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House of Commons
Tuesday 10 December 1996
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[Madam Speaker in the Chair]
PRIVATE BUSINESS
King's College London Bill [Lords]
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That the Promoters of the King's College London Bill [Lords] may, notwithstanding anything in the Standing Orders or practice of this House, proceed with the Bill in the present Session; and the Petition for the Bill shall be deemed to have been deposited and all Standing Orders applicable thereto shall be deemed to have been complied with;
Hon. Members:
Object.
That if the Bill is brought from the Lords in the present Session, the Agents for the Bill shall deposit in the Private Bill Office a declaration signed by them stating that the Bill is the same, in every respect, as the Bill which was brought from the Lords in the last Session;
That, as soon as a certificate by one of the Clerks in the Private Bill Office, that such a declaration has been so deposited, has been laid upon the Table of the House, the Bill shall be read the first and second time (and shall be recorded in the Journal of this House as having been so read) and shall be ordered to be read the third time;
That no further Fees shall be charged in respect of any proceedings on the Bill in respect of which Fees have already been incurred during any previous Session.--[The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means.]
Debate to be resumed on Tuesday 17 December.
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Oral Answers to Questions
SOCIAL SECURITY
Jobseeker's Allowance
1. Mr. Austin Mitchell: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will make a statement on the introduction of the jobseeker's allowance. [6820]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Roger Evans): Jobseeker's allowance has now been in operation for two months. It is helping people back to work and securing better value for money for the taxpayer.
Mr. Mitchell: Is it correct that this vicious, half-baked and ill-conceived measure is now producing all kinds of problems behind the scenes? Benefit offices are overwhelmed with work, so cases are taking two to three times longer than they took under unemployment benefit. Is it also correct that share fishermen, with their share fisherman's stamp, are experiencing unique difficulties because of their inability to produce proof of earnings from their last trip?
Mr. Evans: The general thrust of that question is misguided. Of course there are difficulties with such a complicated scheme, which involves many officials, but broadly speaking it is working well. I am astonished that the hon. Gentleman makes that point about share fishermen. With jobseeker's allowance--as before with unemployment benefit--they enjoy a special protected status that is unique in the benefits system, which reflects the hazardous and arduous nature of their work. The rules regarding their earnings have not been made more difficult. Share fishermen have been exempted from the remunerative work rule, and the averaging rules for their earnings under JSA are favourable to them.
Mr. Bernard Jenkin: Does my hon. Friend agree that nothing serves the recipients of benefits worse than for us to regard our responsibilities as having ended once we have handed over the money to them? Is it not much better for financial help to go hand in hand with active encouragement to find work and to get back into the labour market, because unemployment is the greatest evil that stalks this land and is the root of poverty in Britain?
Mr. Evans: The thrust of my hon. Friend's argument is right. In connection with the jobseeker's package, we introduced the back-to-work bonus, the national insurance contributions holiday, the extended four-week payments of housing benefit and council tax benefit, earnings top-ups and child disregard. Those measures are part of the Government's general package to get people off benefit and into work.
Benefits Agency (Wales)
2. Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what representations he has received
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concerning the proposals by the management of the Benefits Agency in Wales for the closure of processing units and public caller offices. [6845]
Mr. Jones: I am grateful to the Minister for that reply. Is he aware that, in the past 12 months, there were 16,000 personal calls to the Benefits Agency office in Holyhead, 5,000 claims for social fund payments and 3,500 payments over the counter? How can the Benefits Agency claim that it provides a better service to the people of Holyhead, Llangefni and other areas in Wales when it is withdrawing facilities and closing offices? Vulnerable people will be worse off if the plans are implemented. We are grateful to the Minister for the two-months extension of the consultation period. Will he go one step further and scrap the plans?
Mr. Evans: The proposals are subject to consultation. As the hon. Gentleman said, the period has been extended and has not yet expired. The hon. Gentleman draws attention to the use of Benefits Agency offices in Anglesey at the moment, but he should bear in mind the fact that powerful factors are changing, and will change, the way in which people use Benefits Agency offices. The jobseeker's allowance is a streamlined benefit that has covered all unemployed people since 7 October. Previously, 70 per cent. of the unemployed case load was on income support, and those people went to a Benefits Agency office. There are four jobcentres in Anglesey, all of which provide a service for JSA.
Mr. Rogers: Does the Minister accept that the proposals for south Wales are, at the very least, ill conceived and half baked, and that whoever drew them up had no concept of the geography of south Wales? In the Rhondda valleys, for example, people will have to travel many miles by means of very poor public transport, because many of them do not have any private transport. The idea that they can do their business by telephone is just as daft. Will the Minister issue telephones to them so that they can contact his Department?
