Food: Banks

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, the noble Lord is absolutely right that we need to help the poorest in our country. That is why, over the past two years, the Government have provided grants of around £2 billion to help freeze council tax; the fuel duty increase that was due to take effect on 1 January was cancelled and the increase planned for 1 April deferred until 1 September; and we have lifted the personal tax allowance and taken 2 million of the lowest-paid people out of tax altogether. It is, of course, why we have the Healthy Start and school fruit and vegetable schemes. It is also good news that on 23 January we learnt that employment is up by 90,000 and that the rate of job growth last year was the fastest since 1989.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

My Lords, the Minister said that the duty of the Government is indeed, as I am sure we would all agree, to help the poorest in the land. Following the Question of my noble friend Lord Dubs, how does the Minister reconcile that statement with the fact that, from April onwards, some of the poorest families in the land, including something like 1 million children, will lose £40 to £60 per week, over time, from their benefits? What estimate has the Minister made of how many of those families will need to go to food banks in order to survive until they get their payment at the end of the month?

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, with respect to the noble Baroness, we are straying a little from food banks. The difficult economic situation is having an impact on everyone, including workers, who find their wages either being frozen or increasing only by small amounts. The Government have protected poor and vulnerable groups as far as possible while undertaking the urgent task of tackling the fiscal deficit. Work remains the best and most immediate way out of poverty, and we have continued to prioritise providing the best possible work incentives through welfare reform and increasing the personal allowance.

Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts

Tuesday 21st December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord McKenzie of Luton]

My Lords, I am most grateful to the Minister for that very full reply. I have no intention of pressing this amendment, as I tabled it in order to seek information. I am comforted by what he said about the progress and planned progress of the child maintenance system and that it is still the objective to try to introduce the new basis of calculation next year and the systems that will support that. I understand that it is intended that all the CSA cases will eventually migrate to the new system by 2014.

However, I am still a little mystified by this issue of ministerial accountability, as there is accountability to Parliament through the Secretary of State. I am a little curious as to what difference the measure would make for Ministers in practice, as for most, if not all, NDPBs there is a way for Ministers to engage and influence. A framework agreement defines not only the financing of NDPBs but their governance arrangements and their relationship with Ministers, so the argument that the Government are switching just to achieve that purpose is a little thin.

I wish to make it clear that I certainly do not contend that improvements came about only once CMEC came into being. Improvements were made under the operational improvement plan before CMEC came into being. I certainly assert—I think that the Minister agreed with this—that CMEC has carried that on and has made continuing progress, although matters still remain to be resolved. I am comforted by the fact that this will not be done in a way that would disrupt the progress that has been made and disrupt the introduction of the new systems.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

Before my noble friend decides what to do with his amendment, as he may be drawing his remarks to a close, I wish to ask the Minister a question through him, so to speak. Do I understand that what the Minister is doing is maintaining the policy drive of CMEC while reinventing the structure of the old CSA? As he may know from his briefing, that structure was that there was a chief executive, who reported quarterly or at six-month intervals to the Minister, supported by an advisory board and shadowed, so to speak, by a policy directorate within the department—a grade 5 and above that a grade 3—who would, so to speak, act as the interface between the policy development and the operational work done by the CSA, headed by its chief executive. Is that the proposed structure that the Minister seeks to reinvent or has he a different version in mind? It would be helpful to know how he thinks the organisation will function at the top level and what independent advice—research advice and expertise—he can expect to draw on, which obviously CMEC has taken further and developed in a far more effective way than under the old CSA.