Sir Stephen Timms
MP for East Ham · Labour · United Kingdom
“I agree with the hon. Gentleman. If he would like to send me details of that particular case, I will happily look into it. On the subject of people with hearing impairments, my right hon. Friend the Minister for Women and Equalities and I will be meeting the British Sign Language Advisory Board this afternoon.”
“Better outcomes require early identification and support for girls and young women with special educational needs, including dyslexia. That is the aim of the SEND reforms and the development of national inclusion standards.”
“Autistic people and people with ADHD have been struggling to get the right support at the right time. Recommendations from Professor Karen Guldberg’s neurodivergence task and finish group directly informed the SEND reforms that were published earlier this year.”
“The Equality Act 2010 places a duty on public bodies to make reasonable adjustments, so that disabled people are not put at a disadvantage by accessibility challenges.”
“The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. This benefit is there to contribute to the additional costs of disability. Too often, what has happened—my hon.”
“I think we can take the hon. Member’s question as a tacit recognition that in 14 years the previous Government should have done something to fix these problems. The steering group is clear that the provision of cash to meet the additional costs of disability is vital.”
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“I am grateful for the opportunity to initiate this debate. Premier Christian Radio celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. It is a full-service, speech-based radio station for Christians on the Digital One national radio multiplex, and it provides 24-hour ministry, discussion and news from a Christian perspective to a committed audience. It has been on Digital One since 2009. Digital audio broadcasting now accounts for 61% of its audience of 600,000 to 700,000 people who listen for at least 10 hours per week. At the end of March, in about six weeks’ time, Premier’s six-year contract with Arqiva—the owner of Digital One—will come to an end. It was due to end on 20 December, but Premier was granted an extension until 31 March. Beyond that, its continued presence on Digital One is in doubt.”
“It does not have a big corporation standing behind it, and removal from Digital One would be an existential threat.”
“I think it is serious and hope that the discussions that follow will be successful, but I understand the right hon. Gentleman’s puzzlement about the precise timing of what happened. Earlier this month, Ofcom announced that it has received two competing applications—from Listen2Digital and Sound Digital respectively—for the licence to run the second national radio digital multiplex from next year. Premier is listed as a station on both the bids, so it should be assured of a place on Digital Two. However, if it cannot stay on Digital One after March, it will have a very serious problem. Digital Two will not open until the second quarter of next year, so Premier would lose more than half its audience and a large chunk of advertising and other income.”
“Section 54(6) of the Act states: “Where the licence holder applies to the Authority for the variation of any condition imposed in pursuance of subsection (1)(b) and relating to the characteristics of any of the digital sound programme services to be broadcast under the licence, the Authority shall vary the condition accordingly unless…(a) it appears to the Authority that, if the application were granted, the capacity of the digital sound programme services broadcast under the licence to appeal to a variety of tastes and interests would be unacceptably diminished”.”
“The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right and I think we can be hopeful that such an arrangement will be found. Premier has worked very hard over 20 years to build its audience and has a lot of very committed listeners. The issue I particularly want to raise concerns the requirements of the Broadcasting Act 1996, as it seems to me that they should apply in this case.”
“Premier leads on important campaigns: the RE.ACT campaign in 2011 to safeguard religious education in schools; the Safetynet campaign in 2012 to protect children from online pornography; and the Not for Sale campaign, which did important work on the Modern Slavery Bill.”
“Section 3 of the Communications Act 2003 also applies, with its requirement to secure “the availability throughout the United Kingdom of a wide range of television and radio services which (taken as a whole) are both of high quality and calculated to appeal to a variety of tastes and interests.” Premier Christian Radio is not the only Christian station on Digital One—United Christian Broadcasters is there as well—but it provides a unique and distinctive service. It is speech-led, and one of only three non-BBC stations on Digital One with 50%-plus speech content. Premier has its own news team, with journalists who provide a distinctive perspective on current affairs. It has a unique Christian telephone helpline and it is a very distinctive presence on Digital One.”
