Oral Answers to Questions
Mark Menzies Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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Will Quince
Although we recognise there are problem areas, it is worth noting that the majority of supported housing is provided by well-run registered social landlords with a strong social mission. These are regulated by the Regulator of Social Housing, for registered charities, or by the Charity Commission. But I do recognise that there is a problem, and I would be happy to meet the hon. Lady.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mims Davies)
We are working with employers at a local, national and regional level, and we continue to have wide-ranging engagement to promote the scheme. Department for Work and Pensions officials are supporting applications through existing and growing partnerships. From day one, we have engaged with more than 300 stakeholders to ensure that the design of the kickstart scheme delivers for our young people and employers alike. We continue to work with those in growing sectors to boost further opportunities, so far creating more than 4,000 applications and more than 20,000 approved kickstart roles—these numbers are growing daily.
Mark Menzies [V]
Last week, I met with Ameon, a building services company based in Fylde that is looking to grow its team due to the recent construction boom in the north-west. In construction, qualifications are vital to building a career. Will my hon. Friend outline how the kickstart scheme interacts with sixth-form and further education colleges to help enrolees to get valuable experience of work and certified lifetime skills?
Mims Davies
Businesses in my hon. Friend’s constituency are coming forward daily, and DWP employer advisers are running daily sessions to get young people ready to be matched with placements. In addition, we have created new youth hubs and are working with local partners to assist young people in removing any barriers. Alongside that, we have allocated every kickstarter an additional £1,500 of employability support to ensure that they are ready to take up future work opportunities.
Dr Coffey
We want to make sure that all eligible pensioners claim the pension credit to which they are rightly entitled, and we want to encourage people to either call the free claim line—0800 999 1234—or go online to gov.uk/pension-credit. We did a considerable amount of advertising earlier in the year to encourage that, and of course the BBC has, in effect, done some free advertising, recognising that those people who have pension credit will also get a free TV licence.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con) [V]
Mims Davies
As part of our plan for jobs, the new job-finding support and JETS services will, crucially, help jobseekers move back into employment as quickly as possible, helping them to identify sectors that could be growing or new to them. I met our JETS providers just last week to hear some of their early success stories from across England and Wales. JETS rolls out in Scotland in early January.
Oral Answers to Questions
Mark Menzies Excerpts(4 years, 11 months ago)
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Alok Sharma
My hon. Friend is of course right to point out that, despite any uncertainty around Brexit, the British economy is in good shape. We do have one of the highest employment rates in the EU, Britain is the No. 1 destination in Europe for foreign direct investment, and the IMF projects that our economy will grow faster than Germany’s this year. Unlike the Opposition, Conservative Members believe in supporting businesses and employers.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Will Quince)
The Government know that getting ex-offenders into work is a crucial part of rehabilitation. DWP prison work coaches and jobcentre work coaches provide tailored support to ex-offenders. The DWP works collaboratively with Ministry of Justice on its education and employment strategy, creating a system where prisoners are on a path to employment as soon as they enter prison.
Mark Menzies
People from all walks of life have to undergo work capability assessments, but ex-offenders have complex needs and often institutionalised experiences. What measures is my hon. Friend taking to ensure that the assessors themselves are taking the appropriate measures?
Will Quince
My hon. Friend raises a good point. Healthcare professionals are subject to a rigorous recruitment process, followed by a comprehensive training programme in disability assessment for physical and mental health conditions, and have to be approved by the Department. They are then required to complete a programme of continuing professional development.
Oral Answers to Questions
Mark Menzies Excerpts(5 years, 2 months ago)
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Alok Sharma
As the hon. Gentleman knows, we have now put in place mechanisms so that Welsh speakers do benefit. I am happy to meet him and any other colleagues to discuss any issues that they may wish to raise.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Amber Rudd)
I am pleased to say that, because of the changes made by this Government, we have record levels of employment—up 3.4 million since 2010—and the female unemployment rate is currently at a record low.
Mark Menzies
Recent figures show that unemployment in my constituency continues to fall. What plans does the Secretary of State have to reduce it further by working with businesses and further education colleges to ensure that young people have the skills needed for today’s workplace?
