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Welfare Reform Bill

Like the hon. Member for Selby (Mr. Grogan), I am a great fan of the Webbs. I find it odd that an amendment tabled by a former Government adviser who now feels comfortable in the Conservative party is being resisted as "too soft". Sometimes I cannot work out who is on which side. We have to be on the side of the child and the family, so we have real concerns about the motion to disagree with amendment 2. Various arguments have been advanced as to why we should reject amendment 2. One is that the amendment is not clear, because it uses the phrase "single parent" rather than "lone parent", but it is fairly obvious what it means. Indeed, Lord McKenzie, in opposing the amendment in the other place said that it would mean that""lone parents with a youngest child aged three or four would be required to attend a work-focused interview",—[Official Report, House of Lords, 22 October 2009; Vol. 713, c. 840.]" so he knew perfectly well what it meant. If the Government's only objection is that this amendment is not tidy enough, they could have tabled an amendment to make the provision work properly, but they do not want it to work properly, which is not a credible argument. It has been argued that the amendment does not apply to the full range of benefits, but only to certain ones, and that it could be tidied up. If it simply needs sorting out, but its spirit is accepted, the Government could deal with the matter. However, the Government do not want to deal with the matter, because they do not agree with the principle, and it is the principle that must concern us now. I thought that the Minister was very candid when I asked him why we need the stick. Why do we need to blackmail lone parents with a youngest child of three or four to take all the goodies, help and assistance that is on offer? According to the Government, lone parents need to be forced to take that, because the Government know what is best for them. That is clearly the Government's position, as the Minister hinted when he said that we have to make it more uncomfortable for lone parents to do the wrong thing. The key question for Liberals is who decides what is the wrong thing for someone responsible for the well-being of a child aged three or four. Even when a child is as young as three or four, the Government say that they, rather than the parent, know what is best for that child, and they will threaten the household's well-being if the parent does not do what they want, which seems very presumptuous.