Saving Gateway Accounts Bill

Amendment 7 amends Clause 3(1) which deals with the definition of eligible persons. Under the subsection, a person is eligible if he is entitled to the benefits or tax credits listed in subsection (2). The Government have consistently said that they wish to use passporting as the basis for eligibility for a saving gateway account. I assume, therefore, that the word "entitled" in subsection (1)(a) means that a person has made a successful claim for the benefit concerned. The Minister will be aware that the take-up of benefits and tax credits is far short of the total of those who are eligible. It varies between the benefits. The recent PAC report, to which I have already referred this afternoon, said that take-up of working tax credit is only 61 per cent, and that one in five families do not take up child tax credits. Jobseeker’s allowance take-up is, again, only around 60 per cent. In another place on Report, the Minister said that an additional 2.8 million people could qualify for a saving gateway account if they actually claimed the benefit for which they are eligible. The way in which the Government are approaching the saving gateway account is to remove those persons from saving gateway eligibility because they do not, for whatever reason, wish to apply for one of these benefits. However, why should they be denied access to an opportunity for a savings incentive if they wish to apply for that alone, independent of applying for a benefit? My amendment is designed to allow a person to establish an entitlement to a saving gateway account if they otherwise satisfy the requirements for one of the benefits or tax credits. Thus, if the person is entitled to claim, under the terms of my amendment he could have a saving gateway account. The amendment is probing for today’s Grand Committee because I recognise that the processes that have been designed around saving gateway accounts are predicated on the establishment of an entitlement to a payment of benefit or tax credit, and there would need to be a different approach for those who did not want to do anything but apply for a saving gateway account voucher. The Minister will doubtless say that costs would increase that way but, since the non take-up of benefits and tax credits is very high—we are talking about millions of people being excluded from the saving gateway account—the justice of passporting looks to be very rough indeed. There is a case for allowing through those who for reasons of dignity or otherwise do not want to apply for a means-tested benefit, but take a different approach to a beneficial savings scheme. Why should they not be allowed access to the saving gateway scheme? I beg to move.