“That requirement to “appeal to a variety of tastes and interests” was at the heart of it. In Committee, on 14 May 1996—I was there—Iain Sproat said: “For digital radio, as for digital television, allowing the new technology to extend choice is a main aim of the Government.” I hope the Minister will confirm that it still is. Iain Sproat also said that “no more than two of the stations on the multiplex should be aimed at predominantly the same section of the listening audience”.—[ Official Report, Standing Committee D, 14 May 1996.] I understand that MPs are likely very soon to start receiving listeners’ postcards on the subject. As a London MP I have been on the receiving end of Premier postcard campaigns in the past, and the number of postcards is pretty impressive.”
“Yes, I do agree. It seems to me that the summary removal of Premier from Digital One, and its replacement with a pop music station very similar to several others, falls foul of the requirement in the 1996 Act, as the capacity to appeal to a variety of tastes and interests would be unacceptably diminished. I hope that Ofcom will take that view; I would have hoped that it might have done so already. I hope the Minister will take that view as well. I feel strongly about this, as I was a member of the Committee on the Broadcasting Bill back in 1996, and I remember being very impressed by the diligence of the then broadcasting Minister, the late Iain Sproat, in bringing forward a regulatory framework for broadcasting that was commercially viable but also decent.”
“The first is due to take place on 14 June, and has been backed by the Communities Secretary. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that Premier is very important indeed for many of its listeners.”
“The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Last week, Premier started to ask its listeners to write in with their support. I am told that 2,000 to 3,000 a day have been writing in since then. Let me just read what one of them said, which very much echoes the hon. Gentleman’s point: “Premier is a lifeline for me. I am registered disabled, with M.E., and unable to get to church or meet with other people. Premier helps me to connect and engage with my faith and feel part of a wider community.” I think a large number of people who listen to Premier feel the same way. Premier Christian Radio has recently announced an annual “society Sunday” to build closer relationships between local representatives and faith groups in their area to celebrate the work of faith groups in communities.”
“Removing Premier Christian Radio from Digital One—I very much hope yesterday’s approach means that that will not now happen—would be unacceptable. If a request is to be made to replace Premier with a pop music station—it has not been made yet—Ofcom should reject it. I am very much hoping that the Minister will agree.”
“A number of stations were there but are not any longer: One Word, a speech-based service of plays, books and comedy; ITN, speech-based rolling news; Talk Radio; Primetime, targeted at the over 50s; The Jazz, a Jazz music station, as one would expect; NME Radio, music news; and Bloomberg, financial and market news. All of those were on Digital One but have now gone. Against that disappointing pattern, the enforced removal of Premier looks even less defensible. Even a gap in transmission of 12 to 15 months would be a very serious blow to Premier’s listeners, to viability of the station, and to the principle of diversity set out in the Broadcasting Act 1996. Premier provides its listeners with a valued opportunity to connect to their faith, and to reflect from that starting point on what is happening in the world and on current affairs.”
“I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making that point. Before it went on to Digital One, I think I am right in saying that Premier Christian Radio would not have been available in Northern Ireland, and now it is. There are currently 14 stations on Digital One: Classic FM, Capital Xtra, Smooth Xtra, LBC, Kiss, Magic, Planet Rock, Absolute Radio, Absolute 80s, Talksport, Premier, UCB, which I mentioned, BFBS, the armed forces station, and TeamRock. LBC and Talksport have 100% speech content; Premier has 50:50 speech and music. The other 11 stations focus predominantly on music in varying proportions. The inclusion of yet another music channel at the expense of Premier would clearly harm the aim of appealing to a variety of listeners and tastes. There is a trend of losing speech-based stations from Digital One.”
“Will the Minister also confirm the straightforward fact that if the previous arrangement of uprating by RPI had remained in place throughout this Parliament, the state pension would be higher now than the figure in this order before us?”
