Mr.
Murphy: I welcome the hon. Gentleman to the Committee
again—I think that this is his second stint, although we have
had six sittings thus far, so it is just as well that we do not get
paid per
hour.
Mr.
Murphy: No. I will not give
way.
Mr.
Ruffley: On a point of order, Mr. Amess. I
should just like to place it on the record that I am an employer who
believes that, in whipping the Bill, we should have flexible working
practices and a work-life balance. That is why my hon. Friend the
Member for Windsor (Adam Afriyie) has not appeared at every single
sitting so far, but we will be seeing a lot more of him in the weeks to
come.
The
Chairman: We have got that on the record.
Minister.
Mr.
Murphy: Thank you, Mr. Amess. I wonder whether
I
could—
Hon.
Members: Flexible working.
Mr.
Murphy: Okay. One
more.
Danny
Alexander: I am grateful to the Minister for giving way.
Before we conclude our discussion, I have a slightly different
question. I appreciate that the Minister does not want to give
averages, figures per head or all the things on which he has just been
scrutinised. However, he says that it will take as much funding as it
takes, so will he explain where the figure of £360 million came
from in the first place? That figure has been attached to the funding
for this welfare reform project for a long time. Was it plucked out of
the air or based on some rational assessment of what might be
needed?
Mr.
Murphy: The £360 million set out in the welfare
reform Green Paper is an assessment of how much would be needed to
carry out the IT investment and to put in place the support, the
personal advisers, the work-focused interviews and the ESA. As I said,
we will not publicly set an average or a goal as regards how much
getting someone closer to the labour market is worth. If we did,
Opposition Members would, quite fairly, say, “Why have you only
set this amount? Isn’t it a disgrace that you have set a public
financial figure based on each and every individual?”
I do not want to stray into
your area of responsibilities, Mr. Amess, but I wonder
whether I could be encouraged to come close to a conversation about the
amendment before us, although perhaps I should first say a little more
about the outcomes in terms of cost per individual or averages. Despite
some disquiet in the room, we think that contracts that are not 100 per
cent. outcomes based, but a 70:30 mix, are the right approach and will
ensure that we do not have the quick-wins situation that was mentioned
before our lunch break. A mix of 70 per cent. outcomes and 30 per cent.
overheads and investment will enable people to access the welfare
provision market in a way that a 100 per cent. outcomes structure would
not. Let me turn to
the specifics of the amendment. As I said, we do not want to write
anyone off and we will pick up on the best experience of pathways as a
matter of public policy and delivery to ensure that that does not
happen. However, we recognise that it would be unreasonable to require
people with the most severe functional limitations to engage in
mandatory work-related activity. As we know, such people will be placed
in a support group and will not be required to take part in
work-focused interviews as a condition of receiving the full amount of
their employment and support allowance.
Clause 11(1) provides that the
obligation to participate in work-focused interviews cannot apply to
customers who are in the support group. We are not labelling those
people as incapable, but as having limited capability for work-related
activity at this time. We expect that many of their conditions might
improve sufficiently to enable them to leave the support group at some
point. As I made clear in the Committee’s second sitting, and as
the Secretary of State made clear on Second Reading, customers in the
support group will be able to volunteer at any time for any appropriate
support on offer, including work-focused interviews with a specialist
personal adviser. Therefore, paragraph (a) of the amendment is
unnecessary. Support
group members are not caught by the provisions in clause 11, so their
benefit cannot be affected if they do not participate in any
work-related activity, provided that they continue to comply with
standard benefit rules such as those on permitted work. As there is no
risk of support group customers being sanctioned if they do not
participate in work-related activity, paragraphs (b) and (c) of the
amendment are unnecessary.
However, I do agree with the
entirely fair comments of the hon. Member for South-West Surrey about
the journey back to work being taken in small steps by many people. For
some, that will be about regaining confidence if it has been knocked,
undermined or lost. For others it will be about refreshing
skills—people who were employed in traditional industries who
have been out of work for some time, for example, or people who worked
in the world of IT, in which, increasingly, a person’s skills
can become stale if they have been out of work for just six months.
