My Lords, for many years we have discussed the Azure card, and it is good to return to it—and also to say that we had one or two victories in our most recent discussions, whereby instead of the value of the card being scrapped altogether there is a rollover now, so people can save a little perhaps from £35 to go over to the next week.
We are dealing here with vulnerable people. People are never illegal; they are people just like every one of us in this Chamber, as I keep on repeating. We have the opportunity to either undermine the dignity of people or to restore it. We should remember that it is as we restore that dignity that we build a legacy for the future that is far more worth while than trying to diminish the rights of people. Imagine that you are in a queue at a checkout in a shop or a store and you are wondering whether, with £35—£5 a day—you have enough to pay for the goods you have in the basket or trolley. Imagine that you get to the cashier and the cashier says, “Sorry, you can’t have that”, because you have gone over the £35. By introducing cash benefits, we could at least give people a little bit of dignity in that queue, so that they are not embarrassed. They are people—and often people of great dignity and worth.
Today I read in a paper that I do not often read that there is an easyJet shop opening in north London where for at least a month most items are 25p each. I do not know whether other noble Lords have read about this. That is great—so the person with the Azure card goes there and finds out that they do not use it there. It is used only in 14 or 15 stores. And how would they get to north London, when you cannot use it to buy a bus ticket or a ticket on the underground? If they had cash, they could do that. I am reading between the lines in transitional instructions—not in what the Minister said in the other place—that the Azure card was to stay. We have another opportunity here to bring about a bit of dignity for those people. You have children with you—and children sometimes might want a piece of toffee or chocolate, but you cannot do it, because you do not have the money. And is that included in the goods that you can buy with the Azure card? Probably it is.
We have created second-class, third-class or fourth-class citizens existing on £5 a day. I spend more on that in the cafeteria and in the restaurants here, and I know that some people pay as much as that for a coffee in some places in our Parliament. But we have the opportunity, and we are moving in that direction whereby the Azure card is yesterday’s news and cash benefits in hand are today’s news. Then we have to restore the right of appeal. There is a lot more to be done, but I am sure that the Minister will give us some comforting words at the end of this debate.