Cost of Living Increases: Pensioners

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Ashworth]

Yes, I do. My right hon. Friend, who was a first-class Pensions Minister and Chief Secretary to the Treasury, will remember being at the Government Dispatch Box when shadow Secretaries of State for Work and Pensions from the Tory party criticised pension credit and opposed the minimum income guarantee, saying that it was an extension of means-testing and undermined the universal basic state pension. Now, today, they are using pension credit to justify a £388 real-terms cut in the value of the basic state pension. I hope that the very sensible recommendation by my right hon. Friend, the Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, is taken up by the Secretary of State, and that she responds to him when she speaks.

Of course, Ministers should be moving heaven and earth to drive up take-up, but the Pensions Minister revealed earlier this afternoon that, instead, we have a letter writing campaign. Writing to local newspapers—that is his plan to drive up uptake of pension credit. When pensioners cannot afford their heating bills and cannot afford to eat—when pensioners cannot afford the basic necessities of life—rather than taking action, all he does is write to local newspapers. What is he doing? Is he expecting pensioners to burn the papers to keep themselves warm? I am told he has written to the Leicester Mercury. Well, I have been looking at his local paper, the Hexham Courant. I cannot actually see his letter in it, but I can see that it is warning that

“Thousands in the North East to miss out on automatic £150 rebate…MORE than 320,000 households across the North-East will not automatically receive a £150 council tax rebate…and 40,000 in Northumberland”.

Many of them will be pensioners. May I suggest that he sorts out his own backyard before gracing the pages of my paper, the Leicester Mercury?

There is one other area where I think the Minister needs to show greater urgency in supporting the United Kingdom’s pensioners and I would be grateful if the Secretary of State responded in detail to the points I have made. She will know that the underpayment of the basic state pension to around 135,000 pensioners, the vast majority of whom are women, has been a scandal. I pay tribute to the former Liberal Democrat Pensions Minister, Sir Steve Webb, the Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) and the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier), who have all shone a light on that.

The Department has allocated £1 billion and estimates that approximately 118,000 pensioners will be traced and could receive around £8,900 by the time the payments are made. So far, so good. But the last time Ministers provided updated figures, in autumn, they had paid out just £60 million to just under 10,000 people, so £900 million is outstanding. When we are in a cost of living crisis, should not the Department be showing greater urgency? When will the other £900 million be paid? The Secretary of State will know that there are stories of the DWP helpline giving inaccurate information and false assurances, forcing pensioners to keep living on less. There is no information available as far as I can see on how lump sums will impact on capital limits and the consequent impact on other entitlements, such as to social care. Divorced women have been excluded from the whole exercise on the basis that it does not think there are enough errors to be worth doing, even though there are cases of divorced women where errors have been made and it has had to pay out thousands in back payments.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

Two weeks ago, during my absence with covid, a private Member’s Bill was presented which called specifically for divorced women to no longer be excluded and receive more than an apology. Will the shadow Secretary of State indicate whether he would support that Bill?

[Jonathan Ashworth]

Without having read the details, it sounds like a very sensible Bill. I look forward to reading the details. At first sight, it certainly has my strong encouragement.

--- Later in debate ---

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

That is very kind of you, Mr Deputy Speaker.

Before Christmas, a constituent reached out to me to tell me about his mother. She had recently died, and when dealing with her affairs, he was distraught to discover that she had died with no money in the bank and with unpaid bills stacking up. She had worked hard, paid into the system and raised her family, and what she was left with was not enough. Of course, there was nothing I could do for his mother, though he was obviously extremely distraught to think that she had experienced that anxiety in the latter days of her life, but he wanted me to be aware of the cost pressures that pensioners face and to do what I could to stop older people ending up in the same position.

We know that my constituent’s mother is far from the only pensioner to have had to live in poverty and make the choice between heating or eating. That sounds like a cliché, but I am the co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on ending the need for food banks, and we hear in our inquiry sessions of people going without. They do not have the patience or the time to wait for the Chancellor’s statement. For many, the Government’s recent actions have pushed them over the edge, with the real-terms cut to the state pension by abandoning the triple lock and the failure to respond to the cost of living crisis.

In her opening remarks, the Secretary of State said two things. She said that the triple lock had been paused because the pandemic had caused an unexpected, unplanned or out-of-the-ordinary increase in inflation, but that the cost of living crisis was due to multiple factors. Can we just accept that covid is one of multiple factors that has caused the cost of living crisis?

I have always said that the state pension is not just about pensioners now; it is about people in the future. Young people who cannot get on to the property ladder, cannot get a mortgage or are in insecure employment need to know that there is a state pension for them in the future that will support them. This evening, I was at the Gingerbread single-parent family reception downstairs, and it was pointed out to me that many single parents do not qualify for auto-enrolment because they do not earn enough. That is another reason why it is even more important that the state pension is viable if private pensions are not going to be there to support people in the future.

