DWP Estate: Office Closures

Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts

Thursday 17th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. May I seek your guidance on whether it is orderly for an hon. Member who has taken very substantial donations from a trade union to ask an urgent question on a matter of direct interest to that trade union?

[Mr Speaker]

We need to be careful. Is the right hon. Gentleman sure that the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) took the donation, or was it an agreement with the constituency party? This is a very serious allegation. Is it a constituency party donation or was it donated directly to the hon. Gentleman?

[Dr Murrison]

It is in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

[Mr Speaker]

That is not what I asked. We will leave it for now. We had better move on.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (David Rutley)]

At the Department for Work and Pensions, we constantly look at ways to improve our services. I wish to say up-front that we know it is important to communicate changes to all relevant stakeholders so that everyone understands our plans and why we are making changes.

This seems to be an unusual situation, Mr Speaker. It is very disappointing that the embargo agreed with the Public and Commercial Services Union does not seem to have been respected. Clearly, our staff should be the top priority at this time. I hope colleagues will understand that I am not able to go into all the detail this morning as we are briefing affected colleagues as we speak. In fact, the delivery of the first stage of the strategy is being announced to affected colleagues at 10.30 today—right now. The Minister for Employment will write to MPs with an affected site in their constituency after 1 pm today, and there will be a written statement to Parliament tomorrow morning. The letter to MPs will include notification of a virtual surgery that the Minister for Employment will hold on Wednesday 23 March.

The change is to back-of-house offices and will support the delivery of the Government priorities to get more people back into employment, to deliver long-term savings for the taxpayer and to meet Government commitments to modernise public services. The Department has developed a strategy that will, over the next 10 years, reshape and improve how, where and when it delivers services to claimants. The Department is transitioning to an estate that is smaller, greener and better. This will deliver substantial benefits by increasingly developing modern, secure, resilient, sustainable and automated systems to drive better experiences for our customers, colleagues and taxpayers.

The plans for the next three-year period affect the future delivery of back-of-house services—that is, services that are delivered remotely via telephone and online, without the need to see customers face to face. I assure the House that the plans do not affect Jobcentre Plus and customer-facing roles. We have been engaging fully with PCS union representatives at the sites affected since January, and PCS union representatives will be present at sites for the announcements today, as the House would expect. Our focus today is, of course, on supporting staff through the changes.

Changes to DWP estates are not unusual. Like most public services, we are always looking to meet our customers’ changing needs, reflecting developments in technology and the approaches of successive Governments. We value our staff and are working with them now to support those who will be affected by the changes as we seek to deliver the best possible services to our customers at all times.

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[David Rutley]

My hon. Friend makes a very important point. We will, of course, make sure that those communications are made. We will also make sure that the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Mims Davies), has those conversations with MPs. If any MP needs to contact her, they should do so, and she will be willing to talk to them. She will also proactively get out to speak to colleagues. Please be sensitive to the fact that she is currently recovering from covid at home, so I am fulfilling her role today. If any colleagues wish to speak to me after this urgent question, I will gladly meet them.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

It looks as though the Department for Work and Pensions does not believe in levelling up, does not believe in its own rhetoric on jobs, and does not believe in keeping people in work. We hear that offices will be closed in Stoke, Southend, Peterborough, Chesterfield, Aberdeen, Kirkcaldy, Barrow, Bishop Auckland, Doncaster and Burnley, taking jobs out of these communities. Can the Minister answer these questions for the Members in Stoke, in Wellingborough and in Stockton whose communities and constituents will be concerned about the news today? We have heard that up to 12,000 jobs might be affected, but how many of the workers will be able to find new jobs locally within the Department? Can the Minister guarantee that there will no compulsory redundancies?

I appreciate that staff are being informed only this morning, but this is the correct forum for the Minister to answer these important questions. The PSC Union has said that its members are facing spiralling workloads. Is it not the case that the Department actually needs more staff, not fewer? If these closures are allowed to go ahead, we will face the absurd prospect of making staff redundant in one area, while recruiting new staff in another to do exactly the same job. That will be both costly and inefficient, so can the Minister confirm that that will not be allowed to happen?

If these closures go ahead, local communities will be faced with the loss of hundreds of good jobs potentially. Many of the closures are in areas of economic deprivation that can hardly afford to lose good-quality public sector jobs. Will there be a plan to help those communities attract well-paid jobs back to their local areas? This all comes at a time when families and working people are being hit hard by the cost of living crisis made by this Government. The price of petrol, food and energy is still soaring and people are worried about the future. Has there been any assessment of the impact that these job losses will have on the local economy? I think the Minister indicated in his previous answer that there had not been, but I would be grateful if he could confirm that. Has any consideration been given to the effect that this will have on the high streets of the affected towns? Will we see yet more boarded-up buildings? This is the opposite of levelling up; this is levelling down and it is closing down.

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[David Rutley]

As my right hon. Friend highlights, we are doing a huge amount of work to help claimants to find work and to help people to progress in work. I am delighted that he has those facilities in Harlow and I or the Minister for employment will gladly come and visit in the very near future.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Select Committee, Stephen Timms.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

This week’s employment figures show that there are 580,000 fewer people in work now than there were before the pandemic. In particular, there seem to be several hundred thousand older workers now choosing not to work nor to claim benefit. We all want a full labour market recovery. Does the Minister recognise that this is going to require major Government investment rather than the disinvestment that I think he is announcing this morning?

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[Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. At last week’s business questions, the Leader of the House announced that there would be a debate this afternoon on protecting and restoring nature at COP15 and beyond. Unfortunately, it seems to have dropped off the Order Paper and no one understands why. I am sure that Government business has changed, but through your offices, may I encourage the Leader of the House and the Chair of the Backbench Business Committee to allow time for that debate, plenty of time before COP15 happens?

[Mr Speaker]

I do not know whether the Leader of the House wishes to give an answer to that. [Interruption.] I am sure that we can get you an answer but I do not have one to hand. I am sure that, as we go to business questions, the Leader of the House may want to point it out.