---

Welfare Reform

No, my Lords, that is not part of our proposals. Benefit sanctions are not new. They exist at the moment and people cope. Evidence shows that once someone has been sanctioned, overwhelmingly they tend not to be sanctioned a second time. It is an important issue. Withdrawal of benefit should be done only on the basis of clear guidelines and a clear understanding of what the system requires and what the conditionality is. Some of the evidence is that that is not always well understood, so part of what we must be about is to make sure that there is good communication about the rights, responsibilities and boundaries of the system.