Scotland Bill

Kate Green Excerpts

Monday 8th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[David Mundell]

I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman’s analysis at all. The provision is not even about agreement to a decision. It is a timing arrangement as part of the systems that need to operate. It will work the other way, too; the UK Government will need to consult the Scottish Government when they want to make changes to devolved universal credit flexibilities that will have an impact on Scotland. Other clauses, such as those on transport and elections, also require the UK Government to consult Scottish Ministers before acting.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

It is helpful that the Secretary of State has said on the record in this Chamber what the intentions are in relation to the clauses in question. What will happen in the event of a dispute about the outcome of such a consultation process? Where will disputes be decided?

[David Mundell]

There are existing dispute reconciliation mechanisms in the Joint Ministerial Committee. There have inevitably been a number of disputes between the Government of the United Kingdom and the devolved Administrations, and most of them have been able to be resolved through that process.

To respond to the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie), I will turn to the provisions of the Bill. It is a wide-ranging Bill that will bring about a transfer of responsibility to Holyrood that will touch just about every aspect of Scottish life, affect every pay packet in Scotland and have the potential to deliver real and tangible benefits to the people of Scotland.

I turn first to the provisions on taxation. Central to the Bill is the devolution of income tax. Although the definition of income tax will remain reserved, the Scottish Parliament will have full control over rates and bands. That builds on the tax devolution set out in the Scotland Act 2012, which provided for significant powers over income tax that will come into effect next April.

One notable change to the Bill, compared with the draft clauses published in January, is the confirmation that the Scottish Parliament will be able to set a zero rate of income tax on earnings if it so chooses. That effectively gives it the opportunity to reduce the individual’s tax burden significantly if it can afford to do so and makes appropriate spending cuts or tax rises elsewhere. Of course, the reverse is true—if the Scottish Government want to spend more, they will be able to do so by taxing more, and they will be accountable to the Scottish taxpayer for it.

Alongside the devolution of income tax sits the assignment of half of Scotland’s VAT revenues. Members will recall that it is against EU law to have differential VAT rates within a member state, so the devolution of VAT would not be legal.

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[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate on a significant piece of constitutional legislation—the next step in a process we have been witnessing since at least 1997, when the first steps to a devolved Scottish Parliament were put in place.

It will come as no surprise to the House that I take a close personal interest in this Bill, as a Scot by birth and upbringing who has lived in England for many decades. Not only is it important to me personally for that reason, but it is important to many of my constituents who share exactly the same family experience. These families have lived, and continue to live, on both sides of the border, and they feel an emotional and physical attachment to England and Scotland as a result of their history and their lives today. We have, again, heard from other Members who share that family experience, including in at least two maiden speeches—those of the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa) and my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Ruth Smeeth). They, too, described exactly that experience, which is very common in this country of people who have strong family links and histories in both England and Scotland—and indeed in other parts of the UK.

The Bill is not only important to families across the UK, but it is an important financial, political and constitutional settlement that needs therefore to be fair to people in all parts of the UK. Clearly, there is cross-party support for the Smith commission principles and for the idea of greater devolution. This is a great opportunity for people in Scotland to tackle the poverty and inequality that still pertain in that country. It is very much one that I hope we will be able to replicate in my part of the country in the devolution settlement we achieve for Greater Manchester. But that cross-party support for devolution sits alongside our wish for the continued ability to pool and share risks and resources, and nowhere is that more important than in relation to welfare provision, where it is key that costs and risks must be fairly shared.

There has been much discussion this evening of the extent to which this Bill gives effect to the intentions of the Smith commission. Smith said that there should be “complete autonomy” over devolved benefits. We heard tonight concerns that, in practice, the UK Government will now be able to veto that autonomy, and questions were asked about what that would mean in practice and how things would operate.

