Welfare Reform Bill

My Lords, I support the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lady Hollis of Heigham. She has painted a vivid and powerful picture of what this means for the people affected. I have sat through and participated in a couple of debates already about this, partly on the regulations, in Grand Committee. The more I have listened and read the evidence, the more uncomfortable I feel about us allowing this measure to go ahead. When I was younger, I flat-shared. I answered the ads in Time Out, and it is a very different thing. I am sure that many noble Lords may have been in that position, and think there is nothing wrong in sharing accommodation. But doing it from choice is very different from being pushed into it. As my noble friend has spelt out, we are talking about less salubrious accommodation. I am concerned about various groups who are particularly vulnerable here, as we have already heard. When the Social Security Advisory Committee considered this, it talked in particular about the way women will be affected. Women are not disproportionately affected as a group, but those who will be affected could be particularly adversely so. There are two groups in particular. Pregnant single women, the advisory committee said, will be restricted to the shared accommodation rate until they give birth. They face one of three undesirable situations. They can move home twice, at a time when they may be financially, emotionally and physically ill-equipped to do so, into shared accommodation, and then back to self-contained accommodation when the baby is born; they can decide to move into shared accommodation and remain there after the birth of their child; or they can try to make up the shortfall in their rent. The second group is women fleeing domestic violence. The prospect of having to share with male strangers is particularly daunting for them. Another group we discussed in Committee was those with shared parenting, and we considered how inappropriate it is for their children to be in the kind of accommodation that they have to take in this situation. The Minister did not really address those concerns. Finally, I referred in Committee to a letter which had quite an impact on me. It was one that the noble Baroness, Lady Browning, mentioned having received from the mother of a young man on the autistic spectrum, describing the difficulties he faced in shared accommodation. Think about how inappropriate shared accommodation might be for someone with this condition, who may find it very difficult to live with other people or with strangers, who might find it very difficult to live with him too. A lack of understanding of that kind of behaviour could create real tensions. I can see so many problems. The Minister responded by talking about the discretionary housing payments. The issue is not just about the amount of money, but also the important point that someone in this situation—and, I suspect people with mental health problems—need security and certainty. Discretionary housing payments do not give that, because you do not know whether you will be able to get the money. That causes more anxiety and could lead to forms of behaviour that could have negative consequences. The noble Lord also made the point that there are already exemptions for severely disabled people, but this person did not fall into the exempt category. There is a spectrum of behaviour within which people will not be exempted but could face real problems with the extension of shared accommodation. The amendment of the noble Baroness is a way of trying to mitigate those problems, and I endorse what she has said. I hope the Minister will take it away and think about whether, through the amendment or another way, he can address the wide range of concerns that have been expressed three times now—in discussing the regulations, in Grand Committee, and now.