Welfare Reform and Work Bill (Third sitting)
Debate between Anna Turley and Corri Wilson(8 years, 7 months ago)
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Corri Wilson
Q 201 I would like to ask you the same question that I asked the last panel. Much of the proposed legislation is borne out of an assumption that those on benefits face the same choices as those in work. Do you agree with that?
Julia Unwin: I do not agree that there is a huge distinction between those on benefits and those in work, because we know that a significant proportion of people in work are on benefits and tax credits—there was an earlier discussion about housing benefits, for example. People are moving around the labour market in a very dynamic and frequently very damaging way, but once you are on benefits and out of work, it is very hard to make the sorts of choice that better-off people are able to make. We ask people on benefits to take enormous personal risks, and I think that point is very well made.
Dr Niemietz: Ideally, they should be in a situation where they broadly make the same choices and the same trade-off. That is not the way the benefits system is currently structured, because you have ring-fenced elements for particular expenses—you get an amount for childcare, an amount for housing and an amount for something else. If that were somehow wrapped up in a single payment and it was then left to people to make their choices, their everyday lives and the trade-offs they make would become more similar to those of working people.
Anna Turley
Q 202 What are your views on—this is one of the most controversial aspects of the Bill—limiting tax credits to two children? What do you think the impact of that will be, particularly for the most disadvantaged and larger families?
Julia Unwin: One thing we know is that tax credits do not influence behaviour in the linear way that many people expect. Given my description of people coming in and out of dependency on benefits and tax credits, there is no way of knowing at what stage in someone’s life they will require those tax credits. I simply do not believe that people choose to have more children in the sure and certain knowledge that tax credits will bail them out. That is not how decision making works in most households that I have come across.
I think the impact could be very damaging for larger households. I would go back to the even more substantive issue, which is the concern about where families on benefits with more than three children will live and how they will afford to live. That strikes me as deeply problematic for families who have been on benefits for some time, and particularly those who find themselves on benefits.
Dr Niemietz: This links back to the earlier question about whether people on benefits make the same choices in the same way as people who are not on benefits. If you do not qualify for child tax credits, your income does not automatically go up because you have a third child. I do not see anything wrong with replicating that situation for people whose income mostly consists of state transfers.
Welfare Reform and Work Bill (Second sitting)
Debate between Anna Turley and Corri Wilson(8 years, 7 months ago)
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Anna Turley (Redcar) (Lab/Co-op)
Q 12 Building on that point about the lack of detail in the Bill, one of the biggest concerns you have raised is the huge number of existing claimants, but there is no detail on how they will be dealt with. What are your thoughts on how they should be dealt with? How serious is it that the detail is not there?
Paul Broadhead: Many, in fact more than half, of the existing claimants are in receipt of pension credit, so we are talking about a certain type of individual and we need to ensure that the advice is right. Many of these people have been long-term claimants, so we need fully to understand that change. The timetable for delivery is challenging. There could be an argument—I am not saying there is, because it depends on the Government’s delivery plans—for saying, “Okay, on 1 April 2018, this applies to new claimants,” and we then make sure that we take our time to ensure that everyone understands the effect of the change on their circumstances. Perhaps we could put that back 12 months or so for existing claimants, but it needs to be considered very carefully so that we do not end up with unintended consequences. We have talked about debt—whether it is debt or not and whether it is going to be repaid—and many of these people will not like the thought of debt and might put themselves in a more difficult position than is needed.
Paul Smee: I hope that the Government can come to an early conclusion about the channel through which the advice will be given, because we would want to work with those who are giving the advice in order to understand their position.
Corri Wilson (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)
Q 13 What effect, if any, would the potential increase of sanctions have on the entitlement period? If there were breaks in claims, would that have an effect?
Paul Smee: I am not sure I can answer that off the top of my head. I would not expect there to be any, but if I find that there is, I will drop you a note.
Welfare Reform and Work Bill (First sitting)
Debate between Anna Turley and Corri Wilson(8 years, 7 months ago)
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Anna Turley (Redcar) (Lab/Co-op)
Q 28 We know that we have high levels of poverty in working families, and the most recent statistics from DWP show that 64% of children growing up in poverty have at least one working parent. Given that, are you concerned that reporting solely on children who are in workless families will not give a true picture of child poverty in the UK?
Neera Sharma: Yes, Barnardo’s is very concerned. We should also report on children who are growing up in working families. That is why it is imperative that an income measure is retained.
Corri Wilson
Q 29 To follow on from what Hannah was saying, given that the child poverty targets were unlikely to have been met, would it have been better to delay the targets instead of removing them?
Neera Sharma: Yes, the Government could have taken the opportunity to look at the timing and set interim measures and looked at the direction into the future instead of looking at abolishing them completely.