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Welfare Reform Bill

I take exception to any suggestion that the views of the government Bench are part of a political game. The noble Lord, Lord Freud, is a fairly late entrant to the discussions on lone parents. Members on the Liberal Democrat and Labour Benches have fought the corner of lone-parent poverty for something like 15-plus years. I take strong exception to being told that we are now in a political game as we come up to a general election. Those remarks are unfortunate and I hope that, on reflection, he will feel able to withdraw them. None of us makes such aspersions in this House and all of us assume good faith, however misguided we may think any amendment may be. I hope that the noble Lord will accept that statement. The noble Lord’s original amendment was highly regrettable, ill thought out, back to front and illogical. It would have meant that the lone parent faced greater conditionality and greater sanction for the lesser failure—of turning up for an interview— and with a younger child. But when it came to the greater failure, to follow through a commitment that they had given to enter work preparation—a commitment which was more feasible given the greater age of their child—the noble Lord would have removed the sanction. In other words, the conditionality in the sanction applies for the lesser offence on the younger child, but not for the greater failure and the older child. That is daft. I am amazed that the noble Lord thinks that there is any coherence in his position. I have been involved in new deals for eight or 10 years as a junior Minister and subsequently. I know that, without the evidence of conditionality backed by a sanction, the participation of the group of lone parents that one most wants to reach and is hardest to reach becomes essentially voluntary. In that sense, what the original amendment would have done, which is why it was so deplorable, is drive a coach and horses through the concept of trying to ensure that all lone parents of children aged three to five are engaged in work preparation. The Benches opposite would have made that entirely voluntary. That is not in the best interests of the lone parent or the child. My noble friend has spelt out a long list of good cause and protections and efforts to engage lone parents. Of course we want the lone parent as a willing participant, because that is how we will ensure that she goes into the labour market in due course and stays there. That is the outcome that we want. But I know that the later that engagement with the lone parent is left, the harder and longer that journey is—and it is no kindness to the lone parent or her child that the journey should be made tougher for her than it already is. That was the focus of the original, deplorable amendment. Finally, the noble Lord said that he and his party were on the side of attacking poverty. I hope that at some point he will guarantee—and I invite him to come back to me—that the tax credits that make work pay for lone parents will be protected in their entirety, should there be any change of government. Let me remind the noble Lord that as a result of tax credits, which his party fought all the way, a lone parent going into work at 16 hours a week at minimum wage takes home double that pay as a result of tax credits. An unskilled lone parent returns home with the pay of a semi-skilled man. That has transformed outcomes for that lone parent and her child, and I invite the noble Lord—since he has made the commitment today that his party will overturn the thrust of the Commons amendment, which is to engage the lone parent in work preparation with a child between three and five—to make a similar commitment today that he will protect tax credits, which alone ensure that it is worth while for the lone parent to go out to work on a part-time basis. I invite the noble Lord to respond.