Damian Hinds
MP for East Hampshire · Conservative · United Kingdom
“There are moments in debates like the one we have had today that are difficult to sit through and listen to, but it is the most immense privilege to be a Member of Parliament and to hear some of these testimonies.”
“Today is once again a day of heavy responsibility for all of us to decide on what we in this House call “conscience issues”. Many of the people who we represent hold strong and immutable views, and we hear from them. However, we represent many others who hold much more nuanced views and we are less likely to hear from them.”
“Members who support the Bill should not have their motives questioned, Members who oppose the Bill should not have their motives questioned, and Members who have reached a different conclusion from one they reached at an earlier stage should not have their judgment questioned either.”
“We have heard from royal colleges and other professional bodies, many of whom have a neutral stance on the principle but raise significant questions about particular aspects. We know from Ministers that there would need to be some reprioritisation of NHS resources, but we do not know the extent.”
“If there is the prospect of the Parliament Acts being used, that would increase the importance and the salience of the text as it is now. Today, it is reasonable and entirely in order for hon. Members to consider information that is available now that was not available in those previous parliamentary deliberation.”
“The Government have said, rightly, that the time taken to implement other schemes is not directly comparable, because none are as in this Bill. This is a free vote on a matter of conscience—there is no party line on either side of the Chamber. No one, I suggest, finds this issue easy.”
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“We will continue to pay the relevant additional amount for disabled children in universal credit, regardless of whether those children are the third or subsequent children or otherwise. The hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark rightly raised the subject of childcare. He will know that, in the tax-free childcare system that we are introducing, there is, quite rightly, a special addition to recognise the additional costs of childcare that pertain for children with a disability. In the overall offer of 15 hours and 30 hours of childcare there is, as he will know, rightly a statutory duty on local authorities to ensure proper provision for children with disabilities in the nurseries that their families trust.”
“Thus, a family with five children, one of whom is disabled, would continue to receive child tax credit or universal credit in respect of all five children, as well as the appropriate disabled child element in child tax credit and the additional amount in universal credit. The Government think it right that, just as families who support themselves solely through work must weigh up financial considerations when deciding to have more children, families in receipt of benefits should face the same sorts of financial consideration. That should apply to all families. In recognition of the costs of supporting disabled children, we will create a separate disability element of child tax credit that will be payable for all disabled children, regardless of whether they are the third or subsequent children or otherwise.”
“Those benefits include personal independence payments, disability living allowance and the support group component of employment and support allowance. Additionally, we will continue to increase those benefits by inflation. The Government are committed to supporting disabled children. We have reformed the special needs system to support children continuously from birth to the age of 25 and increased our spend on the main disability benefits by more than £2 billion over the course of the last Parliament. Overall, of course, we continue to spend about £50 billion on disability benefits and services each year. My understanding is that amendments 83 and 84 would have the effect of removing households with one or more children with a disability from the two-child support limit policy in child tax credit and universal credit respectively.”
“I welcome the hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth to her place in the Committee and, more broadly, to the Opposition Front Bench. She has a hard act to follow in the shape of the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston, but I know that she will execute her work absolutely admirably in this Committee and beyond. She and the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury have spoken powerfully about the challenges faced by the parents of disabled children. I echo them in acknowledging the invaluable work that such parents and families do in difficult circumstances. The Government are protecting benefits related to the additional costs of disability and care by exempting them from the freeze and from the cap that we discussed on another day.”
“For the reasons I have set out, the new clause is not appropriate for inclusion in the Bill. We have recognised that there will be a need for some exemptions, for example in relation to multiple births, but those are much better dealt with in a considered way in collaboration with stakeholders through secondary legislation. I urge the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury to withdraw the amendment.”
“The Social Security Advisory Committee, as its name suggests, is a valuable body for advising the Government on our secondary legislation. It does not, however, have the remit to design legislation. That is the proper job of the Government and we consult with the committee as appropriate. Amendments 83 and 84 relate to the proposed exemption of households where any child or qualifying young person is disabled. I have responded on that issue. Finally, the new clause requires the Secretary of State to set up an appeals structure. Social security and tax credits already have comprehensive appeals arrangements that will apply to any decisions made under the provisions in the Bill or exceptions set out in regulations. The provision is therefore not required.”
