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Welfare Reform

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. However, I was disappointed, although not particularly surprised, that the Government chose, once again, to make the Statement first of all to the press rather than to Parliament. Indeed, they engaged with the press and TV so much over the weekend that the Secretary of State for Works and Pensions was able to adjust his second round of articles for the media in response to the criticism levied in the first. The Minister may think that I am being slightly unfair. After all, it is possible that the Secretary of State always intended his article in the Guardian this morning carefully to avoid any mention of increased individual responsibility, in contrast to that in the Mail on Sunday, which stated it loud and clear. Either way, it is not unfair to ask whether the Minister really believes that the Government take the role of Parliament seriously in the light of the premature appearance of the Green Paper on Friday and the extent of the Government’s subsequent briefing of the press. Even to someone who had not read the media coverage, the Statement would not contain many surprises. So many policies have been lifted by the Government from my own party over the past year, from inheritance tax to policies on crime, that they are too numerous to list in full here—but the Statement adds a large handful more. It will therefore come as no shock to the Minister or your Lordships that we support the Government in what they are trying to achieve. I am glad that they have looked again at our suggested changes to the benefit system, and have decided that schemes such as work programmes for those out of work for a long period of time are not as unworkable as they claimed in January when we first announced them. A few of the policies go back even further than that. We have always supported the recommendations that David Freud made in his report last year, and we are glad that he appears to be back in favour after it became clear that the previous Prime Minister’s understanding and support of Freud’s recommendations were not matched by that of his successor. I can repeat here the promise of my honourable friend in another place, Chris Grayling, that we on these Benches will support any government legislation that is needed to implement these proposals. As the Statement says, some of the legislative framework is in place already. Your Lordships will no doubt remember the Welfare Reform Act 2007 where, before Freud’s report fell from favour, the necessary provisions for the implementation of the employment and support allowance were passed with the full support of my noble friend Lord Skelmersdale. The Government have taken a year to answer the question we posed then of when they will actually implement those provisions and complete the transfer from incapacity benefit, but it is all the more welcome for the delay. Will the Government need more legislation in order to implement the other goals laid out in the Statement? Are the Government fully committed this time to implementing these reforms so that we do not have the sort of stop-start enthusiasm that has dogged welfare reform for the past decade? For example, has the Minister’s department cleared with the Treasury the necessary funding to ensure that support programmes necessary to help those currently out of work and on benefits are going to be properly resourced? With the economy starting to feel the effects of the Prime Minister’s years of mismanagement, it will not be easy for many who have never been on benefits to keep their jobs, let alone for those who are working to overcome disability to find new ones. I hope the Government will not perform yet another U-turn when they realise that they cannot implement our proposals only halfway but must fully commit to ensuring properly resourced support infrastructure before any savings on benefits can actually be appreciated. I should like to press the Minister on the Government’s future intentions. The Government have accepted in this Green Paper what we have said for a long time: that ensuring that children are not brought up in workless families is one of the most effective ways to ensure that children are not brought up in poverty. Today we have heard the extremely welcome news that the Government have finally accepted that family life needs to be strengthened, and that this, too, is a critical route to ending child poverty. Does that mean that the Government will accept the Conservative policy to end the couple penalty in the tax credit system?