Universal Credit
Mark Menzies Excerpts(6 years, 1 month ago)
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Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
I do not approach the matters in the statutory instruments lightly, and I will tell hon. Members why. I was brought up by a single parent who was widowed a month before I was born, who worked shifts in a factory and who got by on a widow’s pension, child benefit and the money she made and by managing that money carefully, so I know only too well the impact that such changes can have. But I also know that people in those situations are acutely concerned about changes coming down the line and the alarmist things being said currently. I appeal to the Opposition, particularly the Front-Bench team, to think of those people when they make alarmist statements. By all means have legitimate, fair and open debate, but do not trot out numbers that are simply not true; do not let people believe that something as precious as free school meals is being taken away from them when that is not the case. I ask those on our Front Bench whether these changes remotely resemble what has been proposed by Labour Front Benchers. They are not changes that I could support, but they are nothing like what Labour is proposing.
I thank the Secretary of State for Education for his letter outlining the Government’s position on free school meals. In it, he states:
“The proposed changes to the eligibility criteria have been designed to ensure that support is targeted where it is needed most, meaning that those on the lowest incomes remain the focus of Free School Meals…
No child will lose their meals during the rollout of Universal credit as a result of these changes.
Our plans mean an extra 50,000 children will be eligible for a nutritious meal at school by 2022.
Labour’s claim that our changes could leave over a million children without this is deliberately misleading.”
As I have said, there are people out there in the real world who think that something will be taken from them and their children, which causes them concern and alarm. I question whether there is a deliberate attempt to weaponise the vulnerable, just as people once boasted about the NHS being weaponised in order to rig votes. I urge Members not to do that, because they will cause fear and anxiety where it is not required. There is enough fear and anxiety in those households as it is.
The letter continues:
“Since 2010, we have extended the availability for free school meals to disadvantaged students in further education and introduced universal infant free school meals.
When Universal Credit was introduced, the Government were clear that they would set a new criteria for free school meals. To ensure that no one was adversely affected during its roll out, the Government temporarily made Universal Credit a qualifying benefit for Free School Meals, regardless of income. As was made clear at the time, this was always an interim measure…
If you receive a free school meal now—you will continue to do so until the end of the rollout of Universal Credit, planned for 2022, and then to the end of either primary or secondary school (which ever you are in at this point).
For example a child in year 5 on a FSM now, whose parents are on UC but have an income of £40,000, will continue to get a FSM until the end of secondary school.”
I know that many colleagues want to take part in the debate, but I particularly want to thank the Government Front Bench for a robust defence of an important policy. Let us nail the myths, the untruths and the attempts to frighten people. If the Labour party continues to peddle things that are untrue, it behoves us to state what is true and not to frighten the vulnerable, many of whom we are all proud to represent.
Mohammad Yasin
I am sorry, but I cannot. Many other Members want to speak and it is fair to give them a chance.
During the summer holidays 4,412 more three-day emergency food supplies were given to children than in previous months, and we know that children on free school meals already underperform in schools. Why would any Government choose to make life more difficult and more challenging for those children?
Mohammad Yasin
A number of Members want to speak. It would be unfair if I gave way, as the hon. Gentleman has spoken already.
Why would a Government who claim to want to tackle inequality, to help the disadvantaged, to tackle child obesity and to help out those who are just about managing come up with a policy that does the exact opposite? The new earnings limit is a huge step backwards. According to the Children’s Society, 1 million children in poverty who could benefit now will not. This policy also undermines one of the main reasons given for introducing universal credit in the first place—to ensure that “work always pays”. The new rules will create a situation where working families will be punished for taking on extra hours or accepting a pay rise because they would have their free school meals taken away. These are worth around £400 a year per child—a huge sum for those on a low income.
A recent report from the Food Foundation highlights the deprivation gap, which has increased by more than 50% in a decade. Children in the poorest areas of England are twice as likely to be obese as their wealthier neighbours. The Government could have tackled that problem by increasing the uptake of free school meals and ensuring that all children from low-income households receive a nutritious meal at lunchtime. Instead they are taking those meals away. The Government should have learned from their attempts to take away free school meals in the manifesto that they put to the country last year that they have no mandate to reduce school meals and it makes no sense to do so. Schools cannot teach hungry children. If the Government were serious about life chances and social mobility, they would not be taking food out of the mouths of babes.
Pension Equality for Women
Mark Menzies Excerpts(6 years, 4 months ago)
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Mrs Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con)
I thank my north-east colleague, the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris), for securing this important debate.