“The Government have already given a clear commitment that multiple births, for example twins or triplets, will be treated as a single birth with a child element for each sibling where there were previously fewer than two children in the household. We have also set out that there will be protections—we discussed this earlier—for women who have a third child as the result of rape. We will set out exemptions in regulations after discussions with stakeholders and careful consideration. Using regulations to set out exemptions provides the Government with greater flexibility to adjust exemptions in the future without needing to secure primary legislation. That is more appropriate because we may wish to act relatively quickly in the light of operational experience.”
“I do not dispute for a moment what the hon. Gentleman says. I agree with him entirely that we—the Government and Members of Parliament—must be vigilant in ensuring that families, including those with disabled children, have access to good childcare. It is a duty on local authorities but vigilance is always required to ensure that such measures are delivered. The hon. Gentleman asked about the roll-out of universal credit. I am not quite sure of the specific context in relation to the measures—I will just say that it is on track. It will be in every jobcentre by April 2016, with the bulk of migration complete by 2019. New clause 16 seeks to specify exemptions to our proposals, including a new role for the Social Security Advisory Committee, and to establish an appeals process.”
“The policy will therefore apply only to claimants who have been supporting themselves entirely outside the benefits and tax credits system for more than six months and who will therefore not see a cash loss. We also need to remember that child benefit will remain in payment for all eligible children, continuing to provide support beyond the child element of universal credit.”
“The amendment would see the policy that limits support to two children applied only to children born after April 2017, rather than also applying to entirely new claims for universal credit. The part of clause 12 that the amendment would change is primarily about fairness to the taxpayer and ensuring that where people can provide for themselves, they do so. We estimate that the amendment would increase universal credit expenditure by £245 million in 2019-20. We have committed to protecting universal credit claimants at the point of change and new claimants who have been in receipt of universal credit or tax credits in the previous six months.”
“It is an untold pleasure to put the hon. Lady’s mind at rest. We are referring to entirely new claims and not to an existing recipient of tax credits for a third or subsequent child under either universal credit or the predecessor tax credits system. There is also the six-month window, so the Bill strikes the right balance between those needing support and the taxpayer.”
“I will have to ask for the hon. Lady’s forbearance and forgiveness for my lack of photographic memory of proposed new subsection (3A). However, I can reassure her that the point is about new claims or those with a gap of more than six months since receipt of either universal credit or the predecessor tax credits system. The Bill strikes the right balance between the support that people need and the taxpayer. I therefore urge the hon. Lady to withdraw the amendment.”
“The Bill builds on this Government’s achievements in delivering for working people, whether that is the 1,000 jobs created every day—2 million since 2010—the 2.9% growth in wages this year, a 9% increase in total hours worked since 2010, or the fact that, according to the OBR, living standards are projected to be higher in 2015 than in any previous year. These clauses, which freeze the main rates of working-age benefits, child benefit and the majority of tax credits, are a central element of the Bill and are key to this Government’s ambition of putting welfare on a fairer and more sustainable footing. The exemptions for benefits, which help with the additional costs of disability, ensure that we continue to protect the most vulnerable.”
“However, before I do so, I want to recap the purpose of the Bill and in particular clauses 9 and 10. The Bill seeks to move this country from a low-wage, high-tax and high-welfare society, to a higher-wage, lower-tax and less welfare-reliant one. That means ensuring that work always pays and focusing support on those on the very lowest incomes. Crucially, it means ensuring that the system is fair to those who pay for it, as well as those who benefit from it. Combined with the national living wage and the changes to the income tax personal allowance, the summer Budget ensured that a typical family working full time on the national living wage will be better off by the end of the Parliament, with eight out of 10 working households better off by 2017-18.”
“Things have accelerated, Mr Owen. It is a pleasure to respond to this concatenated set of amendments. As these are probably the last words that will be said in this Committee before we break for the party conferences, I want to pay tribute to the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston and the right hon. Member for East Ham, who is my cloakroom neighbour. They are both impassioned campaigners whose dedication and intentions can never be doubted. They will be very much missed from this Committee. Of course, we warmly welcome the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury to her new position. This has been a full debate on a range of important issues. In responding to the amendments, I will reiterate the rationale behind our proposed changes and set out why we are not persuaded that the amendments should be accepted.”
