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Social Security (Income Support and Jobseeker’s Allowance) Amendment Regulations 2006

My Lords, I do not propose to emulate the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, although I congratulate him on his ingenuity in having a dry run for the debate on the pensions White Paper next week. Many of the points he makes are sensible. I shall focus on the decision that there should be an eight-week cut-off period. It seems to me that the first line of Regulation 2(4)(c)(a), which is,"““for more than eight weeks””," is unnecessary, because the second criterion is,"““where he does not, before the period during which he is required to attend the court or tribunal, give an employment officer notice, in writing where requested by the employment officer, that he is so required””." That seems to me to be a perfectly satisfactory and proper way in which to notify the employment officer so that he knows whether a case is on. I cannot for the life of me see why the principle is affected, whether the case lasts for one week or 12 weeks, and why the person should still continue to get their jobseeker’s allowance. That is an important principle, and I do not see why eight weeks is the cut-off point. Indeed, I do not think that there should be a cut-off point at all. It will take a good deal to persuade me why that should be so. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, that we need some explanation on the 96 hours, especially in relation to people being detained under the Terrorism Act, whom we must always remember are suspects; they have not been convicted of anything. Could we have an explanation of that? My strongest feeling is that the eight weeks is not an appropriate limit; indeed, there should be no limit at all, as long as the notification has properly been made. Subject to those points, we on these Benches support these sensible regulations.