Social Security — House of Commons, 2015-12-01
Topic: Social Welfare
Priti Sushil Patel (Conservative, Centre-right): I beg to move, That the draft Welfare Reform (Northern Ireland) Order 2015, which was laid before this House on 26 November, be approved The order will ensure that the people of Northern Ireland can benefit from the radical programme of welfare reforms enabled by the Welfare Reform Act 2012 in Great Britain. That landmark act ushered in a new welfare contract with the British people. It said to those who are able to work, "Work will always pay." It said to the most vulnerable in society, "We will continue to provide you with the support you need", and it said to the taxpayer, "Your hard-earned money will be spent responsibly." This new contract reflects principles which continue to guide our welfare reform programme—that work is the best route out of poverty, that spending on welfare should be sustainable, that people on benefits should face the same choices as those in work, and that the most vulnerable should be protected. Those are the principles that underpin the Welfare Reform Act 2012, and they are the principles that underpin the Order in Council before the House today Before I turn to the specifics of the order, I want to remind the House of the desperate need for welfare reform in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. When we took office in 2010 nearly 1 in 5 households had no one working, the number of households in which no one had ever worked had nearly doubled, and nearly 1.5 million people had been on benefits for most of the previous decade. The welfare system, with its byzantine complexity and perverse incentives, had allowed people to become detached from the rest of society, trapped in worklessness and dependency Over the past five years, we have stuck to our economic plan, delivered welfare reform and seen great progress: employment is up over 2 million; there are over 680,000 fewer workless households; and the number of people claiming the main out-of-work benefits has fallen by 1 million. In Northern Ireland, too, there have been improvements in the labour market, with 33,000 more people in employment than in 2010 and the claimant count down nearly 30% over the same period, but there is still much more to do. Northern Ireland has a lower proportion of its working age population in work than any other country or region of the UK; 130,000 households have no one in work; and 5% of those claiming the main out-of-work benefits across the UK as a whole are in Northern Ireland, which is well above its share of the UK working-age population In rebalancing Northern Ireland’s economy to meet the challenges of today’s global economy, we are tackling these challenges and creating jobs. Economic reforms, such as the proposed corporation tax reduction, will be vital, but economic reforms alone will not create a more prosperous society or improve the life chances of people trapped in dependency. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions has said many times in this House, economic reform must be complemented by social reform. We must ensure that people are supported and incentivised to take advantage of the opportunities that economic growth can create, and that is what the order does. Improved incentives are at the heart of universal credit. The single taper rate ensures that work will always pay, and the stronger conditionality framework encourages claimants to do everything they reasonably can to find or prepare for work.