Research by Independent Age has shown that, in 2018-19, only 60% of those entitled to pension credit were receiving it. If those extra 40% of people were reached, 440,000 pensioners would be lifted out of poverty, as others have mentioned. I was pleased that a recent DWP response to a written question of mine said that it was currently estimating that there had been a 30% increase in new claims in 2021 compared with 2020, or approximately 31,000 new claims. However, that figure does not tell us if any of those claims come from pensioners in older age groups who were already missing out on pension credit, or if they are from people newly reaching pension age. We know that there are 80,000 more people reaching pension age each year than the year before, so a figure of 31,000 could just mean that 49,000 are not receiving it when they are entitled to do so. There does not seem to be targeted awareness-raising. We have agreed across this House that we must do as much as possible to ensure that those who qualify for pension credit get it. I want to understand what the Department for Work and Pensions can do to upgrade its systems and identify those who might be eligible or potentially assess broad geographical areas where there are low take-up rates. What is it doing to ensure its messaging is reaching those it needs to reach, and is it conducting any critical analysis?

We know some groups are especially likely to be in poverty in later life and that is linked to underpayment of pensions. My friend and former colleague the former Liberal Democrats pensions Minister Steve Webb has been mentioned this evening and I am grateful to him for his work around that. However, as has been mentioned this evening, divorced women are explicitly being excluded from the LEAP—legal entitlements and administrative practice—exercise. Dealing with pensions on divorce is incredibly complicated—such as the allocation of one person’s potential future pension rights to another’s. It is hard to understand why the Department thinks there can have been no error in the payment of pensions under these complicated arrangements considering some of the basic errors made in other areas. My hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green) presented a private Member’s Bill on my behalf just two weeks ago while I was off with covid; it would include divorced women in this exercise. I ask the Minister to consider supporting my Bill, or to set out either this evening or in the fiscal statement why he will not do so.

Bills are increasing dramatically now. It has taken 35 years for underpayments of some state pensions to be identified, but pensioners on the poverty line cannot wait that long. The Government must now act to address this crisis both historically in terms of their own failings and given the current cost of living crisis.

Long Covid

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 24th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

We were told this week by the Prime Minister that the worst of covid was over and that we are moving from responding to covid as a crisis to it being something we will be living with for the long term. I think we all hope that the Government’s assessment is right and that after two long years of sacrifice, the worst is over.

This Adjournment debate, granted before last week’s recess, is also timely, because missing from the Prime Minister’s statement on Monday was something very important: how we deal with long covid. In fact, the Prime Minister did not comment on long covid at all. He talked about omicron being a less severe variant, and he said that covid should now be treated like the flu, but that overlooks the fact that the debilitating symptoms of long covid are not impacted by the severity of someone’s initial covid symptoms. Someone can have very mild covid symptoms initially, but be left with an endless illness stopping them from carrying out the most basic activities. That is one of the reasons why my party wants everyone to continue to have access to free testing—the fight against covid is not over just because we want to appease Back Benchers.

It is not really possible to describe long covid, but doctors now think that it is caused by somebody having an ongoing immune response to covid, long after the virus has left their body. What that looks like differs from person to person. There are 150 possible symptoms, with each person having a unique combination. The most commonly reported symptom is fatigue, then shortness of breath, loss of smell, difficulty concentrating and aching muscles. Symptoms can also include vertigo, fever, vomiting and diarrhoea to name just a few.

Long covid is also relapsing-remitting, which means that symptoms can come and go with little warning. In short, it is complicated, but what we do know is that it is affecting a vast amount of people. According to the Office for National Statistics, in the four weeks before 2 January, 1.3 million people across the UK had it. Considering that the spread of omicron did not peak until 30 December, the actual number of people suffering today is likely to be higher.

Tackling long covid is a challenge that we must take on, as much as tackling covid itself. When I applied for this debate, I caused a little confusion for some: “Why does a Scottish MP want to talk about a health condition when the care of her constituents is under the remit of the Scottish Government?” In some ways, they are right. It would be remiss of me not to pay tribute to the hard work of my friend the Member of the Scottish Parliament for Edinburgh West, who has been leading the way on getting health and social care support for long covid sufferers in Scotland. I know that his calls for proper care pathways, specialist clinics and support from trained district nurses will hugely benefit my constituents and others.

Treatment is only half the battle, however. The focus of this debate is how long covid affects someone’s ability to work and what support they need as a result. If we are now living with covid, we are also living with long covid. We have learned a lot about the disease in the past two years. There was little understanding for people who caught covid in the early days, and no understanding that their symptoms could last, but they have lasted. For that first cohort of sufferers, they have lasted for nearly two years. At first, it might have been understandable to think that they just needed to wait it out for their health to return to normal, but it would be completely disingenuous to say that now. Their symptoms are the reality of their daily life.

I have already mentioned that more than 150 symptoms are associated with long covid. The medical profession is still just starting to grapple with it and most people do not understand it much at all. Sadly, that lack of understanding is causing a stigma, as it often does, which is all too well known by sufferers of other diseases such as ME. Like long covid, fatigue is a common symptom of ME that also comes and goes.

When preparing for this debate, I spoke to representatives from Action for ME who have extensive experience with the problems facing those who describe fatigue as their primary symptom. They told me that people with ME face a significant stigma and face being told that their illness does not exist or that they should learn to just push through. They also told me that the same narrative and the same problems are being reported for the hundreds of thousands of people who have severe fatigue as a result of long covid. Indeed, Action for ME has had to close its helpline and waiting list because such a surge of people have contacted it. I cannot believe that that is unrelated to long covid.