Volunteering and part-time work are also important steps along the
journey back to economic
activity.
Mr.
Hunt: I am grateful to the Minister for finally getting
around to addressing the substance of the amendment. I shall briefly
address the two points that he has raised, and ask him to respond.
First, he said that there is no need for paragraph (a) of the
amendment, which would stipulate in primary legislation that people in
the support group will be able to volunteer to take part in the
packages. He says that the Secretary of State has given assurances on
the Floor of the House, and that this issue is addressed in the notes
to the Bill, but nowhere in the Bill does it say that people in the
support group have the right to volunteer to take part in work-related
activity. Does not he think it important that that right should appear
somewhere in the
Bill? The
Minister’s second point was that sanctions would not apply to
people in the support group. We accept that that is as it should be,
but that is not really the purpose of paragraph (c) of the amendment.
It is to ensure that when the Department is arranging contracts with
providers to help people to get closer to the labour market, it is
accepted that for some people the objective should not be simply to
place them in a full-time job. Some people in the support group may
volunteer to participate in work-related activities, and for them, the
best outcome of the programme might well be part-time, voluntary or
community work, or education.
Mr.
Murphy: Importantly, we also have to ensure that the
contracts are right, and we have had discussions on this with private
and voluntary sector providers. First, we should try to ensure that as
far as possible work is sustained rather than short term. Secondly,
contracts should be structured to ensure that contractors do not
simply, as a matter of operation, support those who are already nearest
to the labour market, although I am sure that most of them do not wish
to do that. We will make those two important distinctions in our
contracts.
Mr.
Boswell: I am grateful to the Minister for those
assurances. Will he at least acknowledge that if, without prejudice to
the level of resources that turnout to be necessary, there is
a tightening of the situation—in the real world, this has
happened with all Governments at different times—people in the
support group will wish to fall back on his pledge that they will not
be excluded and their support will not be
rationed? My second
point is, in drawing up the structure of contracts for the private
contractors who will take on the additional part of this work, while
the Minister rightly expresses the need to have certain firm
conditions, will he also make it clear that the contractors have an
obligation to admit members of the support group to the services that
they offer without prejudice to whether or not they are on the support
group? They must offer the services to anyone within the allowance, not
simply to those who are in its employment or work-related
section.
Mr.
Murphy: Those are entirely fair points. The first of the
hon. Gentleman’s two points is captured by clause 11(1)(b) on
the basis of any sanctions. If someone is in the support group, we
cannot impose anything on them on the basis of subsection (1)(b). That
is included in the
Bill.
Mr.
Boswell: I shall be brief, because I realise that the
Minister wants to make progress. With respect, that is not a sufficient
answer, because it simply says that such people will not lose the
benefit. We are talking about a situation where they might lose the
right to participate in the programme, which the Secretary of State has
promised
them.
Mr.
Murphy: As the hon. Gentleman says, that is about the
sanctions on benefit. I shall make some progress and comment on how we
intend to ensure that the pathways-style support happens. He is also
right about the contracts for the private and voluntary sector: they
must be flexible enough to ensure that someone who is in the support
group and who volunteers can have access to the pathways-style support.
That would be done through the work-focused interviews, which will
largely be provided by the private and voluntary sectors. He is right
to raise that issue. We intend that it will be fed through into the
contracts. As hon.
Members are aware—this relates to the point raised by the hon.
Member for South-West Surrey, who may wish to reflect on this over
time, perhaps in advance of Report in the Commons—the
entitlement to access pathways-style support is enabled through section
2 of the Employment and Training Act 1973. It gives the power to
provide such support, and talks
about “assisting persons
to select, train for, obtain and retain employment suitable for their
ages and
capacities”. That
is the primary legislative source of the type of support that we are
talking about. I understand that it was the source of the
conditionality support through the new deal for disabled people, and is
relied on in the extension of support in other benefit regimes and in
some of the jobseeker’s allowance new
deals. As the hon.
