The
Chairman: May I advise members of the Committee that the
huge document that the Minister mentioned in an earlier contribution is
now in the room? I have had copies put on the table. The subject is
welfare reform and the use of regulation-making
powers.
Clause
2Work-related
activity: income suport claimants and partners of
claimants
Mr.
Clappison: I beg to move amendment 39, in
clause 2, page 4, line 21, at
end insert— ‘(A1) This
section does not apply in the case of a single parent with a child
under five years of
age.’.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to consider
amendment 44, in
clause 2, page 4, line 21,
at end insert— ‘(A1) This
section does not apply in the case of a single parent with a child
under seven years of
age.’.
Mr.
Clappison: Clause 2 deals with the work-related activity
which may be required of certain benefit claimants, including benefit
claimants on income support, income-based jobseeker’s allowance
or income-related employment and support allowance. Although it is not
specifically mentioned in the Bill, the clause appears to affect lone
parents of younger children who are currently in receipt of income
support. This is the relevant point to ventilate some important
considerations for lone parents of younger children.
Amendment 39
deals with the age that the youngest child must have reached before
lone parents are required to take part in the work-related activity
regime envisaged in these proposals. It would set that age at five.
Amendment 44, which has been tabled by the Liberal
Democrats, sets it at seven. The background to this is quite important.
Until last year it was possible for a single parent to remain on income
support until the youngest child reached the age of 16. However, in
June 2007 the Government announced that they were moving lone parents
from income support to jobseeker’s allowance in
stages.
The process
began last year, when the age limit for single parents to remain on
income support was reduced to the youngest child reaching the age of
12. As we speak, the process of transferring lone parents from income
support to jobseeker’s allowance is proceeding in jobcentres up
and down the country. The age at which lone parents are transferred
from income support to jobseeker’s allowance will fall to seven
in October 2010. That leaves open the question of what is
expected of lone parents with children under seven. Of course, they
will not be expected to move from income support to jobseeker’s
allowance, as is the case with lone parents of children over the age of
seven, but under the Government’s plans they will be expected to
fulfil the requirements set out in the clause, some of which we have
already touched on when debating other amendments.
Our
understanding of the Government’s proposals as a whole is that
they see lone parents as part of a progression to work group from the
time their youngest child is aged one. The Government have set out how
they see that group in their discussion paper on the implementation of
the Gregg review. According to their response to that review, lone
parents with children aged between one and two years will
be “Required
to attend Work Focused interviews and agree an action plan. They are
not mandated to undertake any activities recorded on the action
plan”. However,
the important point is that when the youngest child reaches the age of
three, lone parents will
be “Required
to follow the full progression to Work regime based around Work Focused
interviews, action plans, work related activity and the backstop of
adviser
direction.” That
presumably means that lone parents with children aged three or over
will be subject to the regime of sanctions for failing to comply with
the requirements, as is set out in the Bill.
Amendment 39
would substitute the age of three with the age of five as the point at
which the regime and all its requirements would begin. The age of five
was specified in the Government’s July 2008 Green Paper as the
appropriate age at which requirements could begin to be made on lone
parents. The Green Paper envisaged piloting a requirement for lone
parents whose youngest child is five or six to attend relevant skills
training where that would address the skills gaps identified as a
barrier to starting work. Subsequently, the Gregg review suggested that
lone parents with a youngest child between the age of one and seven
should be in the progression to work group, as I have indicated, as
part of the Gregg vision of personalised conditionality, although I do
not believe that Professor Gregg specified the age of three as the age
at which that move to the regime would occur, as the Government are now
setting
out. The
progression to work group is intended to prepare people for full
availability for work, and in this case we are talking about preparing
single parents for entry to the jobseeker’s regime when their
youngest child reaches the age of seven. Commencing the work-related
activity for them at the age of five, as suggested in amendment 39,
would give them two years in which to undertake work-related activity
to prepare them for work, and something along those lines seems to have
been present in the Government’s thinking in the July 2008 Green
Paper.
The question I
wish to put to the Minister is this: why is the two years of
work-related activity in that regime from the time the youngest child
reaches the age of five insufficient to prepare lone parents for
work? Mr.
James Plaskitt (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab): In view of
what the hon. Gentleman is saying, can he tell us what has happened to
the recommendation of his own party’s social justice policy
group, chaired by the former leader of his party,
that: “Whilst
their youngest child is below the age of 5 they should spend between 5
and 10 hours a week preparing for
work”?
Mr.
