Benefits: Reductions — House of Lords, 2018-11-01
Topic: Social Welfare
John Bassam (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I thank everybody for their participation in this debate. The quality of it has proven the need that I identified at the outset: that we ought to have an annual Hollis debate on poverty and the best way to tackle it. I was greatly heartened by the warm words from all sides of the House about our late friend Baroness Patricia Hollis and her legacy. I recognise from some of the contributions—particularly those of the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, and my noble friend Lady Andrews—the way in which Patricia worked and her generosity of spirit. You often felt that she was there to make the case and advocate the case, even when she was being briefed by her civil servants. I well remember coming out of a meeting where she and I were being briefed for some future debate, and the civil servants were thanking her for the briefing she had just given them. That was a testament to her knowledge, and concentration on the detail of her brief There have been some common threads in this debate, although it has not always sounded quite like that. Colleagues on the Conservative Benches have been critical in part of the way in which universal credit has been rolled out. They recognised and acknowledged some of the problems with the system. The noble Baroness, Lady Buscombe, made an aggressive defence of the Government’s policy and I expect no less from her. The welter of statistics that she delivered this evening bear some close inspection and, on our side, we will want to reflect on some of the points she made. I think there was agreement, too, on both sides of the House that it is important that we place work at the centre of ensuring that people have an opportunity to work their way out of poverty, and that the relationship between the benefits system and the world of work is extraordinarily important, particularly for people on low incomes. Getting that right is very difficult. Our Government made strides and progressed in that direction; it is right that the current Government do the same However, it remains the case that there are losers from the introduction of universal credit. Almost two in five households will lose an average of more than £50 a week and 2.8 million households will see their income cut. A million home owners will see tax credits disappear, losing £43 a week on average, while 600,000 working single parents—I stress: working single parents—will lose money as well and 750,000 households on disability benefit will lose an average of £76 a week. There are more losers from this scheme than there are winners but getting it right is most important and, on our side, while we recognise that universal credit is a valuable system, we also recognise that it has flaws and that this Government have much to do to put those flaws right I thought that the Chancellor’s Statement this week was in one sense an admission of mistakes made in the past and an acknowledgement that more needs to be done in the future. We on our side of the House will argue that case because the impact on family life of these changes is profound. Anybody who doubts that should attend a surgery run by an MP, or go to a CAB or a law centre, and listen to some of the stories that come forward. They do not paint a happy picture That said, I am grateful to the House for its forbearance. I have learned a lot from this debate and I am sure that other colleagues have as well. It was a very fitting legacy to our friend Patricia Hollis, who was not just an inspiration but a great mentor to us all. Her passing will be greatly missed.