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Wales
Government Legislative Programme
The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Paul Murphy): I am pleased to inform the House that the Government’s fourth session legislative programme will contain 14 Bills. Almost every one will affect Wales in some way.
The programme builds on the pre-Budget report with a focus on helping people meet the economic challenges they are facing particularly in this current climate.
The Government will take forward measures to ensure fairness in our society, with fair rules, a fair say and a fair chance for all.
There will be two Bills with framework provisions:
Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill
Marine and Coastal Access Bill
Further information on these provisions will be made available after the Bills’ introductions.
A further six Bills at least will contain specific provisions for Wales, which will generally be provisions to confer the same powers on Welsh Ministers, in devolved areas of responsibility, as are being conferred on UK Ministers in those areas in relation to England. These are:
Business Rates Supplements
Children, Skills and Learning
Coroners and Justice
Equality
Policing and Crime
Welfare Reform
Further Welsh provisions may be included as Bills continue to be developed.
The Government continue to remain committed to delivering devolution through provisions in Westminster Bills and by using the Legislative Competence Order process.
Work and Pensions
Personalised Conditionality and Support
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (James Purnell): On Tuesday 2 December, I received Professor Paul Gregg’s report on the effectiveness of the conditionality requirements that are currently applied to working age benefit claimants. This report “Realising Potential: A Vision for Personalised Conditionality and Support”, was commissioned by my Department earlier this year.
The report is wide-ranging and ambitious and looks at the effectiveness of welfare reform and how more unemployed people, lone parents and people with a health condition or disability can access personalised help and be supported back to work. While the economic backdrop to the review is challenging it remains crucial to consider, debate and put in place further reforms to the welfare state to ensure we help as many disadvantaged people as possible to find work.
The report assesses the effectiveness of the current requirements that apply to the unemployed and to other groups. Evidence suggests that the requirements that apply to the unemployed on jobseeker’s allowance have been highly effective over the past decade. The work-focused interview regime that applies to other claimants has also had some success, but primarily for those closest to the labour market.
However, the report recognises that the numbers of people getting support are still low compared to the numbers who do actually want to get back to work. This means that many of the most vulnerable people are
not accessing help that evidence tells us is effective. This denies the wider financial, health and well-being gains that comes from working.
The report makes a number of important recommendations around how to address the weaknesses that remain within the current benefit system to ensure more people can access support and get back to work. The report suggests that almost everyone claiming benefit and not in work should:
be required to engage in activity that will help them to move towards, and then into employment;
have an empowered personal adviser with whom they will be able to agree a route back to work;
be obliged to agree an action plan on the steps they agree with their adviser will help them;
have a clear understanding of the expectations placed upon them (and why) and what the consequences for failing to meet these are; and
be able to access a wide range of personal support on the basis of need not benefit label.
The report makes clear that the Department should not seek to realise this vision by expecting lone parents with younger children and people with a health condition or disability to be treated as though they were unemployed and be made to look for suitable jobs. This would be counter-productive, unreasonable and punitive. Rather the report recommends the creation of an entirely new sort of conditionality regime for people who have a good opportunity to secure employment with time, encouragement and support. People in this “Progression to Work” group should face requirements which:
reflect the claimants co-ownership of the return to work process;
are tailored to their capability and built around their circumstances;
are based on activity that supports their own route back to work; and
are linked up with effective support.
The report also identifies some groups of people who should face no conditionality requirements whatsoever. These groups are lone parents and partners with very young children, carers with the most significant caring responsibilities and people with the most severe health conditions.
To realise this vision the report suggests that the right support needs to be made available, based on need rather than what benefit people are on. We also need to make sure those who deliver employment support, whether in Jobcentre Plus or the private and voluntary sector, have the right incentives to deliver the right support at the right time.
The Department warmly welcomes the report and will consider Professor Gregg’s findings very carefully and will respond shortly.
Copies of “Realising Potential: A Vision for Personalised Conditionality and Support” have been placed in the Library of the House.
Winter Supplementary Estimates
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (James Purnell): Subject to parliamentary approval of the necessary supplementary estimate, the Department for Work and Pensions departmental expenditure limit will increase by £3,752,000 from £7,834,033,000 to £7,837,785,000 and the administration budget will increase by £1,292,000 from £5,692,537,000 to £5,693,829,000.
Within the departmental expenditure limit change, the impact on resource and capital is as set out in the following table:
| Change £’000 | New Departmental Expenditure Limit £’000 | |||||
| Voted | Non-voted | Total | Voted | Non-voted | Total | |
| (1) Depreciation, which forms part of resource departmental expenditure limit, is excluded from the total departmental expenditure limit since the capital departmental expenditure limit includes capital spending and to include depreciation of those assets would lead to double counting. | ||||||
Resource Departmental Expenditure Limit
The change in the resource element of the departmental expenditure limit arises from:
Request for Resources 2
i) A budget transfer of £569,000 to the Ministry of Justice to fund training relating to the introduction of employment support allowance.
ii) A budget transfer of £3,500,000 to the Ministry of Justice to fund expected increases in consent orders through the courts for child maintenance, following repeal of section 6 of the Child Support Act 1991.
Request for Resources 5
iii) A machinery of government transfer of £1,030,000 from Cabinet Office in respect of the electronic delivery team. the electronic delivery team is responsible for the Government Gateway.
iv) A budget transfer of £45,000 to HM Treasury to support the work of the Centre of Expertise in Sustainable Procurement.
v) A budget transfer of £40,000 to Cabinet Office to support the work of the Government secure zone.
vi) A budget transfer of £376,000 from Cabinet Office to enable the Department to meet additional costs arising from the expansion of services provided by the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel.
vii) A budget transfer of £4,000,000 from the Department for Children, Schools and Families in respect of the costs of Caxton House, for which this Department has taken over management responsibility and agreed the transfer of the property to Land Securities Trillium.
Capital Departmental Expenditure Limit
The change in the capital element of the departmental expenditure limit arises from:
Request for Resources 2
viii) A machinery of government transfer of £210,000 from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to the Health and Safety Executive in respect of the Pesticides Safety Directorate. This transfer occurs as a result of the Hampton Review on regulatory inspections and enforcement.
Request for Resources 5
ix) Budget transfers of £2,000,000 from the Department for Children, Schools and Families and £1,000,000 from the Department for Communities and Local Government relating to the work of Government Connect. Government Connect is a strategic partnership between national and local government that provides a secure IT infrastructure between central government departments and local authorities.
The movement in the administration cost limit arises from the changes to the resource departmental expenditure limit as noted in items i) to iv), vi) and vii).
Movements in Non-Voted Expenditure
The reduction in non-voted resource expenditure is due to a reduction in the cost of administering national insurance fund benefit payments. This reduction is offset by an increase in voted resource due to an equivalent reduction in income from HM Revenue and Customs to meet the cost of administering national insurance fund benefit payments:
Request for Resources 2
x) A reduction in non-voted resource expenditure of £32,415,000 offset by an increase in voted resource expenditure of £32,415,000.
Request for Resources 3
xi) A reduction in non-voted resource expenditure of £25,448,000 offset by an increase in voted resource expenditure of £25,448,000.
Request for Resources 5
xii) A reduction in non-voted resource expenditure of £19,444,000 offset by an increase in voted resource expenditure of £19,444,000.
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