Lord Blunkett
Main Page: Lord Blunkett (Labour - Life peer)
Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)
I often wonder on these occasions how Aneurin Bevan and Michael Foot would have got on, having only six minutes to make a speech, but I will do my best.
Last week, my right hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Dame Tessa Jowell) reflected on the current political dialogue, saying that
“our political narrative has been characterised by a view of the worst of national human nature rather than the best.”—[Official Report, 8 May 2013; Vol. 563, c. 28.]
I regret to say that she is right. She is right because history teaches us that when politicians—particularly those of governing parties—are prepared to stoop to the politics of blame and resentment, and when the fulcrum of politics shifts to looking to our communities, rather than to the international financial and banking fraternity, to see who can be blamed for our problems, that is when we see people turning on each other. That is what we are seeing now. People are looking at those on welfare as though they are living high on the hog, and looking at migrants as though they are responsible for what has happened to their living standards, even though they are not.
There is a danger that the current ridiculous debate on Europe could put our prosperity at risk. Today’s debate is about the cost of living. If the debate on Europe continues as it is doing at the moment, the ratio of the pound to other currencies internationally will worsen to the point at which our imports will be more expensive and our cost of living will rise. The uncertainty will reduce inward investment into our country and, as we have seen from the Prime Minister’s somewhat ill-timed visit to the United States this week, negotiations over international trade with China, India, the US and the Russian Federation which require a Europe-wide approach to achieve a scale that allows us to negotiate sensibly, will be put at risk.
I simply ask Members on both sides of the House to be big enough to address the real challenges that we face as a nation, rather than turning individuals against individuals and fostering the politics of grievance. Historically, we seem continually to rewrite the issue of migration to this country. There is nothing new about using the politics of insecurity and uncertainty and the fear of change and difference to turn one set of people against another—usually the poor against the very poor—and we are seeing it again today.
Let us compare properly organised, legal inward migration with the illegal migration that pushes people into the sub-economy, which would have happened had we not reached the agreement to allow people to work legally here and pay tax and national insurance from 2004. This is fact, not fiction: 40% of those people from eastern Europe who registered to work here in 2004 were already in this country. They were working in the sub-economy. Nobody wants that; we want secure boundaries and legal, open migration that is properly organised.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
I could not help but note, when the right hon. Gentleman said it was ridiculous to blame migrants for our economic woes—I agree with him on that—that it might also be ridiculous to assume that they had nothing to do with our economic woes. At the weekend, Lord Mandelson said:
“In 2004 when as a Labour government, we were not only welcoming people to come into this country to work, we were sending out search parties for people and encouraging them, in some cases, to take up work in this country.”
Would the right hon. Gentleman care to comment on that?
Mr Blunkett
This talk of search parties is, frankly, risible. The fact was that we had a booming economy with enormous growth and we needed people to fill those jobs. We needed them to do so legally, rather than illegally. At the moment, however, illegal migration is growing and the message we are sending out, particularly to graduate and postgraduate students, is entirely wrong. Of course there is an issue about integration and about protecting people, but we need a sensible, rational dialogue, rather than one that fosters and engenders fear.
What about the welfare state? In 2005, we set out our principles for welfare reform. Of course, earned entitlement is crucial. We all accept that work is the best form of welfare, but turning those who are struggling on welfare into victims and suggesting that they are responsible for the dilemmas that we face in these times of austerity is frankly unacceptable. My right hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) mentioned the £1,700 cut in average earnings, but this Government have also frozen child benefit and cut tax credits. In-work benefits have also been cut, creating a disincentive rather than an incentive to work. Goodness knows what is going to happen when universal credit comes in later this year.
Above all, the Government are punishing people who are already struggling. The bedroom tax is the most iniquitous of the changes that the Government have brought in—[Hon. Members: “It’s not a tax.”] Does someone want me to give way?
Mr Speaker
Order. The hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) cannot opportunistically spring up in that way. He is showing a considerable discourtesy to the House. The right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett) should proceed unhindered with his speech.
Mr Blunkett
I am grateful to you, Mr Speaker.
I am talking about children under 10 who suddenly discover that their parents have to move and that they can no longer have their own bedroom, and about those with shared care not being able to look after their children at weekends. We could have provided incentives for people to move, but I am not sure whether the Government want them to move or whether they want to punish them for having a house with two bedrooms.
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
My right hon. Friend’s brilliant contribution is reminding us all of why he is such a towering force in politics. Does he agree that the bedroom tax—it matters little what we call it; it is what it is—is a precise example of the politics of division that he has been talking so eloquently about?
Mr Blunkett
I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for her kind words. I want to make the point that there were alternatives, including introducing incentives for people, including older people, to move. It is often older people who require smaller premises and who have larger premises that they can no longer manage. But we will not move them, will we? We will not tax winter fuel or assumed benefits for older people because older people vote in very much greater numbers than younger people. My message today is that politics—democratic politics—can be our solution and that people should engage with it as citizens in their community. They should engage with it through voting, but they should not be misled by organisations and parties such as UKIP that seek to obtain their vote by building on resentment and hatred, which history shows us has brought countries to their knees.
Yes, we need strong borders; we need welfare reform; we need a review of the European Union—but we need fairness at home, too. Today, Sheffield city council’s fairness commission, of all parties and no parties, has presented to Downing street thousands of names on a petition. I mean fairness, not just in respect of dealing with the recession and austerity, but fairness in the sense of what Barbara Castle used to call the social wage—the investment in our decent public services. That is the message we should be putting out today.