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Mr. Alfred Morris: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. My concern about the Minister's speech
arises from a suspicion that he may have picked up the one prepared for him by his officials for Third Reading, rather than the one for the amendment. We have limited time, but is that what has happened?
Madam Deputy Speaker: That cannot possibly be a matter for the Chair.
Mr. Bowis: I am grateful, Madam Speaker. If the right hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Morris) listens, he will discover where my argument is leading. I am sure that he would join me in paying tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Kent and the other parents of the Bill, including my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelsea (Sir N. Scott) and my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, North-East (Mr. Thurnham).
Another stalwart advocate of the Bill was my erstwhile hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon(Mr. Howarth), who urged us to bring this in on a limited basis so that it could be seen to work and so that it would reassure those who were genuinely concerned about the potential costs and about numbers of applicants. Although he believed at that stage that there should be a tight definition of disability to limit eligibility, we have gone much further than that. Nevertheless, I agreed with him then, as I do now, that the pace of implementation is important.
We suggested that there should be waves of implementation, as have been used successfully when introducing other health and welfare reforms. It is because the idea at first came from disabled people of working age that we thought it right that they should go first. We did, however, listen carefully to the people who had contributed to our consultation exercise--including hon. Members from all parties--and decided as a result to expand this first wave to include learning as well as physically disabled people.
It was, and is, our clear intention that this was to be the first wave and that other waves would follow. Indeed, I am able to confirm that, at the end of the first year of the operation of the scheme, we shall review it with a view to extending it to people over 65. This would, as is only sensible, be subject to there not having been serious problems apparent in the first year of operation that demanded a refining or revision of the scheme in some way. I hope that that puts at rest the concerns that I know have been genuinely felt by colleagues in the House and by some people outside that the Bill in some way excludes older people for all time.
Mr. Alan Howarth:
I am grateful to the Minister for what he has just said, but although there is a strong practical case for phasing and taking such an enormously important and beneficial change at a manageable pace, why does he insist on arrogating to himself and to the Government the power to determine the rate of that change? Why should it not be for local authorities to determine the process and the timing of the introduction of the scheme? Would it not be far better to assess the eligibility to receive direct payments in terms of individual need rather than of broad and inevitably crude categories of claimants? To do so on that basis is inevitably discriminatory.
Mr. Bowis:
As the hon. Gentleman acknowledged, initially he wanted to limit the scheme to a narrow
Mr. Kirkwood:
The Minister said that he would consider extending the scheme to the elderly after the first year. Will he go further and consider establishing some pilot projects to extend the measure to the elderly during that first year? That would demonstrate his good faith and show that he had in mind extending the measure in due course.
Mr. Bowis:
I do not intend to put that on the face of the Bill, but there is nothing to stop pilots--as the hon. Gentleman would describe them--being established under existing and voluntary schemes, as that might help to inform the pattern of activity. We shall be interested in how the implementation takes place, and, once local authorities become responsible for the schemes, whether they are able to set them up effectively and manage the demand, the procedures and the monitoring in such a way as I desperately want, so that the measure works and gains public respect and support and does not collapse in recriminations.
Mr. Tom Clarke:
We are at the heart of the legislation and we want to be clear as to the Government's position. If the Government happen to be in office in 12 months' time, will they review the position, or is the Minister telling us today that they will remove the exclusions in 12 months' time?
Mr. Bowis:
No. I have tried to make it clear that when the scheme has been operating for a year, we shall be able to assess--not with any great bureaucratic procedures, but in a fairly simple, straightforward way--how well it has worked in the first year. As I said, we shall do that with a view to extending the scheme, provided that no substantial problems have been identified leading to its refinement, review and reform.
Mr. Clarke:
I am genuinely grateful to the Minister for giving way again, but we want to be absolutely clear. What evidence of information does he think that there will be in a year's time--if his party happens to be in Government--that we do not have now?
Mr. Bowis:
We shall have, in Government, evidence of a year's operation of the direct payments scheme. I shall return to the hon. Gentleman's point, but I want to deal with some serious issues. I hope that he will take the matter seriously as it is important to look carefully at how the scheme is operated. We share the same objective. We all want to make it possible for everyone who is eligible to benefit, but I want to make sure that we have a system in place that is operating effectively.
Mr. Roger Berry (Kingswood):
Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Bowis:
I shall make some progress and then of course I shall give way.
I wish to dismiss one piece of nonsense that has crept into some of the public discussion of the matter. Much has been said about discrimination. I want to underline absolutely and clearly that the measure does not discriminate against older people, any more than it discriminates in favour of disabled and learning disabled people. It is simply an operational matter of who is in the first wave and who is in the second and any subsequent waves. Everyone to whom I have spoken--I have heard it again today--agrees that implementation must be phased.
In answer to the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon, social service departments made it clear that they wanted phasing and a clear two to one majority of those who wanted phasing wanted the Government and Parliament to set the phases. The lobbies and groups wanted phasing, but I have to say--I have spoken to many of them--that they are not of one mind as to how it should be done. Some wanted phasing by numbers--rationing on the basis of first come, first served--others wanted phasing by level of costs, others wanted geographical pilots and others thought that the whole onus should be placed on the shoulders of local authorities to decide their own phasing policy.
Since our debates in Committee, I have re-examined all the options. I have met a range of people with experience in these matters and I have visited and talked to the members of one of the best existing schemes in Kingston upon Thames. Each of the alternatives to the one that we have proposed results in difficulties, anomalies and unfairnesses. I have pointed out that social services at operational level wants Parliament to set the phasing. Phasing by numbers would mean that two people with equal needs and equal abilities to manage a direct payments package would be dealt with differently. That could lead only to resentment and possibly even to judicial review.
Rationing by cost would seem to be both unfair and a perverse incentive to increase the cost of a package in order to qualify. I also have the words of my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Sir A. Bowden)--what I call the "Kemptown warning"--ringing in my ears. On Second Reading, he rightly and fairly pointed out that once local authorities had the discretion to introduce a scheme, local pressure groups would be unremitting in their determination to see them do so. My great fear is that, without an effective phasing mechanism, authorities with no experience of any scheme whatsoever would either decline to start one, or would try to do everything at once and make a hash of it, perhaps with vulnerable people suffering.
Sir Andrew Bowden (Brighton, Kemptown):
My hon Friend mentioned what he calls the "Kemptown warning". I understand when he is saying about phasing. If he were to give the House a specific timetable--based on exact dates--as to when the scheme would come into operation, phased, I would find that quite acceptable. I am in a difficult position as I know that my hon. Friend is saying with total good faith that he wants to review, consider and examine the position at a particular time without making a firm specific commitment. However, will he look again at phasing and say over what period of time--specifying
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