Welfare Reform Bill

My Lords, in supporting the two amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, my point is much narrower than the issues that he raised. I shall concentrate on the administration of the housing cost element and urge the Government to retain the skills and knowledge that exist in local government. I speak as a past president of NALGO, one of the forerunners of UNISON. I was also a representative of UNISON on the TUC general council for the first seven years of its formation. However, this is not trade union special pleading, since it has the support of the Local Government Association and various other organisations. UNISON has 20,000 members working in housing benefit services. It is important to emphasise that those services are provided by housing associations and private contractors across the UK as well as local government itself. The staff have the necessary skills and local knowledge to provide an excellent service. There is no reason why the housing cost element could not continue to be administered at this level. The validating exercise involves many documents, including tenancy agreements, which, if posted to central venues and misplaced, could cause havoc in the lives of individual claimants. Despite the Minister’s assurances at Question Time this morning, and as the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, said, some of us do not believe that the claimed level of computer literacy exists to make the proposals in the Bill work. There will still be a need for face-to-face assistance, and who better to deliver this than the staff currently providing the service? Those of us who are hard-of-hearing are very grateful when we have a meeting in this room, where the loop is working very well. We come to dread going in certain committee rooms where it does not work and we cannot hear. How much harder it is for those trying to make phone calls to public services, especially when you have to choose from five different pathways and, if you miss one of those, you have to start all over again. We often need face-to-face support that those with normal hearing perhaps do not. If local authorities retained responsibility for the housing cost component of universal credit, I feel sure that they would work closely with the DWP to deliver the best possible service. This view is shared by the Institute of Revenues, Rating and Valuation, CoSLA, the Scottish Government as well as the LGA. The District Councils’ Network of the LGA found in a recent survey that councils had face-to-face contact in 25 to 80 per cent of claims. This helps to reduce errors and speed up claims for vulnerable people. A single overpayment or underpayment can generate real administrative and personal difficulties for individuals. I mentioned earlier external contracts. Possibly 16 per cent of local authorities have external contracts to deliver housing benefit, some of which are for between four and eight years. Sometimes, they are administered as part of a larger strategic outsourcing contract, such as with British Telecom, which can be for up to 20 years. Finally, I am extremely concerned about the welfare of the 20,000 staff at present providing this service. The uncertainty and loss of morale cannot be good. If the changes proposed lead to job losses, they face the double bind of losing their jobs because of welfare reform and having to face claiming benefits under the new system. That is not an enviable position. I ask the Minister to consider my proposals.