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Welfare Reform Bill

I think that the objectives of welfare reform have to be to free more people from poverty, to provide more support to get people into employment and to give disabled people the kind of choice and control over their lives that non-disabled people have. I support the Bill because I believe that it will move us further in the right direction in all three respects. I do not believe that this Bill provides a solution to the global economic crisis, nor do I believe that it will create the extra millions of jobs that are needed pretty quickly in this country. That is a matter for fiscal policy—I hope that more of that will be done in the near future—and for co-ordination internationally. The idea that there is some kind of choice between welfare reform on the one hand and policies to stimulate the economy on the other is wrong. The act of shifting money from one budget head to another will not on its own increase demand and will not of itself boost the economy.