“The Government have therefore extended the freeze to ensure that it generates at least the same level of savings, and more, than announced last autumn.”
“The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that people in receipt of a number of benefits will have contributed to the system. It remains the case that we fund benefits out of current contributions. It remains the case that we have a budget deficit of 5% of national income. It remains the case that we need to get that down to start paying down the national debt. In order to do that, we need to find £12 billion of welfare savings. The freeze has been extended to four years due to the current low-inflationary environment to ensure that it makes a significant contribution to the £12 billion reduction that I just mentioned. When originally announced as a two-year freeze, it was forecast to save £3 billion and to lead to a real-terms reduction in benefit rates of 4%. Due to the current environment, it would now save less than £1 billion.”
“Those are vital protections alongside the very acute need to make savings.”
“In bringing forward our policy to freeze benefits and tax credits, we have been extremely mindful of the protections that we believe it is right to put in place to support the most vulnerable. We are exempting all the benefits relating to additional costs of disability, as I just listed. Similarly, we are protecting the disability premiums and additions in working-age benefits, tax credits and pension-age benefits. The support group component in employment and support allowance and the limited capability for work and work-related activity element of universal credit are also protected. Those elements are paid to those with the most severe work-limiting health conditions in recognition of the fact that they are less likely to be able to increase their income by moving into work and may have additional needs as a result.”
“We have exempted the support group component of ESA, the limited capability for work and work-related activity component of universal credit, as well as additions and premiums in JSA, ESA and tax credits related to disability. Statutory payments, including statutory maternity, paternity and adoption pay, statutory shared parental pay and statutory sick pay are also all exempt. Those exemptions ensure that the most vulnerable in society are protected from the benefit freeze. Let me speak directly for a moment to amendments 95 and 96, which seek to exempt disabled people from the freeze by ensuring that any of the relevant sums of working-age benefits and tax credits are increased in line with inflation, if they are claimed by a person who is disabled.”
“I will be delighted to. I was explaining why what was originally a two-year freeze has been extended to a four-year freeze because of the current low-inflationary environment and the need to make the savings that form a substantial part of the £12 billion that we have been discussing. While the Government have a clear mandate for the reforms, it is imperative that we protect the most vulnerable. We are protecting pensioners, with pension credit, the pension additions in other benefits, and the basic state pensions—they are all excluded from the freeze. We are also exempting benefits relating to the additional costs of disability, such as attendance allowance, disability living allowance, and personal independence payments.”
“What we have said is that those in the support group will be exempt, but not those in the work-related activity group. The main rates of working-age benefits are there to provide basic support for claimants who are not in work. Those rates are common across all claimants who receive out-of-work benefits. Introducing new higher rates of payments specifically for disabled people has the potential to discourage claimants from taking steps to get back to work where they can and would introduce significant complication into the system, leading to possible confusion for claimants.”
“The hon. Lady will forgive me, I know, if we do not talk again at length about the benefit cap. We had a big debate about that in the earlier group of amendments that referred to the benefit cap. I repeat all the exemptions that are being made in the freeze—well, I am not going to repeat them all, but she heard them. There are all the exemptions that the Government are making for those specific benefits and elements of benefits that refer to the additional costs of disability. The Government are committed to ensuring that disabled people are able to participate absolutely fully in society and have set out their ambition to halve the disability employment gap, which I think is something that Members on both sides of the Committee and the House would agree on.”
“Will the hon. Gentleman forgive me if I do not, just in the interests of time? Most people with disabilities and health conditions want to work and we will support them to prepare them for work and to move closer to the labour market, and when they are ready, to move back into work. We believe that the freeze is a necessary and fair way of putting welfare spending on a more sustainable footing, but that it is vital to offer protection to the most vulnerable. The best way of doing that is by supporting people who can to move closer to the labour market and by continuing to protect those benefits relating to the additional costs of disability.”
“Alongside that, local authorities are able to provide support to the most vulnerable claimants affected by housing benefit reform through an enhanced package of £800 million of discretionary housing payment funding, which is significantly more than was provided over the previous Parliament. I reassure hon. Members that, alongside the LHA rates, we will continue to publish, as we have previously, the 30th percentile of market rents in each area. We believe that the freeze to the main rates of the majority of working-age benefits, child benefit and tax credits are a necessary and fair way of putting welfare spending on a more sustainable footing. I urge the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury to withdraw the amendment.”