It is important to say to those who speak for complete autonomy and expect that that would not involve a degree of negotiation and consultation between the two Governments that we must recognise the huge scale and challenge of the operational change the Department for Work and Pensions is facing now on welfare. Indeed, it is now in a state of perpetual revolution, which makes such negotiation necessary. It will not help people in Scotland or in England or Wales if the stability and resilience of our welfare systems is put at risk by an insistence on impractical solutions. Equally, however, the Bill’s wording as to what we mean by this process of consultation and this notion of veto is unhelpfully woolly. I hope there will be an opportunity to tighten it up in Committee.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Given the hon. Lady’s caution, what does she think of the example in Northern Ireland? On paper, the Northern Ireland Assembly has legislative power, but Westminster has basically said, “Unless you pass a karaoke version of our legislation, we will interfere in the rest of your Budget and create a Budget crisis.” That situation is now creating a political crisis.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kate Green]

We can see very clearly the importance of precision and of nailing down exactly what is intended in the wording of legislation and agreements. The Northern Ireland example is instructive of what can go wrong.

The Secretary of State gave us an assurance this afternoon about the process of consultation and resolution, but I hope that there is transparency in the way in which decisions are taken, negotiations are conducted and conclusions are reached. We must be clear about how decisions are taken, and we must be able to scrutinise that process. It will also be important to understand timescales and milestones for such decisions to take place. As I said to the Secretary of State, there needs to be clarity over how disputes between the two Governments are resolved. That is not clear to me despite the assurances that he gave us this afternoon. It is a matter that we need to firm up in Committee.

[Alex Salmond]

The hon. Lady made an excellent point very early on in her debate over who adjudicates in a dispute. The answer at the moment is that if there is a financial dispute with the Treasury and the devolved Parliament, the Treasury adjudicates. If it is the Joint Ministerial Committee, the Prime Minister does it. Unless it is specified in this Bill, yet again it will be the Prime Minister and his Government who will act as judge and jury in their own court.

[Kate Green]

The right hon. Gentleman and I might be able to agree that that would not be in the spirit of the discussions that we have had around the purpose of this Bill, which is to create the freedom for Scotland to operate within its devolved powers and to do so within the context of, and as an equal partner in, its relationships with the UK Government.

[John Redwood]

In order for England as well as Scotland to feel that justice is done, how would the hon. Lady recommend that the Scottish grant be adjusted for the money it will be collecting in its own right from taxation?

[Kate Green]

Clearly, the fiscal settlement will be of crucial importance to the people in Scotland, to my constituents and to the constituents of the right hon. Gentleman. That is a function of negotiation that I would expect to see as the fiscal settlement is worked out. One principle that was discussed under the Smith negotiations was the principle of no detriment. We can already see that there are issues to be ironed out here, such as those of operational costs, and the potential knock-on effects and costs of Scottish Government decisions about benefit levels, entitlements and top-ups. For example, it could be that a decision of the Scottish Government creates a passporting through to an entitlement, the cost of which falls to the UK Government. It could be that the decision of the Scottish Government in relation to crediting people into national insurance contributions creates a consequence for the national insurance fund. That is complex to disentangle, and it will be really important for this Parliament to have a mechanism for ongoing scrutiny. I hope that the Minister, in responding to this debate, will say how he thinks that scrutiny will work.

There seems to be surprise that the wording of the Bill appears to have fettered some of the scope of the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament to control the devolved welfare benefits. There is also surprise that only new welfare benefits can be created, and not benefits in relation to, for example, education or health. There are concerns that clause 19, which deals with disabilities, carers and industrial injuries benefits, may be worded too restrictively. It might not be possible to bring certain people into the ambit of the benefit, or people could have a question mark over their qualification for the benefit. For example, it might be that they live on one side of the border, but provide care for someone who lives on the other side of the border, and that needs to be sorted out.

There is concern over the provisions on topping up the reserved benefits and over whether there is an intention for the Scottish Parliament to take an across-the-board approach to topping up those reserved benefits, or whether it is merely a discretion to top up benefits for an individual in one individual case.

I think that we were surprised at the ambit of decisions on discretionary housing payments that will be delegated to Scotland in clause 22, which could potentially fetter the opportunity that colleagues in Scotland might wish to take completely to eliminate the harm done by the bedroom tax. There are also worries about clause 23 and the restriction of the application of short-term temporary assistance, which appears to leave out the possibility that families with children with an ongoing need for support could be excluded from the provisions of the existing legislation. These issues will need to be sorted out if the Scottish Parliament, the Scottish Government and the Scottish National party are to take advantage of the full fiscal autonomy that they have said is their medium-term ambition. We cannot wait for the medium term to resolve these issues; they must be resolved in Committee.

