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Welfare Reform Bill

The phrase "holes and digging" sprang into my mind as the Minister went through his brief. The Minister has said that action plans will take into account personal circumstances. We are not going to have—again to use an expression used earlier by the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas—one size fits all. There will be a shelf, if you like, from which you can pick the various bits that are appropriate to that individual as it seems to the personal adviser. The personal adviser and the individual will agree what they are going to do. That will be set in concrete, almost, in the action plan. I cannot see why these action plans should not be described as personalised. I said that I was not wedded to the particular word, given that these amendments use the word "individual"; none the less, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas. She, like me, believes that you need to give confidence in legislation, especially social security legislation, to those people who are going to be affected by it. At the moment, I cannot see that sort of confidence arising in the Bill. Of course I shall withdraw the amendment, but I have absolutely no doubt that I shall need to come back to this at the next stage of the Bill, unless the Minister’s comments throw me.