Welfare Reform

Lord Katz Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords—

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

My Lords, we have 10 minutes left. We have plenty of time to get everybody in if we are orderly about it. Let us hear from the noble Baroness, Lady Fraser.

[Baroness Fraser of Craigmaddie (Con)]

Thank you very much. I declare my interest as chief executive of Cerebral Palsy Scotland. I want to continue in the tone of my noble friend Lady Stedman-Scott and support the Minister on the importance of supporting people to work. She will know, because she confirmed in a Written Question to me in April, that the average waiting time for applicants on Access to Work to receive a decision is 84.6 days, and 62,000 people are waiting for their applications to be processed. I will read the Minister an email I got from an adult with cerebral palsy this week, who said:

“The government has … cut Access to Work support … without any warning. All of a sudden they don’t fund things that they did until recently. So people are losing their jobs, purpose and ultimately their sanity. They will end up back on the benefits that are being cut”.


What is the Minister doing about Access to Work now, rather than waiting for all the various reviews?