"I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the reforms he is bringing in. Social mobility and poverty were manifestly not improved by 60% during the previous Government’s regime, although the bill went up by 60%. However, people such as my constituent, Mr Martin Wilsher, who is visually impaired, still have …..." Ben Gummer - View Speech
"My hon. Friend is entirely right that the figures are disappointing. I am sure that he, like me, has had successful cases in his surgery. Two people who came to my surgery went through training schemes under the previous Administration—one of them had been unemployed for eight years—but found a …..." Ben Gummer - View Speech
"In response to an intervention by the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), the right hon. Gentleman said that the legal advice was news to him. It was not news to the House of Lords, however, as it was debated there on 15 February, at which point this matter was …..." Ben Gummer - View Speech
"The salient fact of this debate is that by the time it finishes at 10 o’clock, the average age to which we and our constituents might expect to live will have increased by an hour and a half. If I were to speak for 10 minutes or a quarter of …..." Ben Gummer - View Speech
"What I found surprising about that comment from the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) was that it completely ignored the sensible intervention by his colleague the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field), who made quite plain the difficulty of bringing forward the state pension age …..." Ben Gummer - View Speech