Welfare Reform Bill

I am profoundly unhappy with the Bill and I should like to throw it out. It gives a blank cheque for 387 regulations to be issued by the Minister, in many cases only through the negative procedure. The super-affirmative procedure in itself does not give us much control over the situation, but it would give us some. We are receiving reassurances from the Minister for which I am sure we are all most grateful, but if I give him a cheque for £1 million and then someone steals it from him in a year’s time, there is no telling in what way that money might be disposed of. In the same way, can the Minister give an assurance that any subsequent Government will abide by all the reassurances he has given us about how the regulations will be implemented?