabled parent. It is therefore extremely important that we direct our attention to that group. I hope that the Government's headline targets will not distract them from that purpose. Our welcome for the Bill reflects the fact that it goes some way to show that the issue is not being entirely forgotten.

What can be done about it? Mr. Khan and I serve on the Public Accounts Committee and we recently had the pleasure of scrutinising a report from the National Audit Office that considered the Department's record on support for disabled people. It contained some shocking revelations. For example, as the Minister knows, 2.6 million people are on incapacity benefit, but only 125,000 of them are engaged in programmes to get them back into work. That is a drop in the ocean. If we are serious about giving people with disabilities the chances that they require and about extending to them the social justice that we extend to other parts of society, it is vital that we increase the number and quality of places available.

The NAO also found that, since April 2001, one third of all workstep suppliers have not progressed a single person into unsupported employment. As well as providing some of the sticks and carrots in the Bill, we need to consider the quality and availability of that provision. In so doing, I urge the Minister to make far greater use of the private and voluntary sectors, which have a record of innovation that commends itself. I have had some experience of the work of Tomorrow's People in my constituency and around the country. It has a fantastic record in dealing with the difficult problems that people face and helping to alleviate and, in some cases, cure them, so that people can go back into unsupported employment and have a decent chance of staying in it.

I also commend to the Minister's attention the experience of Kent, where the supporting independence programme was a trailblazer for what is possible when local councils are trusted to think imaginatively about how to take welfare spending and turn it into positive opportunities for people. Over the past three years, Kent has seen a 4 per cent. reduction in welfare spending, responding to the challenge set by Ministers through public service agreement targets to take on responsibility, for example, for getting people from welfare back into work. That has been a great success. It has not only helped the chances of people with disabilities but been a positive economic factor.

I also welcome the city strategy programme that Ministers are advancing. I hope that Kent will be selected to be part of that. Sometimes people get the wrong idea about Kent and think that the garden of England is universally affluent and without social problems, but we have great problems of social deprivation.