Gentleman knows, the Bill is about setting out new powers to impose
conditionality upon
those for whom we think it is appropriate. The volunteering would be
covered by the powers in section 2 of the 1973 Act. As he also knows,
we are currently providing support through pathways to work for those
who volunteer, even for those who are in the exempt category. That
process will be carried over to ESA for the support group. He might
want to reflect on specifics and the powers in the 1973 Act, but we
derive the power to provide the support that we refer to as pathways
roll-out from it. Mr.
Hunt: I would indeed like to reflect on the last point
that the Minister made. I am still concerned that there is no primary
legislative right for people in the support group to apply for the
package of support offered under the work-related activity programme. I
am grateful to him for responding at some length both to the points
that I made in my speech and to the interventions that were made. I am
still very concerned that the Minister and the Government have not
appreciated the full purpose of my amendment, which is to ensure that
the end point of any programme offered is the possibility of steps
towards full-time employment, and not just full-time employment
itself. I am
concerned that the programmes, as currently designed in the pathways
pilots, will tend to favour those on the work-related activity
programme, for which people in the support element can volunteer,
should they so choose, but that the programmes might not necessarily be
designed for them. That is the substance of my concern. Will the
Minister respond to that? If he does not, I am afraid that I shall
press the amendment to a
vote. 4.45
pm
Mr.
Murphy: I shall respond briefly to that point and to some
others. Based on the
tone in which the hon. Gentleman moved his amendment, I am not
surprised that it might end with a Division. I am not sure that there
is much that I can do or say to reassure him, given the way in which he
introduced the amendment.
I have an additional concern
about the way in which the amendment is
structured—[Interruption.]
The
Chairman: Order. I think that we should ignore the fire
alarm and carry on until it gets
serious.
Mr.
Murphy: Thank you, Mr. Amess. I shall carry on
until the room is empty.
Mr.
Ruffley: Shouldn’t be too long now.
[Interruption.]
Mr.
Murphy: As someone says from a sedentary position, that
has nothing to do with the fire
alarm. New subsection
(5)(a) of the amendment suggests that the Government
should “ensure a full
programme of work focused interviews is offered to those in the support
group who indicate a desire to take part in these aspects of the
programme.” Based on
what he said at the outset, I suspect that the hon. Member for
South-West Surrey will push the amendment to a vote, and I understand
why he wishes
to do so. However, I do not think that the Government should be
compelled to provide full work-focused interview support to everyone in
the support group who wants it regardless of circumstance. As the
Government and also progressives, that is not where we want to
be. We are talking
about folk with often serious and fluctuating mental health conditions
and the Government being responsible, under primary legislation, for
the provision of work-focused interviews and work-related activity for
everyone, regardless of their condition and of whether that interview
might be bad for their health, counterproductive to their condition or
add to the pressure that they are under.
Adam
Afriyie: Will the Minister give
way?
Mr.
Murphy: One moment; this is a serious
point. If the hon.
Member for South-West Surrey seriously wants that to be a matter of
public policy enshrined in primary legislation, I disagree with him
very strongly. We
know from the draft regulations that automatic access to the support
group is for those with a terminal illness. We have talked about that
already. But it is there also for those who it is assessed on medical
grounds might harm others, including Jobcentre Plus staff and personal
advisers. If the hon. Gentleman seriously wishes that to be public
policy, to enshrine it in primary legislation and to ensure that the
Government have that absolute legal responsibility to everyone,
regardless of their circumstances, condition and health, as well as the
possible impact on those working with them and providing that support,
frankly, I think that he is doing a disservice to many of his other
comments in Committee thus far.
I do not think that that is
what the hon. Gentleman intends, but it is what his amendment would
achieve. It undermines many of his well considered comments. On that
basis, I encourage him to reflect on whether he wants to put such a
provision in primary legislation as part of a supportive mechanism to
get people back into the labour market. I do not think that that is
what he intended. It is up to him to articulate that if that is indeed
what he wants as a matter of public
policy.
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