Thousands of people are left suffering from an illness that may well make it hard for them to work, but their colleagues and employers do not necessarily believe that there is anything wrong with them. How can they explain an absence or ask for support in the face of being told that they are fabricating their debilitating symptoms? A better definition, guidance for employers and a Government-led campaign to boost awareness and understanding would go a long way towards changing attitudes to long covid.

The problem is exacerbated for people who do not have a formal diagnosis of long covid to fall back on. The Government’s working definition of long covid is a condition where symptoms cannot be diagnosed as being from anything else but the after-effect of a covid infection, but not all sufferers of long covid have had a positive covid test result. For the past 18 months, covid tests have become a part of daily life for most of us, but those who got covid in the first months of the pandemic were ill without ever being tested because the tests simply did not exist. That is a huge problem in a system where support—from employers or the Department for Work and Pensions—requires proof.

There is a future problem too that I have already referred to and that perhaps the Government would like to pre-empt. On Monday, the Prime Minister announced that free testing will end in just five weeks’ time, which means that more people will have covid, and might then have long covid, without a formal diagnosis. It would be a small but vital change to ensure that the diagnosis does not rely on someone having a positive test result on their NHS record.

[Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)]

Would antibody testing achieve the aim the hon. Member intends, rather than antigen testing, which is what we are currently doing?

[Wendy Chamberlain]

I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. I would accept either testing, but I am asking that proof of a positive test does not need to be a requirement for a diagnosis of long covid. Of course, it would be better for many reasons to just keep testing everyone, but failing this, I ask the Minister to speak to his colleagues in the Department of Health about how long covid can be diagnosed without a test result, and to commit to making sure it is not required for recognition of the disease by his own Department.

I am sure that, in his remarks, the Minister will tell me that there is no evidence of a problem of long covid and keeping people in work, but that is because the information is not being collected. As I have said, 1.3 million people have long covid, and of those almost two thirds report an impact on their ability to carry out their daily lives. It is logical to assume that this includes employment—getting up, commuting, concentrating and completing a full day of work—and I would urge the Minister urgently to collect the data needed to find out the extent to which people with long covid are struggling at work.

I also urge the Minister urgently to provide guidance to employers as to how they can support employees with long covid. At the very least, affected staff need understanding, but beyond this, employers need to know what reasonable adjustments are appropriate, how to support staff who are on long-term sick leave and how to adjust their business practices to function in the face of increased absences. I have some experience in that I worked for a time in human resources—I have some experience with dealing with issues that arise as a result of long-term health conditions—and I have great sympathy for those in human resources who are tackling this problem now on behalf of their employers.

This problem may be larger for some employers than others, particularly given the number of key workers who caught covid by working on the frontline during the first waves of the pandemic, and I have been written to by many constituents in this position. To mention just one, a constituent of mine was working as a healthcare support worker in the first wave of the pandemic when she caught covid from a patient and, as a result of long covid, she has been unable to return to work. Her employer, the local council, wants to help, but it does not know what is best to do. There will be thousands of employees in the same position all around the country, and employers need guidance from the DWP about the condition, and what support they can and should be expected to give. In this regard, I am told that it would be helpful if long covid was classified as an occupational disease. I therefore ask the Minister to use his time today to advise whether that is under consideration, and then to bring forward such guidance as a matter of urgency.

I am sure the Minister will agree with me in hoping that, with the right support and guidance, most people experiencing long covid will be able to stay in their jobs—to keep working, to keep earning, to continue in their careers—but, sadly, that will not be the case for everybody. There will be those who cannot work as much as they used to or who cannot work at all, and that is where our social security system steps up. As the Minister knows, it is already official Government guidance that for

“anyone with a disability or long-term health condition, including long Covid, there is a strong financial safety net”,

and it goes on to list available support as statutory sick pay, universal credit and personal independence payments.

However, as is so often the case with benefits, it is not that easy. Applying for benefits is complicated, as there are a lot of forms, a lot of boxes to tick and a lot of assessments. When someone has a debilitating condition such as long covid or one of the other relapsing-remitting diseases I have already mentioned, they may not be able to sit and complete a 30-page form in one go, or even in the course of a week or two. Research by the MS Society has shown that a third of people with MS thought four weeks was not enough time to complete the forms, but the majority of applicants did not know that they could request a two-week extension.

One solution is simply to extend the time allowed to complete the forms. There is no incentive for claimants to take excessive time because they want to get the support that they need. Meanwhile, DWP resources are used up requiring people to request extensions. Setting the time to return the forms at eight weeks would be a simple and cheap solution. If the Minister disagrees and prefers a system that does not work for disabled people and also costs his Department money, will he at least commit to including clear information on the PIP application form on how people go about applying for an extension?

While we are thinking about the forms, does the Minister agree with me that the forms ought to be designed to be usable by the people completing them? People with relapsing-remitting conditions, of which long covid is just one, do not find those forms usable. There is no space on the forms properly to explain the impact of having fluctuating symptoms. They do not work for people with long covid, and these forms must be fit for purpose. I strongly encourage the Minister to consult with disabled people on this.

Long covid is a novel condition, and the DWP, like all of us, is having to learn and adapt, but as DWP staff see more and more individuals with long covid, it is vital that they receive the appropriate guidance and training. Universal credit requires claimants who can do so to look for work. In fact, more recently it required claimants quite quickly to look for just any work at all. Are work coaches trained in what sort of requirements are appropriate for someone with a relapsing remitting disease, where they fatigue quickly or have brain fog or any of the other hundred-odd symptoms of long covid? I look forward to hearing from the Minister about what guidance is in place and what support is offered, but I fear there is little.

