In 2003 the former Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath was spending 0.9% of GDP on tax credits. Under his stewardship that rose to 1.9% of GDP in 2010. By 2020, this Government will have brought that down again to 1.2%, which will still be one third more than the highest levels of spending on tax credits under Labour from 1997 to 2003.
I support the Government’s desire to focus our welfare spending on those who are particularly vulnerable, and to make the system encourage work and people doing better at work. Welfare should be a safety net, not a net that ensnares those it is meant to help. People understand that welfare must be reformed, and even some Labour Members know that the system needs to change and that Gordon Brown’s attempt to create a client state was wrong. His use of tax credits to flatter his relative poverty measure was disingenuous.
Abuse of welfare is something that people in Britain find distasteful. A week ago a constituent who has been diagnosed with a terminal illness came to me. He may
have a more difficult time under these measures, but he said, “I’m so glad that you are tackling this because the level of welfare is completely unfair on people who work.”
The Bill is full of positive steps such as measuring the root causes of poverty and rightly emphasising the positive intent in calling the measurement process “life chances”.