Welfare Reform Bill

I thank the Minister for his full response. Unless I missed it, I do not think he dealt with one amendment, but I shall come to that. I thank noble Lords for their very helpful contributions to the debate. The noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, gave a cautionary tale of what happened in the 1980s. I cannot speak for the noble Lord, but the Minister’s response that local authorities will set up an internal review mechanism if they think it is appropriate is not the kind of positive response that, for instance, the noble Lord, Lord Newton, in his former incarnation made when similar points were being made about going from single payments to the Social Fund. Perhaps on his behalf I could say that I am disappointed with that response. A number of noble Lords made the point about the money that would be available in the future. One thing that we have not talked about is that, at present, the crisis loans bit of it has money recycling, but money will not be recycling because there will not be any loans. Presumably, that will also mean, not just that it is not going up with inflation, but that there is no money coming back into the system. Again, that will make less money available for local authorities. The noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, made a very powerful point when he read out the principles that the Social Fund Commissioner set out and then compared and contrasted them, in good student essay style, with what the Government produced. My noble friend Lord McKenzie made another good point when he asked where the vision was for what the Government want to achieve. I am no clearer about that vision. We have talked about the importance of local decisions. The noble Lord reiterated the point about decision-making at local level but did not address the point that it is possible that these decisions will not be made at local level. If Westminster can send its emergency decision-making up to Scotland, what guarantee do we have that decision-making on ““daughter of Social Fund”” will be taken locally? If that is the vision and purpose, perhaps the Government need to make it clear and set down that those decisions must be made locally—otherwise we might not have localism at all. We need more reassurance on that. The noble Lord, Lord German, made some important points about accountability. The Minister responded but did not explain what the reporting back mechanism will be. Accounting officers may be accountable to the Permanent Secretary at the DWP, but how will they be accountable if there are no reporting back mechanisms and no requirement to report on how the money is being used? Again, a bottom line must be written into this. I welcome the fact that the noble Lord said that he will reflect on some of these issues, particularly ring-fencing. He said that he would like the reflection process to be as open as possible—so no ring-fencing around that reflection process. He made a very important statement, which will be on the record. He said that the Government would have to make sure that money will go to vulnerable people and will not be diverted elsewhere. I am pleased by that because we are clearly in agreement. However, I am not clear how we can achieve it without ring-fencing. If on reflection he could come back and satisfy the Committee that this can be achieved without ring-fencing, I am sure that we would all be very happy and impressed. However, I find it very difficult to see how it can be achieved without some form of ring-fencing. I remain to be surprised and impressed. On domestic violence, the noble Lord made the point that someone must already have left home in order to get help from the Social Fund. I understand that, but does he not accept that some women will be afraid to leave their home if they are not sure that there will be help for them when they take their children into the great unknown? At present at least they know that there is a very good chance that they will get help from the Social Fund. There is a real danger here.