Yesterday, in Parliament, we celebrated the centenary of the formation of the Women’s Royal Naval Service. We celebrated and remembered the service and sacrifice of the women who gave so much to our nation. Today, we are yet again debating the plight of 3.8 million women from across the United Kingdom who have been financially impacted by the lack of notice of pension increases—our WASPI women. Those women have quietly contributed to our nation’s economic growth throughout their working lives in paid work, alongside providing the bedrock on which our families and children depend, through unpaid parental and caring duties, without question. Those women have now created one of the biggest campaigns we have witnessed in many years, because Governments of all colours over two decades have failed them.
As a believer in the power of people peacefully coming together to campaign for change and working together for what they believe is right, I am completely supportive of the WASPI women from across our country, many of whom are here today, including two dedicated and effective campaigners from my own constituency who are leading the campaigning. They are giving up all their time to voice the concerns of my 6,200 Berwick-upon-Tweed WASPI constituents, the 23,800 WASPI women across Northumberland and the 3,777,000 across our four nations.
In this debate, we need to remember that the WASPI women have served our nation in many different forms and guises. We have military service personnel, teachers, doctors, nurses, mothers, midwives, accountants, farmers, lawyers and office workers—those are just the ones who come to see me in my constituency—and many others who have been the backbone of our nation’s economy since they started work in the late 1960s. Those women have provided the building blocks that have taken our country through the strong economic times and the hard. We need to keep them in mind during this debate, not just as one big story, but by remembering the individual story of each WASPI woman who has come to our surgeries with problems of financial hardship.
With that in mind, I would like to reflect on some of the issues faced by my WASPI women living in north Northumberland. People in my patch have a strong and ingrained spirit of independence and self-sufficiency. Perhaps it is a remnant of the border reiver spirit that being on the border of two nations brings, but I sit comfortably with my Scottish friends here today.
A long history of hard work, regardless of weather—of which we have much—remains the hallmark of rural Northumberland. That is particularly clear in the strength of the women who have been to see me. They have raised families alongside a lifetime of hard work and have made sacrifices to ensure that future generations have better lives than previous generations. That last point means that it is hard for some women, who have explained this to me in great detail, to ask for benefits to survive, particularly because they were led to believe that they would be receiving the state pension, into which they had paid, at a certain time, but that has now been altered without due time to prepare.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
I recognise the type of people to whom my hon. Friend is referring. Women out there clearly feel that they have experienced miscommunication, and they are facing genuine hardship, so I ask my hon. Friend to continue her cause.
Mrs Trevelyan
I thank my hon. Friend. It is so important that we think of the individual women. There may be 3.8 million of them, but that means 3.8 million individual women across our nations. These women have worked hard all their lives and now face some incredibly difficult circumstances, and ill health can mean that they are struggling to survive on what they have. The lack of notice of changes to their pensionable age means that their financial plans—where they were able to make them—have been thrown entirely out of kilter.
Such issues are exacerbated by the intrinsic problems that people face in rural areas. Job opportunities can be limited, and I have met constituents who face age discrimination when trying to get back into the workplace as a result of the changes. The challenge is compounded by limited or non-existent—as it is many parts of my constituency—rural public transport. Connectivity can be extremely poor for some people who live many miles from a bus stop. Without a car, many people’s options are severely restricted. The personal stories of financial adversity faced by my constituents have been beyond frustrating for me to listen to.
Those of us who brought together the all-party parliamentary group on state pension inequality for women have found the Department for Work and Pensions unwilling to engage with us to try to build a relationship to seek viable and fair solutions for the 3.8 million women. Every case is unique, and each woman’s financial situation is different, and we need to treat each one on its merits. I gently suggest to the DWP and to Ministers that that needs to be how we start to treat the women.
Too many women have told me of the inefficiency and inconsistency in the treatment of their cases by the DWP, and I will be most grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman), my constituency neighbour and our Pensions Minister, if he tackles today the impasse that this campaign and the Department seem to have reached. I have tried on the behalf of my constituents to bring all the parties together for a considered, open discussion to provide some progress on these historical failings. Sadly, I have so far been unsuccessful.
