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Social Security

The hon. Gentleman will have to wait for the publication of the policy commission’s report; I am not going to do a Mystic Meg impression and guess what it will say. There will of course be a full, grown-up debate on the idea of a simpler and fairer benefits system, and all parties are welcome to contribute, but I am not going to make any premature judgments about means-testing. Ministers know as well as we do that some element of means-testing will be necessary in any benefits system in a mature western industrialised democracy. It is stupid to suggest that we could abolish means-testing across all benefits as a matter of ideological principle. The tricky question for all parties is where to draw the line. The hon. Gentleman will have to wait and see how the debate unfolds. Lone parents will access many of the benefits that are the subject of this order. I welcome the Department’s recent comments on the importance of getting lone parents back to work, but we must be sure to get the language right. This is not about ““sticks””. The days have gone when politicians wielded a big stick towards customers of the benefit system. We need a lot more ““carrot””, and my party understands that policy imperative. We have to win hearts and minds when it comes to getting people out of dependency, not to employ tough macho rhetoric. I hope that we do not hear too much of that from Ministers, or anyone else. It is important to reform the regime for lone parents—in the sense of providing more opportunities, not of forcing them into work in a punitive way—because child poverty levels are a function, to a greater or lesser extent, of whether a lone parent is in work. In that context, it is worth remembering, when considering the benefits that are the subject of this order, that the Government have another string to their bow. Uprating is sensible and necessary, but it is not a sufficient condition for tackling poverty across all income groups and sectors of society. The Minister referred to the Welfare Reform Bill, but we must remember—again in a grown-up and mature way—that it was perhaps not the flagship radical reform promised at the time of the Green Paper. We know that Ministers accept that the Bill did not do enough to support people back into work. Why else would the Secretary of State have commissioned a review in December last year, led by the Minister for Employment and Welfare Reform, assisted by Mr. David Freud? That will be of interest to those receiving the benefits that are the subject of this order. They will get their uprating, as we will not vote against the order, but they will want to know what is going on when the Secretary of State has to commission, in very short order, a radical look at what the welfare state does. At least, that is how his briefers represented it to journalists. Perhaps the Minister who winds up could share with the House some details about when the Freud review will be published and debated. Someone from the Department briefed the Financial Times this time last week—there is no reason why they should not do so—that we could expect the review some time this week. In the interests of a decent, grown-up and informed debate, Ministers might wish to inform the rest of the House when we may expect the Freud review, and also assure us that they will ask the Leader of the House for some Government time in which to debate its contents. I hope that when we debate next year’s uprating order, fewer people will be in dependency and more people who want support will get it. I also hope that the millions of people who say that they would work if they had the proper support will have had the chance that they want to have a better life for themselves and their families and to be less reliant on benefits. We hope, too, that more of our fellow citizens will be able to make arrangements for their pensionable age, so that some of the currently all-too-low pensioner incomes will be higher. We will work with the Government on any proposals they may make, but I serve them notice that Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition will make their own proposals to deliver better welfare and a fairer system that lifts more people out of dependency, which is not where so many of our citizens really want to be.