The same is true for personal independence assessments. A PIP assessment is supposed to determine what additional support someone needs as a result of their disability or illness, but again that is an impossible test for anybody with a fluctuating condition. They could be functioning one day, or even ok, but the next day they are unable to get out of bed. One assessment—just one assessment on one day—determines whether they get support or not, and that system does not work. Of course, the system is failing not only long covid sufferers, but those with ME, multiple sclerosis and chronic pain, to name a few. There is a simple solution that I ask the Minister to adopt, which is to allow more weight to be given to medical evidence and the information provided by doctors and experts on someone’s condition, or by those people who see claimants on their good days and on their bad days. It is an obvious solution.

There are other ways that the assessment process could be reformed better to support all disabled people, including those with long covid: using specialist assessors, ending the five-week waiting period and increasing payments in line with inflation are vital for the health and wellbeing of all disabled people. I await the publication of the Government’s White Paper this spring, and wonder whether the Minister is able to provide an update on that this evening.

However, those with long covid cannot wait until then for their condition to be properly recognised by the DWP and their employers. The pandemic has been the biggest mass-disabling event since the first world war, and long covid is not going away. We have seen covid rip through classrooms over the past few months. Long covid does not just affect people of working age, and children who suffer from it are going to miss education and training. It does not matter if, like me, someone views social security as a public service and a safety net, or if they see the DWP as a means to get people into work. From either perspective, the Government must do more to support those with long covid to stay in work, get into work, and get the support they need if they cannot work.

We need information about the impact of long covid on employment, and a formal recognition of long covid as a debilitating condition, or an occupational health disease that affects someone’s ability to work. We need proper guidance and training for employers and DWP staff, and an assessment process that works for people with fluctuating symptoms. The Prime Minister told us on Monday that it was time to get our confidence back, but those words are cold comfort to those suffering from the debilitating impacts of long covid. They need practical support and they need it now, and I urge the Minister to heed them.

Social Security and Pensions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 7th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

It is important that the debate covers both orders—social security and pensions—because the issues, and the circumstances facing our constituents, are the same. As the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) said, if the orders are not approved, there will be no increase at all, but it is telling that he and the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills) are the only Conservative Back Benchers to have spoken in this debate and they agree with Opposition Members that the Government’s proposals in relation to the 3.1% increase are insufficient. It is interesting that no Back Bencher is willing to say that they support the Government; I can only assume that they are dealing with the same casework as I and other Opposition Members have received about the circumstances that people face. Inflation is exceeding all expectations, outstripping wages for those in work and impacting on the price of the essentials that we all need in our daily lives.

Earlier today I attended the Scottish Affairs Committee where we heard about access to cash, which is very important for rural communities such as mine and for vulnerable constituents. I visited virtually the access-to-cash hub pilot, whose staff described to me how people budget in pennies—pennies and pence. That is what we are talking about. The decisions that the Government are making in these orders will mean that those people will no longer be able to survive and will fall over a cliff edge.

Benefits are not keeping pace with the cost of living; let us look at disabled people. Much has been said of the universal credit cuts and failure to provide additional support for those on legacy benefits, who are, disproportionately, disabled people. As I said in last week’s disability Green Paper Westminster Hall debate, living costs are simply more expensive for those who are disabled or have a disabled child. Scope’s data from 2019, before the pandemic, suggest that those costs equate to nearly £600 per month, and I would be interested to learn what that figure is now. Put simply, disabled people are more likely to be in energy poverty. They may need electronic devices to cope with their disability, they need increased heating if they have mobility issues, and specialist food plays a part as well. The Minister mentioned the extension of the warm home discount, but the consultation on that closed four months ago and I would be interested to hear when the result will be published.

On pensions, the position is straightforward. The Conservatives have chosen to break a 2019 manifesto commitment by scrapping the triple lock. Choosing to use the September CPI figure only, despite the fact that we knew at the time what inflation was going to look like—in fact, it is even worse than we were told it would be—is a retrograde step, and it means a £1 billion real-terms cut. A 1.1% uptick in just one month means that pensioners on the basic state pension will miss out on £80.60 next year, and those on the new state pension will miss out on £104. The total cost of uprating pensions and benefits by 6%—the Bank of England’s previous estimate of the peak of inflation—would be £4.5 billion. Interestingly, a similar amount was recently written off to covid fraud.

Nobody is saying that the Government are totally responsible for the variety of systemic factors contributing to the increasing cost of living that we are experiencing, particularly those related to the pandemic. What Opposition Members—and indeed some Conservative Members—are saying is that the Government are failing to provide the support that is required. Given that we know what to expect, why are we not taking steps to ensure that benefits and pensions meet the increase in living costs? Anything else is a cut, which will impact on the most vulnerable the hardest. We will see this in our inboxes again. In order to get the Prime Minister out of his current hole, the Government will spend in excess of £10 million setting up an Office of the Prime Minister. People see those decisions and actions, and they will judge accordingly.

Disability Benefits Assessments

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Tuesday 1st February 2022 Westminster Hall

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Gary. I thank the hon. Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) for securing this important debate.