Whatever the historical failures of communication on the changes to the pension age, and regardless of which Government, of whichever colour, failed to get this right over the past 20 years, the key questions for me are how we now start to work together, listen to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman and tackle the failure to deal with the WASPI women’s complaints. We want to ensure that the Department puts in place rigorous processes for the pension age changes that are no doubt to come. I am sure that I will be 80 before I am allowed to retire, and I want to be certain that, whoever is in government, the Department is comfortable that it has robust processes in place so that this situation can never happen again.
Women rarely push themselves forward; they are wont just to get on with life and look after their families. However, this situation has driven them to gather together and speak with one voice on behalf of each other as much as for themselves. It behoves us as their Members of Parliament and the incumbent Government, who have been asked to right historical failings, to listen and to work with my constituents to find a fair and honest solution. I urge the Minister to meet me and my Northumbrian WASPI ladies to start that process in a spirit of conciliation and understanding.
Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con)
I also congratulate the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) on securing today’s debate, and I was happy to add my signature to the application to ensure that it got through the Backbench Business Committee.
May I take this opportunity to pay tribute to local Moray WASPI campaigners? Several other Scottish Members have intervened today to say that their campaigners are watching at home or in a union building in Glasgow. I am delighted that I have a local WASPI campaigner and others from Moray in the Gallery today. One of them is Jennifer Matheson, who is fresh from abseiling off a building in Lossiemouth recently to raise funds for Outfit Moray, when she was resplendent in her WASPI colours to show her continued support for the campaign. May I also put on record my support and admiration for Sheila Forbes, who leads the Moray WASPI campaign?
I have previously spoken in debates on this issue in this Chamber, but today I want to focus on local case studies to ensure that the effects the women in Moray face as a result of these changes are recorded in the Official Report, because the testimony of these women is extremely important.
One lady continues to look after three generations, as well as holding down a full-time job. However, because of the stress caused by her concerns over her pension age, she is now off sick. Another lady, who is close by in the Chamber at the moment, says:
“I am now 64, so four…years without my pension.”
She has worked since she was 16, and she has 43 years of national insurance contributions. To echo some of the comments made by other hon. Members today, this constituent has two schoolmates born in the same year as she was, 1953—one was born in February, and one in July—and they already have their pensions. So birthdays only nine months apart can mean two years’ difference in terms of state pension pay-outs.
Another constituent resigned when she was 61 from an extremely stressful job, and she felt she could live off her savings until she got to her pension age at 62, only to find out that it had changed to 66. She then had the double whammy of trying to claim her occupational pension and being advised that, if she took it, she would lose 5% each year before she reached state retirement age of 66.
In the short time available, I want to finish with another story from Moray. This lady is a carer for her husband, who took a dense stroke five years ago. They were going to use some of the state pension money to buy specialist equipment that was not available on the NHS. That story is harrowing, but the key point for me was that she never, ever received a letter informing her that she would not be getting a pension at 60.
Mark Menzies
My hon. Friend hits the nail on the head. There are lots of women who find themselves taking on caring responsibilities because their partners have life-changing health conditions. It is really important that the Minister takes this into account when looking at the pension implications for these women.
Douglas Ross
I am grateful for that intervention. We have heard that message from both sides of the Chamber, and I am very hopeful that the Minister will take it on board.
The final point I want to make about this specific constituent was that she had lived at the same address for 27 years—she had not moved house, and she had not moved around the country—yet she never received a single letter from the DWP about these changes. That is the inadequacy we have to look at.
I would like to echo the comments of the hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris)—sadly, she is not in the Chamber at the moment—and my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), who spoke about the all-party group’s study into this issue, which I fully support—I was at the launch in Westminster Hall recently. It is great to hear that there have been 90 submissions so far, but we need more because this is an opportunity for WASPI groups and WASPI women across the country to get involved and to ensure that we go through the process and have something to offer the Minister and the Government. We want to identify a solution, and it is important that the women affected by these changes are involved in that.
All 3.8 million WASPI women agree with equalisation, as we have heard across the Chamber today.
State Pension Age for Women
Mark Menzies Excerpts(6 years, 9 months ago)
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Julian Knight
I will not give way, I am afraid, as I am short of time.