“It remains the case that the basic state pension for 2015-16 would be higher than the figure in the order, under paragraph 4(3)(b), if the formula in use before the general election had been applied each year since then, instead of the triple lock. Contrary to the impression that is frequently given, the triple lock has in fact delivered a lower state pension in each year that it has been applied than the previous arrangement would have done. We are often told that the triple lock is this extraordinarily generous arrangement, when, in fact, it is less generous and delivers less to pensioners than the previous arrangement would have done.”
“He was sensible to override the triple lock, because clearly it would have been unwise to use it in that first year. In the following three years, the triple lock was applied and in each year it delivered a pension increase that was lower than the increase that would have been delivered under the formula in use previously—uprating in line with the increase in RPI. This year, for the first time, the increase will be slightly greater than would have been delivered under the previous formula. The increase in this order is 2.5%—the minimum allowed under the current arrangements—whereas the increase in RPI is slightly lower at 2.3%.”
“Uprating this year is notable for one element at least: for the first time since its introduction, the so-called “triple lock”, which the Minister referred to on a number of occasions, has delivered a higher rise in the state pension than the formula in use up to 2010 would have done. The term “triple lock” was intended to convey the impression of great generosity towards pensioners, but it is worth just reflecting again on the history of its use. In its first year it was announced but not actually used, because it would have delivered a pension rise that was too small and so the Minister overrode it and adopted RPI. He told us a few minutes ago that he did not think much of RPI, but he used it in the first year in place of the triple lock, because the triple lock would have delivered a small rise.”
“I thank the Minister for his explanation and confirm that I do not plan to express concerns about the Guaranteed Minimum Pensions Increase Order 2015. I do, however, wish to comment on the Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2015, on which he spent most of his time. As we noted last year, this is a rather thinner debate than the corresponding ones prior to 2014. Much of what we used to consider in these debates is now covered by the Welfare Benefits Up-rating Act 2013, which imposed a 1% uprating for this year, and so is outside the scope of these orders.”
“We do not, though, support the Government’s decision to adopt CPI permanently. We do support the increase in the state pension in line with the triple lock, and as voting against this measure would have the effect of delivering no increase at all, I will not be asking my hon. Friends to vote against the orders. When we look at the impact on poverty and on middle income households of the policies that have been adopted over the past five years, it is clear that it is urgently time for a change.”
“We will reform the banks and end the dither on big decisions, such as airport expansion, with an independent infrastructure commission, and we will back British firms by cutting business rates for small firms and unashamedly arguing for Britain to stay in a reformed European Union. We have a radical plan for spreading power and prosperity across the country, including giving England’s city and county regions more power over their public transport networks and devolving £30 billion-worth of funding over five years to the English regions. We will tackle the housing crisis with a commitment to build 200,000 homes a year by 2020. We could have recognised the case for a temporary use of CPI for benefit uprating as an element of a balanced programme of deficit reduction.”
“We also want the Office for Budget Responsibility to monitor and report on the Government’s progress in reducing child poverty. That is something that the OBR should do. We plan to restrict the growth of benefit spending through stronger, more balanced economic growth and more good jobs paying decent wages. We will tackle low pay and insecurity, raise the minimum wage and improve its enforcement, tackle the abuse of zero-hours contracts and expand free child care for working parents. We will incentivise payment of the living wage by employers by offering a 12-month tax break employers who raise their employees’ wages to that level. We will introduce our compulsory jobs guarantee to get more young and long-term unemployed people off benefits and into work.”
“We share the view of those experts who predict that 2020 will mark not the eradication of child poverty but the end of the first decade in recent history in which absolute child poverty increased…We have come to the reluctant conclusion that, without radical changes to the tax and benefit system to boost the incomes of poor families, there is no realistic hope of the statutory child poverty targets being met in 2020.” The Minister served, as I did, on the Public Bill Committee on the Child Poverty Act 2010. He argued then that the targets should be more demanding, but his legacy, and that of his colleagues, will be that there is no realistic hope of achieving those targets by 2020. Should we be elected in May, our approach will be different. We will balance the books and get the national debt falling in a fair way.”
“Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves), published new analysis from the House of Commons Library last week that shows that five more years of failure to make work pay of the kind we have seen in the past five years, with wages today on average £1,600 less in real terms than at the general election, and wages falling short of expectations to the same extent in the next Parliament as they have in this, would mean another £10 billion in social security spending on top of the figure already projected. The Government’s own Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, in its second annual assessment of progress towards the 2020 child poverty targets, was scathing. It states: “The impact of welfare cuts and entrenched low pay will bite between now and 2020. Poverty is set to rise, not fall.”
“The poorest households with children have lost more than 6% of their incomes and those without children in the middle of the income distribution have seen their incomes rise as a result of tax and benefit changes, as they have benefited from personal allowance increases and have not been affected by social security changes such as those to tax credits. Families out of work or with only one parent in work lost almost £2,000 a year as a result of the changes, while families with both parents in work lost between £1,000 and £1,500 a year. The shadow Secretary of State, my hon.”
“The report goes on to state: “Low-income working-age households have lost the most as a percentage of their income from tax and benefit changes introduced by the coalition…Middle-income working-age households without children have gained the most”. That is what the Government have achieved. Low-income households have lost and middle-income households have gained. That is not what the Minister and his hon. Friends used to argue for when they were in opposition, but it is what they have delivered in office. The IFS found that households with children have been hit hardest by tax and benefit changes.”
“Let me quote the opening couple of sentences, which say: “Tax and benefit changes introduced by the coalition have reduced household incomes by £1,127 a year or 3.3% on average...These involve an average loss to households of £489 per year, comprising an average gain of £321 a year from cuts to direct taxes, an average loss of £333 a year from increases in indirect taxes and a £477 a year average loss from benefit cuts.” Even the gain through direct taxes is outweighed by the loss through indirect taxes, never mind the bigger loss from benefit cuts as a result of this order and its predecessors.”
“That task has been greatly assisted by the publication last month of the report from the Institute for Fiscal Studies—the former employer of the Minister for Pensions—on “The effect of the coalition's tax and benefit changes on household incomes and work incentives.” It is a very revealing analysis.”
“I recently tabled a written question to inquire whether Ministers still thought that that would be achieved. The Minister for Disabled People, whom I am delighted to see in his place, answered the question on 26 January. He said: “The latest forecast agreed with OBR still rounds to 0.1 million cases”. So the figure has clearly already slipped again, and that is only since October. This debate is the last of its kind before the election, so it gives us an opportunity to reflect on the cumulative impact of the Government's changes to benefits in this order and the previous ones.”
“In 2011, Ministers said that transition to universal credit would be complete by 2017, a date that was then six years ahead. Now we are told that the transition to universal credit will be complete by 2021 at the earliest, which is six years away. Expected completion has slipped by four years in four years. The National Audit Office reports that £344 million had been invested in universal credit IT up to 31 October 2014, but that the value of the assets created by that date was £125 million—little more than a third of the sum invested. Waste on such a large scale reflects just how much trouble this project is now in, and the problems continue. Last October, the Department predicted that there would be 100,000 people claiming universal credit by May of this year.”
“That is surprising, especially in the light of the fact that Ministers keep on telling us about their generosity towards pensioners. As well as the state pension, the order contains uprating details for universal credit. Those are currently largely of academic interest, because so few people are in receipt of universal credit. The Government announced in November 2011 that a million people would be claiming universal credit by April 2014. That was an absurd boast, as we pointed out at the time. The Government have consistently failed to grasp the scale of what would be required to implement universal credit. The latest figure for universal credit claimants is 27,000. At the present glacial rate of progress, it will be 1,571 years before the transition to universal credit is complete.”
“I am merely pointing out to the Minister that the increase is 0.2 percentage points higher than the increase in the RPI. Before the last election, the state pension was raised in line with the RPI. If that arrangement had continued each year since 2010, the state pension would be higher for the coming year than the figure in the order in front of us. I simply think that, in listening to his frequent protestations about how generous the Government have been to pensioners, the House should be aware that in every single year since 2010 the level of the state pension is lower than it would have been if the previous arrangement had stayed in place—except for the first year when they matched what the arrangement would have been before the election.”
