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Welfare Reform and Incapacity Benefit

If the hon. Lady welcomed the announcement made in February, she must share my disappointment that it will be three years at least before those measures come into force. Indeed, that raises another question: the date of 2008 was given in February, but we have now had a six-month delay in the publication of the Green Paper. So we must now assume that it is highly likely that it will be 2009, not 2008, before the proposals are implemented. [Interruption.] If the Secretary of State can possibly bear to listen to the debate, he might like to consider whether the date is still 2008, or whether, as a result of the six-month delay in the publication of the Green Paper, 2009 is a more credible date from the Government’s point of view.