Welfare Reform Bill

I support the amendment very strongly. In some ways, it is one of the most important amendments of the whole lot in terms of the Government’s own objective of getting 1 million people off employment support allowance within, I think, 10 years, particularly when 40 per cent of people on the employment support allowance have mental health problems. Although I have not done the work of individual placement and support, I have spoken to a number of people who have, and we have introduced those sorts of workers across my own mental health trust in east London in all our community mental health teams. They are working to help people through the applications and interview process, to help employers, and to help the individual to hang on to a job as best they can once they are in it. This is the hard end of mental health, but the Access to Work programme has tremendous potential to contribute fundamentally and significantly to the Government’s objective. Obviously I should not encourage money to be diverted from physical disability to mental health, so I am not suggesting that, but ultimately one wishes more money to come into this wonderful programme so that far more people with mental health problems could be included. I hope that the Minister will take seriously the comments already made well by other noble Lords. If the Government want to achieve their objective, they need to take the amendment seriously.