Welfare Reform Bill

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws. She made the most of her shortened contribution, but it was concise, powerful and very relevant. We have had a good debate. All of the points that were advanced to me as matters of concern by the pressure group community out there have, I think, been properly and adequately covered. It seems to me that the over-riding theme of the afternoon was concerned as much with implementation as with aims. My noble friend Lady Thomas—I am trying to get the quote correct—was right when she said that how it proceeds determines what it will achieve. That is what really concerns us; there is no argument about any of the principles. Some things that came through in the debate recognised that there are vulnerable citizens who really need to be accommodated in the regulations that come from this legislation. That is against the background not just of vulnerable families but of those faced with the difficult financial circumstances that we can all see ahead. That powerful theme came through in a number of colleagues’ speeches. Staff training also came through to me as something that was genuinely and appropriately concerning people. Dealing particularly with mental illness and such issues, there have of course been increased departmental expenditure limits to deal with some of that, and people will be getting trained up. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, rightly said, inadequate advice is almost worse than none at all. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing when you are dealing with drug addicts and such disadvantaged groups, so staff training is something that the Minister and the Government will need to think about as the Bill goes forward in Committee. I do not know whether any of my colleagues managed to read the actual report produced by Professor Paul Gregg, which he prefaced with a personal statement. You do not need to read the whole report, which was subtitled A Vision for Personalised Conditionality and Support. The first paragraph of the professor’s statement makes it clear what he was trying to do with regard to the change in how benefits are being provided. The Minister found that in the fact that some of his methods for introducing the new benefit regime came as ideas from that report. However, if you read his report carefully, as I have done, you get a very different flavour and tone on the emphasis between the balance of support and conditionality. I shall illustrate it with the second sentence of the professor’s personal statement: ""In addition, and central to this Review, it should where possible give a voice to the claimant in designing support services"." Now, that is not the tone of phase one of the Bill. People will need to take their own views on it, but I suggest that they need only to read that first page. However, the recommendations by Professor Gregg are also instructive; one of them—which we do not much hear the Government talking about—was that we should have a review of conditionality. He said that there should be a general review of sanctions in relation to the rest of the benefit system, to the hardship scheme that has now been in place for some years and, indeed, in relation to the sanctions and deductions of benefit that have been causing concern to some of us for some time. To try and characterise phase one as a fruit, or a direct read-across, of the work that Professor Gregg did is wrong. That has the wrong balance, and some of the emphasis that the report contains on empowering the claimant, rather than giving extra powers to the department, will, I hope, instruct the work of the Committee as we go through the further stages. I was interested that the Minister also talked about the abolition of income support. I wrote down the relevant sentence—I think that I have this right—in which he said, "Once there is no one left to claim it, we will close it down", or words to that effect. Why on earth are the Government taking powers to abolish a benefit when people will be claiming income support for years? They will be claiming income support until carers are dealt with properly. That will take some time and we will hear what the Government have to say about that later in the year. That will still leave lone parents with younger children claiming income support, so why is the relevant clause in the Bill at all? In my view it is a prospective power that the Government will not make use of for five or six years. It is bad legislation to include such powers that the Government are not actively considering using, and I believe that they are not. That is bad and Parliament should look very carefully at giving powers of that kind against that background, if my analysis is right. It will help the Minister’s case if in Committee he tries to get across to us what resources are now available and what capacity constraints there are in Jobcentre Plus. It would be better if we knew the unvarnished truth about that. I study these things as closely as anybody—at least I try to do so—and, as regards the money that is flowing in from the Pre-Budget Statement, the recently announced Budget, and from past announcements, you do not know whether it is all to be spent through DEL-AME, through this CSR or whether it will start in 2011-13. It is very difficult to answer the question: how much new resource is going into Jobcentre Plus that will be available to personal advisers to help the client groups that this Bill is about? I am not an accountant but the Minister is. There must be some way of disentangling the smoke and mirrors that I think surround this question. If I could be persuaded that this is all new money that will be used constructively and will be made available for customer and client support, I would look at the Bill, particularly Part 1, with a less jaundiced eye, if I can put it that way. I suggest to the Government Front Bench that it would be helpful to be told what is new money and what is old money, and exactly what capacity will be available. Will Jobcentre Plus have personal advisers with a sufficiently high level of qualification to discharge the responsibilities that the Bill will give them? That is a very important point. The noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, rightly talked about the regulations, at which we need to look. The point that my noble friend Lady Thomas made on super affirmative procedures was very much on the money. The super affirmative procedure is a specialist statutory instrument that is published in draft, made available and is amendable. It is not subject just to affirmative or negative procedure. We should consider that procedure for some of the key aspects of this Bill. Enabling primary legislation is always difficult but enabling primary legislation that produces pilots makes it very difficult to know where you are at any given moment. I hope that my noble friend’s good suggestion will be taken up. The noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, made a powerful plea on behalf of lone parents. We shall need to return to that matter in detail. I concur with her view on transport. It is a perfectly natural thing for me to be concerned about, given that I come from south-east Scotland. However, I have been concerned about it for some years. I also share the view of the noble Lord, Lord Watson, and the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, about the interface between Scotland and the rest of the country. It is not just childcare and drug rehabilitation regimes that are substantially different in their application. Child development grants and Sure Start schemes which are now becoming freely available in England are not on the radar screen or in contemplation at any stage in Scotland. In providing national legislation, the Government should not assume that conditions are the same in all parts of the United Kingdom. The noble Lord, Lord Rix, made a very powerful point, as he always does in his own home territory, but the thing which really came across to me was his reference to "creaming and parking", as it is known in the trade. People who suffer disadvantage such as illness need better support than they have at the moment. The noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, made an important point about linking rules, which have been with us for some time. I acknowledge that they have improved; the two-year period is an improvement. However, I believe that we should offer people who genuinely suffer from intermittent conditions a guarantee that their benefits will be protected for a two-year period. There may need to be a reconciliation after that period if they win the pools or start writing books and making lots of money; otherwise, the taxpayer could lose substantially in certain circumstances. I think that is unlikely, but such a safeguard should be made available. A mechanism must be available—I know that the Treasury would not like it—to provide absolute comfort for a year or two years to people who are taking that first step of going out of the door and into work for the first time. They also need support after they have started their first job and their employers need support. The noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, made an important point on that. Employers need help. The Government’s work trials, job introduction schemes, local employment partnerships and access to work schemes are positive measures but they need to be reinforced. The Government need to hold employers’ hands, as it were, to ensure that this matter is tackled effectively. I have just remembered that I should have declared at the beginning of my speech that I am a non-remunerated, non-executive director of the Wise Group in Glasgow. I had better say that; otherwise, I could get into trouble. This Bill is worth fighting over. I do not like it as it stands. The first part is a mess. However, the second part is excellent. We heard an excellent speech from the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell. If she would like any further speeches read out in the House, I volunteer to do so any time she likes. As I say, Part 2 is excellent and I look forward to hearing noble Lords speak on it who know more about it than I do. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, that Part 3 is a try-on by CMEC. The Minister should have insisting on waiting two years—a decent period—before this was proposed. Unless there is new evidence, the Minister will be in for a difficult time because the cavalry in the shape of the noble Lord, Lord Goodlad, will appear over the horizon, as he did last year, and sweep all before him. The Minister should not look forward to that unless he has some pretty valid new evidence that justifies bringing back these clauses; otherwise, it will be a try-on by CMEC.