It is indeed about choices, and two parties are having to make those choices while the Labour party refuses to make any choices. Labour Members are saying nothing about what they would do or even telling us a single cut that they would reverse.
Ministers from the two parties have sat down and developed a reasonable strategy for reducing the welfare budget. I remind the House that it costs us more than £220 billion a year—more than we spend on health, education and defence combined. Labour Members conveniently forget that they went into the last election with a commitment to reduce that.
At the same time, the Liberal Democrats were clear that there were red lines that we would not cross. We clearly said that we would not accept getting rid of housing benefit for the under-25s; penalising people who have more children; a freeze on benefits; a reduction in benefits; or £10 billion in cuts. What we have now is a much smaller reduction in the budget, but one that is still significant and necessary. The solution is that everybody on benefits, apart, crucially, from those most vulnerable groups, as it is welcome that DLA, attendance allowance,
disability carer and pension premiums in the ESA support group have been excluded and will continue to get benefits uprated by CPI—