Welfare Reform Bill

I understand, and, coming from a local government background—both as a councillor and as a local government officer—I very much support the localist agenda of freeing up local authorities to do as much as they can to reflect the direct wishes of the local electorate. However, we are talking about people in severe poverty, and one of the overall duties of government at every level is to ensure that people in our communities are not put at risk as a result of that poverty. Therefore, there is a danger in the localist agenda, which I support, of allowing a free-for-all. Without establishing national standards and monitoring, we could have a number of local authorities failing to fulfil their responsibilities as we would wish. Although I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the local electorate should hold those authorities to account, we have unfortunately had numerous examples—I speak as an advocate of local government—of that mechanism for keeping local authorities in check not being effective, particularly on the detail of administering such schemes. I am sure that we can all cite examples of that on a cross-party basis, no matter who has been in control. I am not talking about just my individual concerns. Virtually every organisation dealing with the poor in this country has expressed its concerns about this element of the legislation. My local citizens advice bureau has provided me with numerous examples—which I will not take the House through—of the benefits of both social loans, particularly crisis loans, and community care grants. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Heather Brown, the director of the Hillingdon CAB, and all her team for their hard work. They have emphasised the need to explore all the implications locally and nationally before the Government leap into a new system. Shelter and Crisis, the housing charities, have undertaken their own assessments of the process. Crisis surveyed 250 of their housing advisers. Numerous Members across all parties work closely with Crisis, and we have the greatest of respect for its work. That survey showed that 69% of clients used crisis loans for rent in advance, with 87% using them to help furnish their properties. In its briefing, which many Members will have seen, Crisis quotes one person as saying that unless we have a system that is at least as effective as the social fund, the effect on efforts to get people to move into independent accommodation would be ““catastrophic””. Anxieties have been expressed across the board about the fact that we have not yet had that assurance. I am concerned about the lack of analysis in the Government's proposals of people's needs. There is also a lack of detail on how the proposals will work. My worry is that poor and vulnerable people will be put at risk as a result. It therefore behoves us as a House in discussing this legislation, as well as the Government, to come forward rapidly with detailed proposals that have statutory backing, in order to assure our constituents and all those working in the field that we will have a system to provide emergency support to people who are poor and vulnerable, but not one in which local decision making risks diverting those resources away from where they are needed. It is on that basis that I have tabled this amendment for discussion. I hope that, as a result of this debate, we will at least gain a clear understanding of how the Government are going to address these issues—and address them fairly urgently—given that they are causing considerable concern.