Oral Answers to Questions

Diana Johnson Excerpts

Monday 7th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

4. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the trial of locating jobcentre advisers at food banks.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

10. What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the trial of locating jobcentre advisers at food banks.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Shailesh Vara)]

Jobcentre work coaches undertake outreach work every day in local communities and have recently been helping people with back-to-work support and advice at the Lalley Welcome Centre in Manchester, where a food bank sits alongside other support services. The test is at an early stage and the Department will make the findings public in due course.

[Diana Johnson]

Despite the fall in unemployment, many working families across the country will be relying on food banks this Christmas. I pay tribute to Sarah Sidwell and her staff at the food bank in Hull. Is putting jobcentre staff in food banks not actually an acknowledgement of the shambolic nature of the benefits system, which is affecting people? Should the Minister not think very long and hard about sorting out the system rather than applying a plaster and putting jobcentre staff in food banks?

[Mr Vara]

May I gently remind the hon. Lady that we were invited, at the request of Sister Rita, to go to Lalley Welcome Centre, which also hosts other agencies? I might also say to the hon. Lady that that particular centre has a job club, which makes eminent sense. I presume she does not object to that. If she is happy to have a job club there, why on earth does she object to our going there to help people when we have been invited to go there?