“I agree with the point that my hon. Friend makes. Does she agree that it is hard to understand how Sri Lanka, under its new Government, can be admitted as a full member of the family of nations, and regarded as such around the world, if it does not co-operate with the UN’s work to investigate the war crimes at the end of the civil war?”
“My hon. Friend makes a powerful case. Earlier, she quoted the new President’s words, which indicated that he wanted to make sure that Sri Lanka made the most of its participation in a variety of international organisations to benefit the people of Sri Lanka. Is it not the case that that ambition will be possible only if Sri Lanka starts to co-operate with the UN’s work?”
“A striking feature of the recent trends in unemployment is the increase in youth unemployment, which has risen for three months in a row. In the figures that were published last week, it rose by 30,000, which is the biggest jump for almost two years. Why is it that while overall unemployment is coming down, youth unemployment is going up? Why are young people losing out?”
“Young people remain at a distinct disadvantage in the labour market. The statistics published last week show that for the third month in a row overall unemployment came down but youth unemployment rose. Does the Secretary of State have any new proposals to tackle this problem of currently rising youth unemployment?”
“At the time of the general election the rate of youth unemployment was two and a half times the overall level of unemployment. Since then, the relative position of young people has steadily worsened, to the point where last week the youth unemployment rate was 2.9 times the overall rate of unemployment. Judging by his answer, the Secretary of State may not have noticed that youth unemployment is currently going up. Is it not now high time for a compulsory job guarantee, so that young people have the chance of a job at the start of what should be their working lives, instead of spending years on unemployment benefit?”
“Q10. The Prime Minister said that his policies would eradicate the deficit in this Parliament. Unfortunately, he was mistaken—a very large deficit remains. What is the reason, in his view, why his economic plan has fallen so far short?”
“The Minister is right repeatedly to commend Newham council. The social fund, which my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) mentioned, was the ultimate safety net against destitution. On the basis of the Minister’s statement, can he give any assurance that the replacement local welfare assistance will continue to be available where it is needed?”
“I am very grateful to Mr Speaker for this opportunity, following my point of order in the Chamber last week. My aim is simple: to obtain from the Minister an answer to a straightforward parliamentary question to which I have—in vain—been seeking an answer for the past year and a half. We know from the Trussell Trust that about a quarter of a million people went to a food bank in the past year because their benefit had been sanctioned and they did not have enough money to buy food for themselves and their family.”
“As one service manager commented: ‘We have a number of care leavers being sanctioned which results in extreme poverty.’” There is now, therefore, very widespread concern about what is happening, beyond the very striking conclusion in the report published last month by the Trussell Trust, the Church of England, Oxfam and the Child Poverty Action Group that between 19% and 28% of people driven to use food banks were there because of a benefit sanction. Parliament is entitled to be told what is going on, so will the Minister inform the House how much is currently being withheld from jobseeker’s allowance claimants in benefit sanctions?”
“Barnardo’s run a number of services which work with vulnerable young people, for example services which offer support to care leavers, homeless young people, or teenage parents. Amongst this subset of services over two thirds (67%)”— in a survey it carried out— “said that the increased conditionality and greater use of sanctions were having an impact on their service users. Our services report that sanctions often happen because of misunderstanding on the part of the young people...The impact of sanctions on this group of young people, who often lack family support, is to plunge them into destitution, leaving them reliant on insecure credit, and often resulting in them ending up in rent arrears, putting their tenancy at risk.”
“People who are homeless are more likely to be sanctioned than other claimants.” The Joseph Rowntree Foundation stated in a report published in September: “Sanctions are now used much more frequently within the welfare benefits system. The severity of sanctions has also increased and conditionality is now applied to previously exempt groups (e.g. lone parents, disabled people). Benefit sanctions are having a strongly disproportionate effect on young people under 25, and there is also evidence of severe impacts on homeless people and other vulnerable groups.” In a striking representation, Barnardo’s says: “Particularly worrying…is the impact that the harsher conditionality regime is having on our services which work primarily with young people.”