One of my constituents in North East Fife is a young man with post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and autism, who has been refused PIP. Due to those disabilities, he has been struggling to gather the evidence needed to make an appeal. He is overwhelmed by the requirements placed on him, and is already struggling with simple tasks. In his own words, he would rather die than put himself through this process again. That is clearly a broken system. The disability Green Paper acknowledges that

“some people continue to find assessments difficult and stressful”,

but that does not begin to fully describe the distress felt by my constituent, and clearly by so many others.

The Green Paper is, however, a step in the right direction. I welcome, for example, proposals for the audio recording of assessments by default. That has long been called for by disability rights groups. In the context of immense distrust in the system, people need to know that what they have told their assessor has been accurately recorded. However, as it stands, the Green Paper does not commit the DWP to a timeline by which that will be implemented. It also does not commit to making it easier for people to access the written reports made about them. Transparency is vital if trust is to be restored to the system. I invite the Minister to address that in her response.

The Green Paper still presents missed opportunities. It acknowledges that it is vital for work coaches to have an understanding of the medical problems that their clients experience, but does not say the same of healthcare professionals involved in the assessment process. Why would we not want assessors to understand what they are assessing? It would increase trust in the process if claimants felt they had been understood. It would increase the number of decisions that are right first time, and would decrease the amount of taxpayers’ money spent on mandatory reconsiderations and appeals. To me, that is simply a win-win, and I hope that the Minister agrees.

The Green Paper also fails to address DWP’s approach to new illnesses, or to illnesses that are less understood due to the relapsing and remitting nature of their symptoms. That includes diseases such as myalgic encephalomyelitis, multiple sclerosis and now, of course, long covid. Long covid is currently a diagnosis of exclusion—has an individual had a positive covid test, and are they experiencing symptoms that cannot otherwise be explained? There are some 150 possible symptoms, of which the most prevalent is fatigue, but they can present in any combination in different people. It is not yet recognised as an occupational disease, and there is no coherent strategy from the DWP for supporting sufferers.

I ask the Minister to consider a few key points. The first is evidence of diagnosis. Diagnosis relies on a positive test, but those who continue to suffer symptoms from covid caught in the first wave will have never had a test result. How can they prove their illness? The second is guidance for businesses. The Green Paper sets out that the Government’s intention is to stop disabled people from falling out of work, but if we are to prevent long covid sufferers from falling out of work, action has to be taken now. The third relates to the broader point about relapsing-remitting diseases in which fatigue is a primary symptom. The Government must give proper guidance to assessors and work coaches about how best to assist people with those illnesses.

There is one final missing element in the Green Paper: it does not consider the adequacy of social security payments. Put simply, it is more expensive to be disabled or to be the parent of a disabled child. PIP might be a start, for those who can get it, but research released before the pandemic showed that even after receiving that payment, disabled adults face average extra costs of nearly £600 per month. PIP is not enough. The system is failing disabled people. I ask the Minister to commit to reforms that place disabled people at the heart of the social security system, and to urgently address the specific issues raised today.

Underpayment of Benefits: Compensation

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 13th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

I think all hon. Members here know this is not the first time the ombudsman has found maladministration in relation to the Department for Work and Pensions. Before Christmas I wrote to the Minister about two of my constituents who seem to have been given incorrect advice by benefit advisers in relation to being on remand and being released without charge. They are suffering financial hardship as a result. I listened to what he said about reading the report and taking its recommendations, but what is the DWP doing when these issues are highlighted to it by MPs and rights agencies to ensure we deal with them at an early stage?

[David Rutley]

I am relatively new in post—I have been here about three or four months—and all I can say is that I take a very active interest in the correspondence from MPs across the House. I hope people are aware of that. I will gladly separately follow up either in writing or in a meeting about the particular points that the hon. Member makes. We need to learn lessons. Our postbags are invaluable sources of information that sometimes are not really seen by officials or civil servants in the same light. It is an invaluable source of information to help me do my job. I will gladly follow up.

Social Security (Up-rating of Benefits) Bill

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Monday 15th November 2021 Commons Chamber

I hear the Minister’s reassurances that this is for one year only. I have been in this House too long though. We have been promised something for one year only and then suddenly it has become permanent. That is the big fear out there—that actually there will be another special circumstance next year and the year after, and, as my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham pointed out, we will lose the commitment given a number of years ago that there would be the continuous link with earnings so the pensioners of this country would share more equitably in the wealth within our country. That is why I support these amendments.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. This debate has to finish at 6.51 pm and I intend to bring the Minister in at about 6.46, so I ask the two remaining speakers to take about six minutes each.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

When we first debated the changes to the triple lock in September, the Secretary of State suggested we take advice from my friend the former Pensions Minister, Steve Webb—with whom I speak from time to time, the Secretary of State, who is now in her place, and the Minister will be happy to know. We usually do so when he is highlighting cases of people having lost out on entitlements due to failures in DWP systems.

As well as holding the DWP portfolio for my party, I am here to serve the interests of my constituents and I can tell Members that I have not received a single email or letter supporting the suspension of the triple lock. I have, however, received email after email asking me to fight to maintain it and pointing out that our state pension is already the lowest in Europe, with people worrying how they are going to make ends meet this coming winter.

