Welfare Reform Bill

I was going to turn to that point, but as the hon. Gentleman is there already I will deal with it now. If he studies the Green Paper that we issued last January, he will see that it mentions the age limit of five and that there is no age limit set below five. We can be judged only on what we propose in a Green Paper as a statement of our policy. The question that he and his colleagues on the Labour Benches have to answer is: why, when the Government published their Green Paper last July—six months after ours—did they chose five as the age at which those requirements should be made and why was there a change from five in July to three in December? What changed between July and December to bring that about? As the hon. Gentleman is interested in this matter, may I take him through its history? It was not until June 2007 that the Government announced that they were moving single parents with children over the age of seven from income support to jobseeker's allowance, where the receipt of their benefits would be subject to conditionality. For many years under this Government, and until very recently, single parents were entitled to remain on income support until their youngest child reached the age of 16. The Government's proposals of June 2007 began to be implemented last autumn. It is being done in stages, and single parents with children over the age of 12 are already being moved from income support to jobseeker's allowance. From October 2010, single parents with children aged over seven will receive jobseeker's allowance rather than income support. Let me make it clear that we support these changes. We have no problem with them—we did not demur when they were first announced in June 2007—but the Government have since proposed to go further. In December last year, in their response to the Gregg review on conditionality, they proposed making further requirements of single parents with children aged over seven. These are the really important points for this debate. The Government's proposals were clearly set out in their response to the Gregg report. The Government said that, when the youngest child is aged under 12 months, the single parent is not to be subject to any conditionality requirements. When the child reaches one year old, the single parent becomes part of what the Government term the progression to work group and, at that point, the single parent will be""required to attend Work Focused Interviews and agree an action plan. They are not mandated to undertake any activities recorded on the action plan or any other activities, although they will be encouraged to do so on a voluntary basis."" When the youngest child reaches three, another distinct stage is reached. According to the Government's document, when the child turns three, the single parent is""required to follow the full progression to Work regime, based around Work Focused interviews, action plans, work related activity and the backstop of adviser direction"." Clearly, there is a significant stepping up of requirements when the child reaches the age of three, and the Government will have to explain that. Receipt of benefit for the single parent of a child aged three or over is conditional on undertaking work-related activity. There is also the possibility of direction being given to the single parent about such work-related activity, and it is evident that the single parent could face a sanction of a reduction in benefit as a result of failure to comply with the requirements. It seems curious that, for more than 10 years, the Government were content to permit single parents to remain on income support until their youngest child reached the age of 16, yet, in the space of little more than 18 months, they introduced proposals to move single parents from income support to jobseeker's allowance when the youngest child reaches seven—which we support—and proposed to go further still in imposing this degree of conditionality and rigour on the single parent from the time their youngest child reaches three. Is the correct balance being struck between conditionality and the age of the child? That is a legitimate question to ask. It is particularly legitimate to ask whether three is the appropriate age for these purposes.