Welfare Reform Bill

My Lords, this could be a repeat of a previous debate. I am not going to say anything about Amendment 46 because I think that would only take away from the passionate and informative speech of my noble friend Lady Hollis of Heigham. However, in regard to Amendment 45, I was a councillor on Strathclyde Regional Council and chairman of a sub-committee dealing with urban deprivation which dealt with organisations that provided services for many of the people on the list outlined in Amendment 45. My noble friend has outlined clearly what life is like in that strata of society. I do not have any figures but it seems to me that, collectively, Governments have failed to reduce the number of people in these categories. I accept that it is a reflection on all of us that it is still going on and that the cycle is still there. The stories that we heard and the environment and accommodation that we saw on visits to organisations and centres dealing with many of the groups of people were, quite frankly, horrible. Many of our colleagues here can give examples of that. My noble friend Lady Sherlock mentioned pregnant women; I have particular knowledge of someone suffering from mental illness who was trying to get out of single accommodation. What happens is that people move into accommodation but, because of their behaviour—which is not their fault—they make life unbearable and uncomfortable for their fellow people sharing the house and eventually they get eased out. They get eased out time and again and descend into the lower, rougher types of accommodation. They end up with each other and it is a very unhappy situation. I really feel for the people there. This is only anecdotal but I do not see any reduction. The committee I was on covered the City of Glasgow and I do not see any great reduction in the number of people involved in these categories. I do not want to bring a discordant note into these deliberations because there are so many skilled and knowledgeable people here. However, I will make a comment without taking on too much. There is a continual theme coming from our Liberal colleagues of ““Woe is me. It is terrible what we are doing to people but the national deficit requires it””. I see Liberal colleagues and friends on the Liberal Benches twisting and turning to justify their position on this type of cut and this way of treating people. It is a comparatively small group of people whom we are focusing on. Anybody who knows me knows me that I am not a social liberal, with a capital L or a small l, by any manner of means. I would hammer the benefit fraudsters as much as anybody in this room, so nobody should think that I plead for people like that. This is a small group of people in comparative terms. The Liberals are giving some kind of cover to the hardliners in the Government who are focusing on very vulnerable people. It is a reflection on us all. The noble Lord, Lord Stoneham of Droxford, seemed to be creating a group of people who should be ostracised from society and picked on, who are somehow different from the rest of society. I do not think that it was deliberate, but it shows what happens when you try to twist and turn to justify one’s position. I do not agree that we should say, ““Well, these people deserve it—there are cuts coming, so this group of people should get it””. There is an overemphasis on this group of people, and the £200 million. We are going to have a discretionary fund, but we have had hardly any information from the Government about it, so I would like to hear from the Minister. Despite my previous comments, I do not think that he is a bad man. But then again, it is going to be a long Committee stage and I reserve my position. I would like to hear how he sees these groups being catered for under these proposals.