Clappison: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for
studying that document, because it has proved to be the inspiration
behind much of what we are debating today. It created the momentum of
the debate because we had 11 years in which there was no movement at
all and the age remained 16. To answer the hon. Gentleman’s
question directly, he will see that the age of five was specifically
mentioned in that report as the age of the youngest child at which
parents should be moved across, and of course that document did not
have in mind the full regime that we are now talking about. The
Under-Secretary of State looks perplexed about that, but when that
document was written the social justice policy group did not have in
mind and could not know the full regime proposed by the Government. We
have no issue with the regime as a generality, but in the case of
parents of younger children we think that there is an issue to discuss
in cases where parents will be subject to the regime and to sanctions
for failing to comply. I think that the hon. Gentleman will have to
accept that there are issues to be debated and that it is right for us
to debate the age at which that move takes place. He has not answered
the question of why two years is insufficient
time. 12
noon
The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Kitty
Ussher): The hon. Gentleman said that I looked perplexed.
I was perplexed because I did not understand whether he shared the view
of his own policy commission—and, indeed, our view—that
there should be work-focused activity when the child is under, not at,
the age of five. I would be grateful for his
response.
Mr.
Clappison: I think that I responded to that in my answer
to the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington. We are talking about the
regime, not some general work-focused activity. We have no problem with
interviews. However, this is a very specific regime in which action
plans have to be agreed, directions are given and sanctions may follow
for non-compliance from when the child is aged three, as the hon. Lady
knows from her study of both the documents and the Government’s
response to the Gregg
report. I
hoped that the hon. Lady would answer the question of why two years was
insufficient time for lone parents to prepare for work. We are willing
to listen to the debate. Two years is a long time for somebody to
prepare for work. We are talking about somebody whose lack of
availability for work is caused, in the first instance, by the fact
that they are caring for a child.
They are not in the same position as somebody in receipt of employment
and support allowance, who may need to spend time managing a condition
that they have. Here the inhibition is the care of a child; that is
what prevents the parent from going into the labour market. Five is a
reasonable age in such circumstances, as it leaves two years for a
parent to prepare for work, and the child will have started school. It
is reasonable to ventilate the issue, and we look forward to hearing
why two years is not sufficient time for a parent to be under the
regime envisaged in the
proposals. Mr.
Plaskitt: I wish to continue to press the hon. Gentleman
on that point. As I said before, his own social justice policy group
says that a lone parent should spend between five and 10 hours a week
preparing for work if their child is under five. What activity did the
group envisage during those five to 10
hours?
Mr.
Clappison: I think that I have answered the hon.
Gentleman’s question. I am waiting for an answer from him as to
why two years is not sufficient. I shall make a deal with him. I am
interested to hear his
answer— [Interruption.] I have given the
hon. Gentleman our
answer.
The
Chairman: Order. I ask for a little
calm.
Mr.
Clappison: The hon. Gentleman has had his answer. The
commission for social justice could not have known about this specific
regime, under which lone parents will be subject to sanctions. I think
that the hon. Gentleman will, on reflection, feel that it is reasonable
to ventilate the issue. I return to my question: why is two years not
sufficient? If he cannot answer, I look forward to the
Minister’s
response.
Mr.
Plaskitt: I assume that the hon. Gentleman’s
commission would argue that two years was not sufficient, otherwise why
would it recommend that the job preparation activity should commence
while the child was under five? I return to my earlier question about
the five to 10 hours, which he has still not answered. Does
his commission envisage lone parents undergoing a 10-hour
interview?
Mr.
Clappison: I think that we are going round in circles. The
question is whether two years is sufficient time to prepare under a
regime that is subject to sanctions. If the hon. Gentleman cannot
answer, I look forward to an answer from the
Minister.
Paul
Rowen: We have started an important debate about
conditionality within a new system of work-related activity. As has
been said, we have already seen a change of Government policy, in that
a lone parent will now have to engage in work-related activity when
their child reaches the lower age of 12. That policy has been operating
for only a short time and it is still bedding in, but we now have a
Government proposal to lower the age to three. Taking on board the fact
that the change is new, we believe that support for lone parents
getting back into work is not fully in place, and that must be
addressed. Indeed, we have heard of examples of people who have been
given, in our view, quite inappropriate
advice about what they can and cannot do in terms of getting back to
work. There are still barriers to work for lone parents—child
care, transport and facilities barriers. For example, there is only one
child care place for every 200 children over 11, yet the Government are
already moving the provision from the age of 12 to three, and the way
in which to deal with a parent with older children has not been
addressed. Serious issues must be addressed before the change can be
made.
We suggest in
amendment 44 that the child should be seven rather than five before
conditionality beds in, and we would like a phased movement rather than
the Government’s complete change because that would give the
parent time to organise and prepare themselves for work as the child
starts school. We need some answers about this aspect, which deals with
young children and lone parents. In particular, I should like from the
Minister a commitment—the Child Poverty Action Group has asked
for it, too—that parents will be protected from any financial
sanctions that worsen the severity of child poverty, and that any
non-financial sanctions that might be imposed as a result of the regime
will not create additional expenditure for the parent. If parents are
required to attend a particular locality for a certain number of hours,
will the costs of travel and child care be paid
for? We
also want assurances that decisions on child care will rest fully and
firmly with the parent and that under no circumstances will a direction
be given to them that they have to take a particular form of child
care. We want an assurance that lone parents and partners in
education—I had a case relating to this a couple of weeks
ago—will not be required to cease their education, which in turn
will be recognised as a work-related activity. The case I had involved
a single parent who was looking after two young children and had gone
to university. He received a student loan, but that was classed as
income and affected his entitlement to housing benefit, so he had to
drop out of the course because he could not afford to pay his rent and
university fees. Such real issues affect lone parents, and if we are
going to apply stricter conditionality at a much lower age, we need to
address the availability of child care, for example. It would be
interesting to hear what steps the Minister is taking to ensure that
child care for older children will be improved under the current
regime. It appears that the Government are moving far too quickly, and
that they do not have the support in place to enable this group to get
back into work, which is, I am sure, what we all
want.