Mr. Evans: The hon. Gentleman's comments, and all other representations, will be taken into account before any decision is made. I must point out to him, however, that telephone calls to the Benefits Agency are increasing in number and that, in certain circumstances, they are a more popular way of doing business with it. Modern technology enables telephone inquiries to be moved from where they are received to anywhere where an official is immediately available to deal with them. All those are important factors, and they will be borne in mind before a decision is taken.
State Pension
3. Mr. Amess: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will ask the Government Actuary to estimate the additional cost of paying a full basic pension from age 60 years. [6847]
The Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Peter Lilley): At the instigation of the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman), I have already asked the
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Government Actuary to estimate the additional cost of allowing people to draw the full basic pension from age 60. He calculates that the cost would build up to an extra £15 billion per year.
Mr. Amess: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that, to avoid the £15 billion cost of setting the pension age at 60, the basic state pension would have to be cut by £20 a week in Basildon, Southend, and across the country? Will he confirm that cutting the basic state pension by £20 a week is now the policy of the Opposition?
Mr. Lilley: I can confirm all the points made by my hon. Friend. The hon. Member for Peckham wrote to me after I had pointed out that the cost of her policy would be £15 billion a year. She stated:
- "In government we will protect the public purse from any increase in expenditure . . . We will have to consider what level of basic state pension should be paid . . . We would seek the advice of the Government Actuary, but we anticipate . . . lower level of basic state pension."
Mr. O'Hara: Speaking of pensions, the Secretary of State has referred to changes in the rules governing war pensions as "simplification". Since when does "simplification" mean cuts in four separate allowances for war pensioners and a tightening of eligibility rules for others? In whose dictionary does "cuts" mean "simplification"? Is it not merely a Tory con trick?
Mr. Lilley: I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is joining in on a scaremongering story, which has been discredited since the leader of his party started it the other day. He should now know that we sent a detailed explanation of the measures that we were proposing to every member of the Central Advisory Committee on War Pensions, including the Labour party representative, the hon. Member for Mansfield (Mr. Meale). They have had a week, since the Budget, to consider the explanation. Last Thursday, they met in full session--although the hon. Member for Mansfield was not able to attend and did not feel that the measures were a threat to the people he and the other committee members represent--at the end of which they unanimously deplored the leaks and the story in The Guardian, and commended the manner in which my right hon. and noble Friend the Minister of State had handled the matter.
Subsequently, the Royal British Legion issued a statement which said:
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Mr. Booth:
In addition to protecting the basic pension, have we not also protected basic savings, in contrast to the Labour party, which presided over a great destruction of savings between 1974 and 1979, as inflation ripped away?
Mr. Lilley:
My hon. Friend is right. The greatest threat to pensioners is inflation. We know that inflation is what happens under Labour Governments. In a single year, the last Labour Government wiped out one quarter of the value of the lifetime savings of pensioners. That is why we have had to introduce extra help for the elderly people who retired under Labour--to enable them to rebuild their savings under a good Conservative Government.
Ms Harman:
As those in retirement who are entitled to extra help from the Department of Social Security are war pensioners, will the Secretary of State confirm that one option that was not put out for consultation, but was under consideration as recently as 14 November, was
Mr. Lilley:
I am astonished that the hon. Lady should make that statement when she knows, because I wrote to her earlier today, that it is false. Neither I nor any of my Ministers have considered any such proposal. The hon. Lady may have a bit of paper written by a junior official purporting to suggest that it has been considered, but it has never been submitted to Ministers, has never been considered by Ministers, is not approved by Ministers and is not part of the package put to war pensioners. It is shocking and discreditable that the hon. Lady is trying to cause distress to elderly people who rightly receive help because of the mental suffering caused by their treatment at the hands of the enemy.
"The overall consensus was that there is nothing unduly confrontational in the paper to cause concern among the ex-service organisations".
The British Limbless Ex-Service Men's Association wrote to The Guardian to condemn its story, upon which the Opposition continue to rely, as containing
"a number of grave errors which can only cause distress to War Pensioners."
Why are the Opposition causing distress to war pensioners?
"restricting in some way claims by those with psychiatric conditions"?
That is a quotation from a DSS document. The principle of paying compensation for psychiatric conditions has been recognised since our troops experienced shell shock during world war one and suffered in Japanese prisoner of war camps in world war two. Will the Secretary of State keep faith with that principle and withdraw the proposal? Will he tell the House that he rules out restrictions on claims for psychiatric conditions caused by active military service?
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