On Second Reading, the Secretary of State told us this suspension was to deal with a one-off anomaly caused by the pandemic. I wonder whether she or the Minister actually engaged with the Prime Minister on this in advance of Second Reading, because his comments on the subject do not align with that argument. The Prime Minister has told a very different story, where quickly rising wages are not just desirable but an intended outcome of Brexit. So I have to ask: whose explanation should Parliament believe on these wage increases? Do the Minister and the Secretary of State align with the Prime Minister on this now and if so why are the Government intent on leaving pensioners behind, far too many of whom are already on or below the poverty line?

I am happy to support the Bill as it has returned to us from the other place, which has worked admirably across the Benches to find this compromise. The Chair of the Select Committee, the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms), reminded us in his considered contribution that this is not just about pensioners now; it is about the young, people who cannot get on to the housing ladder and whose wages have been suppressed. We in this place need to ensure that the decisions we make about pensions now give people the reassurance in future that there will be a sustainable state pension for them to live on. The Bill in its current form acknowledges the distortions to the labour market caused by the pandemic, but also acknowledges that inflation is rising. Under that Bill, pensioners will be able to keep the heat on and afford their weekly shop.

I acknowledge that the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) at least tried to justify the Government’s position this evening, but I note that no other Conservative Back Bencher has had the appetite to do so. There is a simple choice before the House today. I cannot support the Government’s amendments, which will cause such harm to so many.

[Patricia Gibson]

I rise to support Lords amendments 1 and 2. The Tory Government’s abandonment of the link between earnings and pensions, smashing the triple-lock manifesto commitment, is truly disgraceful. We are told this is necessary because this year’s earnings measure is “skewed and distorted”. There are many things swirling around Westminster that are skewed and distorted, but the triple lock is not one of them. The UK Government commitment to the triple lock remains, we have been told today by the Minister, but he will understand that that assurance is met with widespread scepticism because today he is here to tell us why their breaking the triple lock must proceed.

We in the SNP tabled an amendment to this Bill requiring the Secretary of State to assess, and be held accountable on, the impact that the legislation would have on levels of poverty among pensioners in each of the devolved nations. It was shamefully voted down by the Tories, and Labour abstained, which it will have to justify to pensioners across the UK. Pensioners across the UK, and certainly in Scotland, have been watching carefully and will not easily forgive that betrayal.

This Government have not listened to pensioners and they have not listened to Members of this House who have defended the triple lock. I doubt they will listen to the Lords either, but I sincerely hope the Minister will prove me wrong.

We have been told today by the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) that this would be “reckless” with taxpayers’ money. I find that insulting and wrong-headed, as will many of my constituents. What we have heard shows that the fiscal restraint we are told is necessary is being balanced on the back of pensioners, such as those in my constituency. We have heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) about how money can always be found, and we need only look at the DUP deal to see that. Money can be found when it is considered necessary.

Politics is about choices and choosing to break promises. Hard commitments made to pensioners about the triple lock are being broken. We are watching and our constituents are watching and they do not approve. The Government tell us that wages are rising, as we have heard, and we know that inflation is rising, so what justification is there to break the triple lock—to change the goalposts in the middle of the game?

Social Security (Up-rating of Benefits) Bill

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 20th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:

“this House, while recognising the extraordinary circumstances of the covid-19 pandemic, declines to give a Second Reading to the Social Security (Up-rating of Benefits) Bill because it represents a broken manifesto commitment made by the Government at the last General Election, fails to address the impact of the pandemic on the two million pensioners living in poverty and fails to increase key benefits, such as making permanent the uplift to Universal Credit.”

The Government are on track to break yet another of their manifesto promises. It is another example of how this Government are willing to turn their back on people living in poverty—now it is pensioners, but next month it will be those on universal credit.

The Liberal Democrats want Britain to be the best place in which to live and to retire, but, frankly, we all accept that it is far from that. People who have worked hard and paid taxes all their lives deserve a comfortable retirement when the time comes. It was our party that was instrumental in putting the triple lock in place, providing a lifeline to millions of pensioners who had seen increases as derisory and as low as 75p per year.

When pensions were only pegged to price inflation, their real value shrunk to one of the lowest in the developed world. We all deserve to live in dignity, to be able to afford food and heating, and to be able to live a life with some meaning or enjoyment, and reaching retirement age does not and should not change that.

There are more than 18,000 people in my constituency claiming the state pension, which is over 20% of the local population. They have worked, paid taxes, raised families, and built communities, and I want them to know that they are visible. The Conservative party clearly does not feel the same about their local pensioners, with the 20 hardest hit constituencies all being represented by Conservative Members. The Secretary of State’s own constituency is the fifth most affected by this broken manifesto commitment.

We all accept that we have lived in exceptional times over the past 18 months, and that earnings growth this year is out of the ordinary, but the big picture here is that this Government are refusing to take any action to lift any group out of poverty. The refusal to do so highlights the hollowness of the phrase “levelling up”. They are cutting universal credit, taking away vital income from 5.5 million households, and pushing thousands of families further into poverty. They have refused throughout to increase legacy benefits at all, ignoring the needs of recipients who are disproportionately disabled. Technical issues were given as the reason for this, but, 18 months on, a lack of appetite seems to be the more obvious case.

The decision to increase national insurance is a further tax on young people, on working people—those who have already been hit the hardest by the pandemic. We know that people are willing to make sacrifices when it is needed—we have seen that during the pandemic—but a part of that must be seeing that we all follow the same rules. There must be a fairness in what is being asked of us. There cannot be one rule for them and one rule for us, which, sadly, is what we see time and again from this Government.