Mr.
McNulty: We have already touched on some of these topics,
including during our discussion of the first set of amendments. It is
important to start by saying that no one has a monopoly on concern for
child poverty, as the hon. Member for Rochdale implies. Everyone can
quote the Child Poverty Action Group. The surest way to help children
out of poverty is to support more parents into paid work that enables
parents to manage the careful balance between employment and family
life—that must be absolutely right. The hon. Member for
Hertsmere will know that Professor Gregg suggested conditionality from
the age of
one. The
hon. Member for Rochdale is confused, in part, when he suggests that
there is a time dimension to being
prepared for work. We have had what I consider to be a rather facile
debate about two years versus one year versus three years versus four
years. Let us be clear that work-related activity is about the health
and well-being—intellectually, morally, spiritually and every
other way—of the individual while there are barriers, including
the delight of childbirth, to getting back into work. That is the
centre of what Gregg was saying, and to describe it as a mechanistic
process in which one can turn a tap on and off and say that six months
will do, as though it were an elongated version of a makeover or
make-up session, is nonsense. This is about not preening someone to get
back into the labour market, but providing all that we can for an end
goal that all the child poverty lobby agrees is desirable: to get
people who want to do so back into
work. The
hon. Gentleman again draws a picture of doom and gloom—Rochdale
doom and gloom not Hertsmere’s; Hertsmere is
happier—about the notion of conditionality as though it were
oppressive, suppressive and driving down on lone parents for some
malign intent, as yet not fully defined, but nothing could be further
from the case. It is about trying to help and support people get back
into work at the earliest opportunity. The hon. Gentleman—for
Hertsmere this time, not Rochdale—is seriously suggesting that
we need to leave people alone and not trouble them until their children
are five, and then between five and seven we should have a magical
process to get them back to work-readiness and back into work. That is,
at one level, utterly neglectful. We need to start working with lone
parents at the earliest opportunity—with them, I
emphasise—with all that that entails on removing barriers, to
get them ready for, and ultimately involved in, work-related activity,
and then to get them back into the labour market. Again, quite
deliberately, work-related activity is drawn at its widest. We cannot
have a Bill that purports to offer as much personalised and flexible
support as possible and then get lost in an anally retentive fixation
on lists that define what that flexibility is—by definition that
is an oxymoron.
Why the age
of three? Notwithstanding the point made by my hon. Friend the Member
for Warwick and Leamington, three is increasingly—it is not yet
100 per cent. there throughout England and Wales—the age at
which the state provides full-time child care. The duty on local
councils is newish, and the absence of such provision will be taken
fully into account when discussing the details of an
individual’s work-related activity at
three. Saying
that the two years do not matter either way, and that five is a lot
better, is at least a more measured approach from the hon. Member for
Hertsmere. The Leader of the Opposition, as is his perennial wont,
dismissed these plans as sick and shameful in his rush to jump on the
nearest bandwagon—he is more fixated with bandwagons than the
Liberal Democrats used to be, which is a shame. It would be interesting
to be a fly on the wall when he welcomes his soon-to-be-ennobled Front
Bencher in the Lords, David Freud, who thinks we are being timid. He
would like us to go much further than even we are suggesting, although
I do not know whether that was a Freudian slip. It is rather a shame
that there is a notion that this is territory in which we should play
rather futile politics. There can and should be as wide a consensus as
possible.
12.15
pm The
age of seven is a nonsense, although I would entertain five a little
more, notwithstanding the point about Scotland. Starting to talk to
individual lone parents about their journey back into work by time the
child is seven should, in the interests of those parents, happen at the
earliest opportunity. The closer the child gets to seven and the lone
parent to that stage of obligation, I would envisage a slightly
stronger focus on the work element of the work-related activities
rather than the broader skills and training element.
The
amendments are, I hope, probing rather than otherwise—certainly
that tabled by the hon. Member for Hertsmere. We take it as read that
the hon. Member for Rochdale could not care less about the Bill or the
policy framework that we are seeking to adopt. However, I fear if he
continues for too much longer, the implication of his comments will be
that he could not care less about the people about whom we are talking,
and that would be a dangerous road to go down. I ask for the amendment
to be withdrawn.
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