Important new provisions are introduced in clause 24 for the housing element of universal credit. Again, this could be a useful provision for the Scottish Government, as they would be able to reflect the characteristics of the Scottish housing and rental markets. For example—I hope that the Minister will tell me whether I am right to think this—they could vary their broad rental market agreement areas or the local housing allowance. However, there are again restrictions on the extent of the powers being devolved. They will not, as I read it, apply to those who receive housing benefit rather than the housing element of universal credit. They will not apply when people switch at pension age into receipt of pension credit. There is a gap in the legislation in ensuring that the devolution of housing benefit is sufficiently comprehensive to ensure that the Scottish Government will have the incentives and levers to use reductions in the housing benefit bill to enable them to build new homes.

I welcome the provisions on the devolution of employment programmes such as the Work programme and Work Choice. This is a sensible reflection of the different characteristics of different labour markets, although I remind SNP colleagues that the differences exist not just between England and Scotland but within Scotland. That is why Labour proposed in our election manifesto to devolve the Work programme and Work Choice to local authority or combined local authority level. I would expect to hear from Scottish parliamentarians and the SNP what their approach will be to that double devolution to reflect local labour markets.

I say to Ministers that I have read the provisions of clause 26 on “work for your benefits” on a number of occasions now and have absolutely no idea what they are getting at. I hope that there might be some clarity tonight.

Finally, there will be some significant operational questions, because the smooth delivery of benefits is as important to benefits recipients as the amounts and entitlements that the system offers them. Decisions taken in Scotland could of course affect operational workload elsewhere, such as in relation to decisions about mandatory reconsideration or changing the assessment process, which could have a significant effect on appeals workloads. I note that a fully functioning separate Scottish tribunal system will not be in place until 2023.

In conclusion, it is clear to me that we have a shared intention but a gap and a lack of specificity in providing for the intentions that we all understood to underpin Smith. They must be addressed before the Bill completes its parliamentary passage. We cannot leave issues of such grave constitutional importance in such uncertainty. It is clear that the scale of the constitutional change implied in the Bill is extensive, complex and impacts on the whole of the UK. That is why we will need to ensure that we have the mechanisms to keep its impact and effect under close and continuous scrutiny here in this House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kate Green Excerpts

Wednesday 18th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend, who dropped off a full copy of the report to my office this morning. She raises an important subject. As a parent and as a politician, I am keen that we should help to protect people from such material. I have got together some of the technology and telephony companies to look at offering a choice of blocking all adult and age-restricted content on their home internet. If we start to work with the companies to deliver such changes, I think that we can protect more young people.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Q15. The Government have said that they want to simplify the tax system, so why are they introducing changes to child benefit that the Treasury Committee today said will create further uncertainty?

Oral Answers to Questions

Kate Green Excerpts

Wednesday 21st July 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is right to say that as well as having to deal with a fiscal crisis—which has been handed over to us by the Labour party—we are faced also with a social crisis: social mobility has gone down; inequality has gone up; the gap between rich and poor has increased; and child poverty has increased by 100,000 since 2004 alone. That is why we have taken 800,000 people out of paying tax altogether. That is why we are going to deliver a pupil premium for children from poor backgrounds wherever they live in this country. That is why we have restored the triple guarantee to pensioners. That is why we have taken measures to make Britain fairer which were not taken by Opposition Members.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Q5. My constituent, Charlie Donegan, suffers from long-term mental health problems, septicaemia, pneumonia and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, and is a wheelchair user as a result. He receives the mobility and care components of disability living allowance at the higher rate. Can the Deputy Prime Minister explain to my constituent and to thousands of other worried members of the public like him, who rely on DLA for some small improvement to the quality of their lives, why he is now to face a medical test for a benefit that is intended to meet his non-medical needs?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

This is not about taking away universal benefits; this is about making sure that those who receive DLA, such as the hon. Lady’s constituent, do so because of real need. That is why it has been proposed by Members from all parties for many, many years that one way to proceed is to have a simple medical test. I meet constituents; I meet people who say that rather than running the gamut of the vast bureaucracy that has now attached itself to DLA, they themselves would prefer a simple medical test to know whether they continue to be entitled to receive that benefit, yes or no.