Welfare Reform Bill

My Lords, I start by thanking, I think, the Minister for his very helpful responses on three months rather than six. That was on residential and now we are to have this early announcement. It leaves those of us who prepared speeches throwing them away. There is a nice bucket here with all of them. Nevertheless, I am always delighted to be able to do that and we thank the Minister for what he has just said. The amendment, which also stands in the name of my noble friend Lord McKenzie, would establish in the Bill that PIP will act as the gateway for the carers’ allowance and that both rates of the PIP daily living allowance would deliver eligibility. We welcome the fact and therefore do not need to go through all the reasons why we needed to have this. We welcome that we will have that information on passporting before Report, whenever that may be. However, there are still a couple of issues that I would like to leave with the Minister. First, the absence of a commitment in the Bill that PIP will act as the passport is something that we would like to see put right. I think that the notes from the DWP also state that PIP will provide part of the gateway for receipt of carers’ allowance. I would be interested to know whether that was just loose drafting or whether there is another bit of the gateway that we do not yet know about. Secondly, I welcome what we are going to get, but it seems that we will get information on the carers’ allowance before we receive the detailed information on the thresholds, which is the same issue. That means that we still will not know exactly who will be entitled to carers’ allowance because we still will not know who will be in PIP or at what level. We continue to worry that the words, ““ensure that those with the most intensive caring responsibility receive the support that they need””, tend to suggest that some people will fall outside that. Should the Government plan to set the carers’ allowance only at the enhanced PIP rate, undoubtedly thousands will lose the entitlement. Thirdly, I think that we will come back to the benefit cap on Monday. Will the carers’ allowance be exempt from the benefit cap, whatever passporting is arranged at whatever level for whatever people? Fourthly, reverting to the words ““most intense caring””, I am sure that this is uppermost in the Minister’s mind but a lot of continual caring may not be intensive caring. I hope that clarity will be provided on that point. For example, a 60 year-old with profound learning and physical disabilities who is still in nappies and needs to be lifted into the bath, or an autistic young adult who needs constant supervision when he is outside the house may not require intensive caring in the sense of nursing care but still need a very high level of care. I shall be interested to hear more about that in due course. Certainly, the National Autistic Society has raised concerns about the new descriptor of a claimant’s need for supervision being changed from the current continual supervision to continuous supervision. Such descriptors, which may change the test with regard to the sort of supervision and help that are needed, clearly constitute a worry for some people involved with caring. We know that these issues are being looked at but there is a lot of interplay between the definition of people who will be eligible for DLA and their care needs. Fifthly, I know that the Treasury is not represented here but I need to ask whether the planned reductions in spending on disability allowance include savings from the carers’ allowance budget. If not, can the noble Lord give us any information on how the caring needs of those who lose entitlement to DLA through the cuts in that budget will be met? We very much welcome the fact that we will have the chance to examine the Government’s proposals before Report, but does the Minister accept that the link between PIP and carers’ allowance should be in the Bill and giving some comfort to the many carers who are worried about their position? However, I thank the Minister for his earlier comments.