This Government’s habit of breaking their promises makes me very wary of this Bill. We might be told that this change is just for one year, but they also promised no increase in tax in their manifesto and they have just increased national insurance.

[Guy Opperman]

I am listening with great interest to the hon. Lady’s speech. I just want to know whether she agrees with Sir Steve Webb, the esteemed former Pensions Minister, who, for five years, represented her party in this House and who indicated on 16 June that he strongly supported the sort of change that the Government propose tonight, but that she opposes.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

I thank the Minister for his intervention. I am grateful to have the opportunity to respond to him, especially as the Secretary of State did not give me that opportunity.

I agree that we have seen extraordinary circumstances over the past 12 months, including significant increases in wages, causing this anomaly, but what this Bill fails to do—I will have this conversation with my friend, Steve Webb—is help those of working age in poverty through maintaining universal credit, or pensioners themselves.

The Bill has only two clauses and five subsections. It fails to address any of the problems with the state pension, or to assess the impact of suspending the triple lock. There are already 2 million pensioners living in poverty, the majority of whom are women and/or from black and Asian communities. This Bill ignores them and the disproportionate impact that suspending the triple lock will have on people already struggling. The promises made by a party in their manifesto matter. It is the essence of the mandate that they claim.

Just last week, during the urgent question on transport, the Transport Secretary welcomed increases in wages and hoped that they continued and were sustained. That is the whole point of the triple lock; it is about helping pensions to keep up with the cost of living.

Women have already been left behind when it comes to the state pension, with those born in the 1950s—the WASPI women—being unfairly penalised by the Department for Work and Pensions’ failure to properly notify them about the change in pension age. Women who had worked hard and planned for retirement suddenly found themselves without either. With women more likely to rely on the state pension than men, this policy is another damaging blow.

Last year, I talked about the importance of the triple lock for intergenerational fairness. This Bill is not just of interest to those of state pension age. Unless we truly trust that this Government will keep their promise—and there is no evidence to show that this will be any different from the other broken promises over the past two years—this will impact everyone. Jobs for life and final salary pensions are a thing of the past. It is harder than it has been in recent memory to get on to the housing ladder. It is fair and right that young people today are able to look ahead to a state pension, but if we return to the days of minimal increases to pensions, they will be impacted, too.

I am asking the House to support the amendment tabled by the Liberal Democrats for all the reasons that I have outlined. While there is no doubt that the pandemic has required exceptional measures, this Bill was an opportunity for the Government to support poorer pensioners and to right previous wrongs, and it is an opportunity that they have ignored. Why is there no impact assessment on how this will affect groups already disadvantaged under the pension system? I hope the Minister will address that in his closing remarks. Why do the Government continue to ignore the needs and wants of ordinary people, and why do they think that anyone will trust their word given what has happened over the past few weeks?

The public deserve better than these broken promises, better than this Government, and the 2 million pensioners living in poverty certainly deserve better than this Bill.

Universal Credit and Working Tax Credits

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Wednesday 15th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

The Government give the impression that they do not think £20 is a lot of money. Although having and spending income is important, it is vital that those who do not have to count the pennies do not forget about everyone else. For many people, £20 is not a box of biscuits from an organic store in west London but what is spent on an entire week’s food shop. The Facebook group “Feed your family on a budget” was set up last year by one woman who managed to do just that on a £20 budget, and that group alone—it is not a unique initiative—has more than 340,000 members. The real impact of taking £20 away from 5.5 million households across the UK is people skipping meals, unable to feed their children, and even more reliance on food banks, which are being used more than ever before—more even than before the pandemic.

On Monday, the Secretary of State suggested that people could make up £20 by working two extra hours. The Government consistently demonstrate that they do not understand that, for many, universal credit is an in-work benefit and that work has other expenses, such as transport and childcare, which mean that claimants will need to work at least another six hours a week to make up for the cut, not two.

Some of my constituents will face a £30 a week loss or even more, because, as we have seen so many times before, the Government have failed to understand the impact of their policies on the devolved nations. Parents who receive any amount of universal credit in Scotland—even as little as £20—are entitled to Scottish child payments, best start grants and best start food payments. Altogether, the cut could mean a loss of more than £1,700 a year. The Scottish Affairs Committee report on welfare published earlier this year noted that there appears to be “a good working relationship” between the Governments, but this cut suggests otherwise.

Of course, “just work more” is never as easy as this Government seem to think it is. There are 1.1 million single parents eligible for universal credit, many of whom need to work part time. I have raised this issue before by asking the Secretary of State to explain the disparity between universal credit and legacy benefits for young parents, where the former benefit acknowledged the additional burden of parenthood and provided the higher rate of payment usually given to those 25 and over. She has failed to provide an adequate explanation to me or 100 charities from around the UK, and indeed other hon. Members, who signed the letter I wrote about this.