My other point is that the current state pension arrangements will have to rise as well. When we meet those issues in the future, we have to get them right because this country is heading for an enormous black hole. The figures are frightening—absolutely frightening. People talk about £30 billion here, £30 billion there, but the reality is that if the Opposition parties want to form a Government in the future, they will have to accept that the pension system in this country needs continued radical reform. If they do not do so, and continue grandstanding, taking on policies and ignoring their own past errors, that is not going to do any good whatever.
In 2003, the Turner commission report—
Julian Knight
I am sorry, I cannot—I did not give way to the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) either.
In 2003, the Turner commission report was born out of cross-party consensus on pensions. That has broken down. Going forward, we need a bit more co-operative work so that it does not happen again.
Oral Answers to Questions
Mark Menzies Excerpts(8 years, 4 months ago)
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Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
T2. What steps are being taken to support those with early onset dementia through the ESA process and, where appropriate, how do we support those who wish to continue in work to do so?
The Minister for Employment (Priti Patel)
We fully recognise the devastating impact that a diagnosis such as early onset dementia can have on individuals and their families. That is why we have the work capability assessment, which is designed to ensure that any claimant who is severely affected can be identified at the earliest possible stages and is supported. They will of course be placed on to the highest rate of benefit, where there has been such a diagnosis, and they will be free from any conditionality.
Oral Answers to Questions
Mark Menzies Excerpts(9 years, 3 months ago)
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Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
4. What progress he has made on supporting people with a mental health condition to find work.
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)
8. What progress he has made on supporting people with a mental health condition to find work.
The Minister for Disabled People (Mr Mark Harper)
The Government are committed to helping people with mental health problems into work. We are piloting a number of innovative approaches to employment support for those with mental health problems, and the Access to Work mental health support service can help people with a mental health condition who are absent from work or who are finding it difficult to get back into work.
Mark Menzies
Mental health issues in Fylde are as serious as they are anywhere else, so what plans does the Minister have to support further people with mental health conditions throughout the Disability Confident campaign?
Mr Harper
I am pleased that my hon. Friend mentions the Disability Confident campaign. I have invited Members from both sides of the House to talk about Disability Confident at an event in the House on Wednesday. Specifically on mental health, I had the privilege last Thursday to visit the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) and to meet with the work coaches in the jobcentre and with those who have been on some of our pilot programmes to hear about the success we have had in encouraging people with a mental health problem to get back into work, or to avoid having one in the first place.
Oral Answers to Questions
Mark Menzies Excerpts(12 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con)
4. What effect he expects the Government’s youth contract to have on the number of unemployed young people.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
16. What effect he expects the Government’s youth contract to have on the number of unemployed young people.
The Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Chris Grayling)
We are in the final stages of preparing for the launch of the youth contract in April. We believe that it will have a positive impact on youth unemployment, providing nearly half a million support opportunities for young people. We and employers are working together to give young people the support they need to gain employment.
Chris Grayling
There is already considerable interest in what is planned, and I hope that it will give unemployed young people a leg-up in the workplace. We hope that the challenge that they face owing to a lack of previous experience—which we were talking about earlier—will be ameliorated, at least to some degree, by the incentive payment that we will provide, and that the result will be far more young people getting their first opportunity to get into work.
Mark Menzies
I thank the Minister for his original answer, but can he tell me what Jobcentre Plus will be doing differently as a result of the youth contract?
Chris Grayling
We are also stepping up the support that we provide to young unemployed people through Jobcentre Plus, which will include more frequent work-focused interviews. We are also recruiting more youth advisers in Jobcentre Plus to provide help to the young unemployed. We are determined to deal with the problem of youth unemployment, which in all parts of the House we agree is a massive challenge for the nation.
Oral Answers to Questions
Mark Menzies Excerpts(12 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Duncan Smith
The whole point of that research was to look at how we can get value for money—how many people we can get back to work, and what we can best do to support them. We inherited a terrible situation from the last Government, with youth unemployment having been rising for a number of years. The programmes we are introducing—such as the Work programme and special provision within that, and the innovation fund—will help them much more than lavishing huge amounts of money for very little return, such as through the future jobs fund.
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)
T7. What are the Government doing to reduce conflict between parents in their dealings with the Child Support Agency?
Maria Miller
Reducing such conflict by putting in place support for parents to work collaboratively at the time of family breakdown lies at the heart of the reforms that we are looking at. I think Members of all parties can welcome that, and it has certainly been welcomed by organisations in the charitable sector who work with families.