Disabled People in Poverty

Alison McGovern Excerpts

Tuesday 17th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Employment (Alison McGovern)]

It is a pleasure, as ever, to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Neil Duncan-Jordan) for securing this important debate. It has been a good debate. I would normally run through all the people who have spoken, but there have been so many—I will try to cover some of the points that have been raised. However, I begin by saying that the level of poverty among disabled people demands our attention and action, and it is right that we discuss it today.

Disabled people, like everybody else, have the right to dignity, the right to work and the right to have power, choice and control over their lives. When someone is in poverty, regardless of whether they are disabled, they are robbed of the opportunity to choose how to live their own life, which is why the situation we face today is so very shameful. When the Tories left office, 14 million people were in poverty, including 6.3 million people living in households in which someone is disabled—enough to fill Wembley stadium 70 times over, and more than the population of Scotland. That is a moral, social and economic failure on a colossal scale, and this Government have already taken urgent action to tackle it by delivering our plan for change, putting more money in people’s pockets and raising living standards.

Some of the specific anti-poverty measures in last week’s spending review are really important. For the first time, we have taken a long-term approach to the household support fund so that local authorities can properly plan, and we are turning the fund into a crisis and resilience fund so that we can properly deal with the issues that come up from time to time when a crisis tips somebody into long-term poverty.

Last autumn, we introduced a fair repayment rate for universal credit by reducing the maximum amount that can be taken from people’s benefits to pay for what they owe from 25% to 15%, meaning that 1.2 million of the poorest households will keep an average of £420 more in universal credit. As my dad used to say, “Out of debt, out of danger.”

[Ellie Chowns]

Today the Minister has heard many MPs, representing their constituents, express their huge concern about the effects of the PIP cuts on disabled members of our communities. She says that she cares about disabled people in poverty and about dignity. Why are her Government refusing to raise funds through a wealth tax so that our disabled constituents can have the support they need to live full and supported lives?

[Alison McGovern]

I thank the hon. Lady for her comment. I do not just say that I care about poverty; I have spent nearly a year working on a child poverty strategy to repair the damage the Tory Government did to this country. We will bring forward proposals as soon as we can to deal with the poverty crisis—I have mentioned several of them already.

The hon. Lady asks about a wealth tax. We have put VAT on private schools and private jets. We have removed exemptions from inheritance tax, which is a wealth tax. We have doubled stamp duty, which is a wealth tax. We are increasing capital gains tax and abolishing non-dom status, which meant that wealthy people could escape the taxes they owe. I do not accept that we have not taken steps to raise money through taxes so that we can pay for the public services this country needs so that working-class people can escape poverty. That is what this Government have done. [Interruption.] I will continue before I lose my temper.

We are expanding free school meals in England to all children with a parent receiving universal credit, lifting 100,000 children out of poverty by the end of the Parliament, and that is on top of our roll-out of free breakfast clubs. As I just mentioned, our child poverty strategy, on which Ministers right across Government have been working extremely hard, will reduce costs, support families with better local services and increase incomes, because we know that is the best way to tackle poverty.

As I mentioned, the extra money we are collecting through taxation will help to rebuild our NHS, with an extra £29 billion a year for the day-to-day running of our health service, so that disabled people can get the healthcare they need. We are also extending the £3 national bus fare cap, helping people to maintain their independence.

I want to respond to some of the points that Members have raised, particularly on the PIP review, which is already under way. I know that Members will be involved in that work but, just to be clear, it is already happening.

[Johanna Baxter]

The Government’s consultation on mandatory ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting, led by the Office for Equality and Opportunity, recently closed. Can the Minister update the House on the findings of that consultation and when we might expect a formal Government response?

[Alison McGovern]

My hon. Friend raises an important manifesto commitment. I will relay her request to the Minister for Disability, who I am sure will update her.

We are anxious to get on with it. As many Members have said, it is important to reset some of the assumptions that employers have about the capabilities of disabled people, and the assumptions about whether disabled people should be included in our economy like everybody else.

On how many people will be affected by this, I point out that all the numbers that have been mentioned, including the numbers we have published on the poverty impact of the policy change, are static. They assume that nothing else changes by 2030.

While I understand the very correct concern that the employment support system this Government inherited was nowhere near what it should be, I can reassure Members that change is already happening. We are already getting on with Connect to Work and building a new jobs and careers service. I currently spend half my life with frontline work coaches in jobcentres, including disability employment advisers who are anxious to do better and are moving forward with a changed system. We are not waiting to get on with the change; the change is already happening.

[Ayoub Khan]

On the £5 billion cut to PIP, does the Minister agree that it is not just a lifeline for the most vulnerable in our society but is £5 billion that ends up in the economy? For that reason, does she not agree that a holistic impact assessment needs to be done? It ought not to be rushed, so that Members can review it and come to a sensible conclusion.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison McGovern]

I thank the hon. Member for his point, because it is one of the other things I wanted to clarify. A number of Members have mentioned money being taken out of communities. Having been a Member of Parliament during the actual austerity years under the Conservatives, I can say that the benefit and other changes made under austerity clearly had a huge impact on certain parts of the country.

That is why the spending review set out our investment plans. I have already mentioned the funding for the NHS and other areas through which we will be supporting the very communities that need to be lifted. I refer the hon. Member to the distributional analysis published alongside the documents last week, where he will see that this Government are prioritising lifting the communities that really need to be lifted.

The hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Dr Pinkerton) has gone now, but I want to say that veterans can be supported through the armed forces independence payment, whether in work or not. That is separate from PIP, and no changes are proposed to it.

[Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Alison McGovern]

I will wind up, because we are out of time. I have no doubt that these discussions will continue over the coming weeks, and I look forward to engaging with everybody here on them. [Interruption.]

[Christine Jardine (in the Chair)]

I am sorry, but we have to put the Question quickly.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered Government support for disabled people in poverty.