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Benefits Uprating

I was going to thank the hon. Gentleman for welcoming the £2 billion of extra resources that, even in difficult times, this Government have managed to find for those who are poor and vulnerable. However, I did not hear any welcome at all in his remarks. He talked about the increase of 1.5 per cent. in disability and carer's benefits, but it would have been a zero-rate increase if we had not brought it forward as the Chancellor announced yesterday. That is not a cut in benefit; it is a 1.5 per cent. increase in benefit this year, over and above the current rate of RPI minus 1.4 per cent. Does he welcome that? He did not say whether he welcomed the fact that those who rely on disability and carer's benefits will have an increase this year instead of a freeze. On the earnings link for the basic state pension, the hon. Gentleman knows that Parliament has already legislated to restore the link from 2012, or by 2015—the end of the next Parliament—at the latest.