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Audrey Wise: And employers. There are rather more unscrupulous employers, but the hon. Gentlemanis attacking lone parents. Throwing in a sop--acknowledging that there are unscrupulous employers--will not do. If we follow him down his road, those who will suffer will be not employers, but lone parents, who will not have the opportunity to take work, to give it a try and to see if it works out, without suffering a penalty if it does not.
All sorts of things can happen when a lone parent seeks and takes a job. The child may find that it is not happy with the mother going to work. The mother may find that the child-care arrangements break down. The child may become ill. There may be more stress on the family than
the parent had anticipated, so having an opportunity of a 12-week period in which the premium is not risked is a wholly good thing, compared with the previous arrangement, where there was to be no linking period.
Having complained about 12 weeks, the hon. Member for West Chelmsford expects us to believe that he is seriously proposing a year's linking period. I am interested that he did not say anything about that last December. He has never said anything about that until this evening. I am sure that, if the Government had brought forward that proposal, which I would have accepted and supported, he would have said, "Oh dear me. It is going to cost the taxpayer a great deal of money." All he and Conservative Opposition are doing tonight is proving their complete hypocrisy and lack of understanding of what the controversy about lone-parent benefits on the Labour Benches was all about.
Therefore, if the Conservatives call a vote, we win and they expose themselves as wanting to depress the standards of lone parents and take away this opportunity. If they do not call a vote, they expose themselves as being silly and hypocritical.
Mr. Rendel:
Does the hon. Lady accept that one thing that the Conservatives have managed to do is unite the Labour rebels with their party?
Audrey Wise:
I think that perhaps the Government Front-Bench team might owe the Conservatives some little debt of gratitude for that, but that is not the mainspring; that is not what motivates us. Their silly games have nothing to do with what we on the Labour Benches do. We consider the issues and the Government have given--well, I was going to say, "A crumb." Perhaps I will say, "Half a loaf."
Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley):
A crust.
Audrey Wise:
Yes, a crust. A compromise. I am not one to throw away a crust. Being of a very thrifty turn of mind, I accept all the crusts and crumbs that are going.
Any lone parents who get some glimmering of what the Conservative Opposition are playing at tonight will be thoroughly disgusted because those parents will want a linking period and the opportunity to take a job without being penalised, and they are certainly not scroungers and unscrupulous people, in the main.
Mr. Burns:
Who said that they were?
Audrey Wise:
I thought that one of the hon. Member's major objections to the regulations was that unscrupulous people would take advantage of them, take a job for 11 weeks, go back on full benefit for a little while and take another job for 11 weeks. That is the picture that the hon. Gentleman was painting. [Interruption.] Oh yes it was. "Unscrupulous," he called them. I say that lone parents are burdened with the difficult job of child rearing on their own. They have far too much and far too many serious things on their mind to go in for the sort of shenanigans and twisting that is more commonly found in the realm of tax evasion. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman is judging lone parents and people on low incomes by the standards of those whose main characteristic is greed and who milk the tax system at every available opportunity.
Mr. John Swinney (North Tayside):
There are often occasions when it strikes me that the House spends too long debating certain items of business. I do not want to detain the House any longer than is necessary to discuss this business.
The hon. Member for Preston (Audrey Wise) made an effective speech in the debate about lone parent benefit cuts in December and has made another effective and important contribution to today's debate. She used an analogy about the Conservative party playing games and I shall continue with that for a little longer.
I do not believe that the lone parents I see in my constituency surgeries are playing games with their lives. They are not trying to find some devious dodge here and there to find something in the system that will advance their position and allow them to dodge here, there and everywhere. Most of the lone parents who come to see me are in very difficult circumstances and have come to their Member of Parliament for assistance as a place of last resort. They are usually looking for a way through a labyrinth of difficulties through which they cannot find a way themselves. The idea that lone parents will be rushing off to the public information sources in my constituency to look through the regulations to find a dodge that will enable them to prosper is an insult to people who live in difficult circumstances.
Mr. John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings):
Surely the hon. Gentleman realises that we are not talking about dodges. In many constituencies, including mine, seasonal and part-time work are a way of life for many people. How will the regulations deal with that? What explanation have we had for that? My hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) talked about having a longer period which would, effectively, stop that being an issue. The regulations do not take account of those factors.
Mr. Swinney:
With great respect, I do not think that we heard anything from the Conservative Front-Bench spokesman that provided a better solution than the proposal before us. I was in the Lobby with the hon. Member for Preston and others in December. We have to recognise that this is a step forward from the material that we were faced with then, and we should consider the regulations in good faith.
A great deal was said by the Conservative Front-Bench spokesman about work incentives. We can look at these issues as work incentives or some form of work compulsion, but we heard nothing from the Conservative spokesman that would make it easier, more advantageous or appealing for lone parents to find their way into employment.
Much of what we have heard tonight has been about the systematic fraud of the benefit system that we are told is always going on. We heard much of that rhetoric in the origins of the benefit integrity project. Not surprisingly, in that analysis fraud has been found to have been much
less of a factor than was thought. Obviously, if fraud exists in the system, it must be tackled and rooted out. It deprives those who are genuinely entitled to benefit.
Mr. Steve Webb (Northavon):
I want to make a few brief remarks about the linking period of 12 weeks. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) that it is a step in the right direction. Perhaps the one serious question raised by the hon. Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) is why it is 12 weeks. The hon. Member for Preston (Audrey Wise) made the important point that a lone parent might try a job only to find that the child care falls through. Perhaps 12 weeks is a reasonable time for such things to be determined one way or another.
The longer-term issue is the job market in short-term contracts. I hope that, in responding to the debate, the Minister will say what analysis his Department has made of the job market for entrants from unemployment or income support. What sort of jobs are available to them, and what sort of jobs do they take? Are they fixed-term contract jobs? Are they three months or six months contracts?
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