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Welfare Reform and Incapacity Benefit

Well, we shall wait and see how many times the present Government are re-elected. The right hon. and learned Gentleman may have the opportunity to resurrect his own leadership election campaign after the next election. He made a very good appeal for last-minute support this afternoon. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that he was deeply disturbed that the welfare reform Green Paper is to be published in January. I have difficulty reconciling the words of his motion and what he said today with the comments of the hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron)—briefly the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s rival and soon to be his new boss. The hon. Member for Witney said on 8 November in his speech to the Centre for Policy Studies:"““Conservative economic empowerment””—" that is something of an oxymoron, of course—"““is a long term agenda to lift more people more securely from dependency to self sufficiency. The details of our agenda will take years rather than months to develop.””" So there we have it. We will be publishing our proposals for welfare reform within months of being returned to office, and we are accused of incoherence. The hon. Gentleman’s proposals will not see the light of day for years, and we are invited to take the view that his party has a better alternative. What complete and utter rubbish. We take a very different view of these matters. The difference between our approach and the approach of the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea could not be clearer. We believe in a modern, active, welfare state, able to help extend opportunities to people so that they can help themselves and their families, and we have put this new approach into practice in the face of opposition from both Conservative and Liberal Democrat Members in the House. His approach, by contrast, such as we are able to discern it, is all about limiting the support and help that is on offer.