“The Salvation Army has told me: “The more stringent conditionality introduced into the benefit system under this government and the resulting rise in benefit sanctions are having a profound effect on many of the people we work with…we urge the government to review the system and ensure that adequate systems are put in place to make sure that benefit sanctions are applied in a way that is both appropriate and proportional.” St Mungo’s Broadway has said: “Under current sanctions regimes St Mungo’s Broadway clients are under threat of being sanctioned for failing to meet conditions which do not help them to enter and remain in work or which they cannot meet.”
“In preparing for this debate, I had a look at the ministerial code, which says: “Ministers should be as open as possible with Parliament and the public, refusing to provide information only when disclosure would not be in the public interest which should be decided in accordance with the relevant statutes and the Freedom of Information Act 2000.” That is all I am asking for. I believe that as a Member of this House—ever grateful to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and to Mr Speaker for upholding the privileges of Members— I am, and we are, entitled to a substantive answer. I applied for this debate within minutes of Mr Speaker giving me his advice. One unexpected result was that I have received a number of representations expressing real worry about the impact of current jobseeker’s allowance sanctions.”
“I have discussed this matter with Dr David Webster of Glasgow university, the leading academic authority on benefit sanctions. He estimates that the amount of benefit withheld in sanctions is now running at £300 million per year. If that is the case, it is important that Parliament knows it. It should not be necessary for people to make speculative estimates—the Minister should provide the answer. She will no doubt want also to provide various caveats, clarifications and health warnings, as did the initial answer on 25 March 2013, but she should provide Parliament with the basic information being sought.”
“On 5 December, I received a repeat of the refusals I had previously received: “The Department doesn’t make an estimate the amount of benefit that would have been withheld as a result of benefit sanctions.” As you know, Mr Deputy Speaker, because I have already pointed it out several times in this debate, the Department did make precisely such an estimate in the written answer to me dated 25 March 2013. I have now, over a period of a year and a half, tabled six written parliamentary questions to obtain straight forward and important information that was provided in a written answer in March 2103, but in all that time and with all that effort, I have so far drawn a complete blank. In exasperation, I appealed to Mr Speaker for advice, and he suggested this debate as a way to enable the Minister finally to provide the requested information.”
“The Minister’s answer went on: “The answer of 25 March 2013, Official Report, column 986W, on social security benefits, contained a calculation of the amount of jobseeker’s allowance (JSA) that claimants would have received if they had continued to be on benefit for the length of a fixed sanction. This is not the same as the amount withheld as a result of sanctions.” I thought, perhaps a little naively, that the Minister was finally giving me a hint about how to obtain the information I wanted, so on 2 December I tabled this question: “How much additional jobseeker’s allowance in total claimants subject to a fixed sanction would have received if they had continued to be on the benefit for the length of time of their sanction in (a) 2012-13 and (b) 2013-14.” Unfortunately, my optimism was ill-founded and short-lived.”
“On 25 November, hoping to understand why an answer that could be given in March 2013 could not be repeated now, I tabled this question: “Pursuant to the Answer of 24 November 2014 to Question 215334 and the Answer of 4 July 2013, Official Report, column 736W, (a) on what date and (b) for what reason his Department stopped estimating the amount of benefit withheld as a result of the application of sanctions.” On 1 December, the Minister sent me this answer: “The Department has never estimated the amount of benefit withheld as a result of benefit sanctions.” As you will appreciate, Mr Deputy Speaker, I know that that was not right, because the answer I received on 25 March 2013 contained a table headed “Benefit withheld from fixed JSA sanctions (£ million)”, so the Minister’s predecessor provided precisely the estimate that her latest answer claims never to have been provided.”
“Last month, I tried yet again, with Question 215334, and received this answer: “The Department does not estimate the amount of benefit withheld as a result of benefit sanctions.” Yet on 25 March 2013, the Department did provide precisely such an estimate.”