The bottom line is that reducing an already inadequate safety net is not going to get more people into work. Research by the Trussell Trust shows that 900,000 people say they will not have enough money to travel to work or essential appointments, and this is a particular concern in rural constituencies such as North East Fife. If people cannot afford to get to work, how are they supposed to get those extra hours? It is a vicious cycle, only worse. Indeed, figures from Fife Council today suggest that crisis applications to the Scottish welfare fund have rocketed since the start of this financial year. This cut is taking place while the effects of the pandemic are still being felt, and we need to make sure that those people and families are supported.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Monday 17th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Will Quince]

I have a lot of time for the shadow Minister, but however many times she asks the same question she is going to get the same response. The Government have focused support on UC and working tax credit claimants because they are more likely to be affected by the sudden economic shock of covid-19 than other legacy benefit claimants. I am not going to comment on the live litigation, but I would say that legacy claimants can make a new UC claim and benefit from the £20 a week increase; the Government encourage anybody to go on gov.uk and use one of the independent benefit calculators to check carefully their eligibility before they apply.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Dr Thérèse Coffey)]

The nation is today uniting to toast an important milestone in the Prime Minister’s road map to recovery, with the long-awaited full reopening of the hospitality sector—thank God for that, given the rain we are suffering. The British public have stood up to the challenge of the pandemic and, while still being cautious, we need to get out there and spend our dosh. Let’s do our bit to support our communities, businesses and jobs, including more than 1 million workers who were furloughed and whom I hope we will now see back at work. As hospitality booms, I am sure that many more new kickstarters will be out there, able to hit the ground running.

[Wendy Chamberlain [V]]

Before the introduction of universal credit, single parents under the age of 25 received a higher rate of benefit payment in recognition of the increased costs of raising a child as a single parent, but that support has sadly not been extended to young single parents who are in receipt of universal credit. Does the Secretary of State agree with me and the assessment of One Parent Families Scotland that the omission amounts to a “young parent penalty”?

[Dr Coffey]

No; we took a sensible approach in having a differential rate for universal credit. Of course, if any of the hon. Lady’s constituents would like support to secure extra income via the child’s other parent, the Child Maintenance Service is there to help parents in such situations.

Income Tax (Charge)

Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts

Thursday 4th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

Over the past year, more people than ever before will have come into contact with our social security system. In March 2020, around 3 million people were on universal credit; in January, it was 6 million. They will have discovered that what is billed as society’s safety net is, in fact, full of fairly large holes. That has been the experience of my constituents in North East Fife, and it will be the same for hundreds of thousands of people throughout the UK.

A year ago, Liberal Democrats welcomed the Chancellor’s move to help to fix the net via the £20-a-week uplift in universal credit—that money was needed even before the pandemic began—but as time went on, it became clear that further support was not going to come. We called for an uplift to legacy benefits, which are disproportionately received by people with disabilities, but after initially being told that the universal credit uplift was a first step because its computer system was easier to change than the systems operating legacy benefits, it turned out that no uplift would be forthcoming.

We asked for extra support for unpaid carers—a group of people who are under-appreciated, overworked and absolutely need our further support—yet rather than the £20 a week that they need at the very least, the increase the Chancellor is giving in the Budget is a derisory 5p a day.

The decision to create another cliff edge by ending the universal credit uplift in six months means taking away £1,000 a year from those who need it the most. Freezing the personal allowance is a stealth tax that simply means that the poorest will pay an increasing proportion of their income in tax as many begin to make the transition from universal credit to employment as the economy recovers.

Last week, my team and I undertook a virtual visit to the jobcentre in Cupar. It was great to meet the fantastic team there, who have coped brilliantly with the required changes to working practices and are clearly making a difference to many who access their support. Despite that North East Fife team’s efforts, I have real concerns about how the Government plan to get people back into work.

Take-up of the kickstart scheme has so far been sluggish. To some extent, that is understandable, given the current restrictions, but when the scheme was launched I asked the Government to reconsider the requirement for businesses to be able to participate directly only if they had 30-plus vacancies, and although I am pleased that they eventually changed that decision, the initial decision prevented businesses in my constituency from moving forward more quickly with the scheme. The pandemic has hit the job prospects of those aged 18 to 24 most heavily; kickstart needs to succeed.

Tourism and hospitality are two key sectors in North East Fife, and I have previously raised in this place many examples of small businesses that are struggling because of covid-19 and lack of support. I welcome the continued 5% VAT rate for hospitality, which many Members from all parties called for, along with the furlough extension, but the reality is that the Budget offers very little for the cafés, shops and sports clubs at the heart of the local economy. Hairdressers such as Alex Thaddeus in Cupar also need a VAT reduction, which the hair and beauty industry has called for. The data tells us that women are also paying a disproportionate economic price during the pandemic.

The furlough extension is useful, but when I have spoken to businesses such as the Ship Inn and the Dory in the East Neuk, they tell me that it now comes with costs—it is not the same scheme that it was a year ago. That means that the small business owners who are currently unable to open face painful choices—accruing more debt, laying off staff or, indeed, closing altogether.

Many Members have raised the self-employed. I can think of many constituents who have found themselves excluded. Beneath the Chancellor’s rhetoric, there is no real change to the self-employment support; it is just that more people qualify now because they have 2019-20 tax returns.

Some of the Scottish Government’s support schemes are problematic. There are Barnett consequentials sitting on the desk of the Cabinet Secretary for Finance right now, and in Scotland we have been in harder lockdown for most of the past year. Just this morning, I spoke to my team regarding bed-and-breakfasts such as Lillian May in Newport-on-Tay, which is still waiting—and has been since December—for Fife Council to get further guidance from the Scottish Government on the administration of funding for bed and breakfasts.