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Mr. Levitt: Like many hon. Members, I believe that the debate has been of high quality. However, that has not been true of all the debate that has taken place outside the Chamber in the past few months. I am afraid that, in many cases, it has produced more heat than light.
For example, people in the country have been led to believe that, if they are now claiming benefits, there is a risk that they will lose them under the proposals in the Bill. That is not the case, although those fears have been cynically manipulated by Conservative Members who do not even have the decency to stay for the last few minutes of the debate.
Kali Mountford:
More of them have just arrived.
Mr. Levitt:
Indeed; there are as many Members on the Conservative Benches now as there have been at any time in the debate.
Outside this Chamber it has been said that the Bill is a "cuts" Bill--which it is not. Thankfully, no one has said that in tonight's debate, because, as has been said from time to time today, there may be changes to different budgets but the overall effect of the package, of which the
incapacity element is only part, is to increase spending on people with disabilities in the years to come, to increase spending on welfare reform and, generally, to improve the lot of the worst-off, especially those with disabilities.
I believe that welfare reform, when looked at in its simplest form, should involve a debate about how we use the available resources to bring most help to the people who most need it. Of course we can talk about generating more help, and about having a bigger pot from which to draw--we shall do so, and we are doing so--but we have been led into a debate about the philosophy underlying the national insurance contribution system.
That debate has not been especially helpful. It has drawn attention to a great many difficulties, inconsistencies and anomalies in the national insurance contribution system. I was surprised but pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Preston (Audrey Wise) alluded to some of the inconsistencies in that system.
I take one good example. As a result of the contributory system, some women whose income is too low have not qualified for maternity benefits. We put that right in the Bill and, by doing so, we flew in the face of the contributory system. We set that system to one side, by giving maternity benefits to women who would not previously have qualified. There has been no outrage about that.
Angela Eagle:
The Conservatives voted against it.
Mr. Levitt:
Indeed they did. Is that a sell-out of the national insurance contribution system?
In the past few months, the debate has become bogged down in such minutiae instead of encompassing all the Bill, which covers a range of Government policies.
Mr. Oliver Letwin (West Dorset):
I have been listening to the hon. Gentleman with increasing astonishment. Is he entirely unaware of the work of his right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field)? Is he entirely unaware of the importance of trying to shift social security towards a system of contributions and away from a system of means testing?
Mr. Levitt:
The contributory system accounts for only about 40 per cent. of the benefit system, and I am aware that there are varying views about how it should develop.
I want to say a quick word about some of the debate on incapacity benefit that has been taking place outside the House, because I believe that some of the issues are of interest only in the House, in the other place or to the higher echelons of some groups outside. Pressure groups exist to get the best that they can for their members. That is the job of the disability movement. That is the job of pressure groups. It is absolutely right that they should push the Government for more and more concessions in their interests, and they have won such concessions. But our job as a Government is different from that of pressure groups. Our job is to balance the needs of different groups and different individuals with the resources that are available to us, and to ensure that we target those resources, as we have done in the past week with the disabled person's tax credit, where they will give the most help--where they will be the most efficient in relieving poverty and improving welfare.
Some people--increasing numbers over the years--have catered for such an eventuality by taking matters into their own hands and investing in occupational pensions. Some of them--a tiny number, I admit--receive occupational pension incomes that are higher than the salary of Back-Bench Members of Parliament. I do not begrudge them that. [Hon. Members: "How many?"] It is a tiny number.
When we are guaranteeing to our pensioners a minimum income of £75 a week, to a disabled person in work a minimum income of £132 a week, to a person on the national minimum wage who works a 40-hour week a wage of £144 a week, and to a working family--by definition, a minimum of two people--an income of £200 a week, through the working families tax credit, why on earth should we top up with replacement benefits the incomes of single people who have no dependants and who receive incomes that are already in excess of £150 a week and, often, considerably more than that?
The minimum guaranteed income for a person with an occupational pension of £85 a week who receives £66.75 a week incapacity benefit is £151.75. That assumes that the person is on short-term incapacity benefit--it is bigger if he is on the long-term benefit--has no dependants and does not receive the age allowance. Let us consider how that compares to all other guaranteed incomes. It is the most generous of all.
I am not particularly worried about how manypeople have incomes of £20,000, £30,000 or more from occupational pensions and are claiming incapacity benefit, because it is not our job as a Labour Government to look after them when we are not guaranteeing the same income to people in the other groups that I have mentioned.
Mr. Berry:
Would my hon. Friend remove all benefits from people on those incomes?
Mr. Levitt:
We are talking about an income- replacement benefit. We have also mentioned the disability living allowance, which is not related to income. If such people qualified for DLA, they would get it.
Mr. Gordon Prentice (Pendle):
My hon. Friend and I disagree about numbers. I have in my hand a letter from the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux, which has been circulated to all hon. Members, which reminds us that only 2.3 per cent. of incapacity benefit
Mr. Levitt:
That is the figure for now, not for the future. Also, we are guaranteeing to people with an occupational pension of £85 a week a top-up to a basic income of more than £150. We are talking not only about people who have an income of more than £200 or £300 a week, but about those who receive more than £150-odd a week, which is higher than the income which we guarantee to any other group in the population.
I remind the House that the proposed taper for occupational pensions in the Government's amendment is the second most generous in the entire benefits system. Housing benefit tapers at 65 per cent., working families tax credit and disabled persons tax credit at 55 per cent., and jobseeker's allowance, and even the old-age pension, at 100 per cent.--one loses pound for pound on those. Only council tax benefit, which tapers at 20 per cent, is more generous.
Although I shall not ask now, because I am running short of time, I should like to know whether my hon. Friend the Member for Kingswood (Mr. Berry) thinks that the 23 per cent. taper that he is advocating for incapacity benefit should be applied to all benefits. If so, has that proposal been costed, and would it be a justified use of resources in helping people who need such help most?
At a meeting on Monday night, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) asked what else would be lost if the Bill were to fall on the incapacity benefit issue. The answer is very simple: we would lose the highest rate of disability benefit ever paid to young people who have severe disabilities; DLA for three and four-year-old children; the stakeholder pension, with its protection for those on low pay and with broken contribution records; bereavement benefits for widows; maternity benefits for women on low pay; and the single gateway.
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