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Welfare Reform Bill

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s intervention, which underlines that we perhaps need to be more ambitious in rolling out such programmes. There is no point having financial penalties and interviews if programmes are not available for people who are keen, to the point of being desperate, to get into work. I hope that the pressure from this debate might encourage Ministers to roll out such programmes more quickly and aggressively across the country. I am aware that others wish to speak, so I will cut my remarks short. Let me end by saying that, as I believe was pointed out by a Labour Member, this is an historic opportunity for the Government to add to their achievements in welfare reform—which, for the most part, have been relatively disappointing from our point of view—and to take a major step forward. So far, the Government’s record in returning people with disabilities to work has not been one of their highlights, but I hope that as a result of the Bill, especially if it is taken a little further in the direction that I have suggested, many hundreds of thousands of people with disabilities will benefit.