“Each list of rents must include achieved rental values from the distribution and range within each area. In line with the Government’s measure to freeze rates, they will then set the new LHA rates based on the lower of either the April 2015 rate or the 30th percentile of listed rents. The Government recognise that some areas will see particularly high increases in rents, so we have made specific provision for those areas. Over the Parliament, 30% of the savings generated from this measure will be used to create more targeted affordability funding, building on the £140 million already distributed since 2014.”
“The measure announced in the summer Budget to freeze local housing allowance rates for four years will contribute savings of £1 billion towards the Government’s commitment to reduce the welfare bill by the £12 billion I mentioned. It is not included in the Bill, as the Secretary of State already has the powers in primary legislation to change the way in which LHA rates are set. Those powers were included in the Welfare Reform Act 2012. It may help, however, if I clarify how the freezing of LHA rates will work during the four-year period. The rates will still be reviewed each year and rent officers will calculate, as they have been doing previously, a rate calculated by reference to the 30th percentile value from a list of rents for properties of a given size in that area.”
“Certainty for individuals, to help them plan ahead, is a key feature of the Government’s economic policies. It is also why we have introduced a national living wage, and pre-announced the anticipation that it will rise to £9 an hour by 2020 and the ambition to increase the tax-free personal allowance to £12,500 by the end of the decade. Legislating now to freeze for four years, along with those other measures, provides clarity to benefits recipients, giving them fair notice and the opportunity to make positive changes. Anyone supporting the amendments before us would have to spell out how they would instead give the public that certainty about the level of spend and identify where else they would make cuts. I turn briefly to new clause 2 on the local housing allowance.”
“We are debating a group of amendments about a four-year freeze to certain benefits. Do I expect that to be successful in delivering the £3.5 billion that it is projected to? Yes, I do, and it is clearly a mathematical point about the rate of inflation and so on. We have the independent forecasts of how the economy is going to grow and of inflation, and I believe that our measure will deliver. The Scottish National party amendments replace the freeze and the duty to review with the removal of the freeze altogether. That would remove the certainty we have about legislating directly for a freeze, and move us from the position where we have a clear plan reflecting the electoral mandate of the Government to one where the taxpayer could not be sure, year on year, as to the level of benefits.”
“Alternative survey data that the UK has to collect as part of the national accounts on expenditure and income have been used in the past. So you will be able to cobble together something, even if the Minister changes his mind about the HBAI, but the UK would become an international joke if it stopped measuring income and low income.”
“Q 191 All the panel have talked about low income as a driver of poverty, and that is for obvious reasons. It is almost a truism. First, could you confirm whether it is your understanding that those measures of income will of course still be measured? Secondly and more importantly, when trying to tackle child poverty, should the Government have not just a target but a relentless focus on maximising employment, supporting parents as they increase their hours, particularly through childcare, and making a very significant increase in the legal minimum that people can be paid, ultimately tied perhaps to 40% below median income? Professor Gordon: The Minister has said that they will still publish the HBAI, and that the Family Resources Survey on which it is based will still go ahead. I do not know whether that will change in the future.”
“Q 192 And what else should the Government be doing? Dr Callan: We have to hit this in every way, not just education and worklessness, terribly important though they are. I have already mentioned addressing family breakdown, addiction, serious personal debt, mental health and poor housing— anything that is driving children’s poor life chances. So, more. Alison Garnham: It is a no-brainer. As you said, it is a no-brainer; we need to look at low income, because that is everyone’s common understanding of what poverty is. It is also a no-brainer that we need to look at maximising employment, supporting parents and so on. We used to have to write strategies, and that is what we will lose with the Child Poverty Act—”
“Q 209 I want to ask Julia a quick question for clarification. We were talking earlier about single parents, and we have talked about the importance to tackling poverty of being in work and having access to enough hours. Obviously, a big part of that is ensuring that childcare support is there. You talked about the childcare allowance in tax credits. Can you talk us through your understanding of the full set of childcare changes to come? Julia Unwin: As I understand it, by introducing a childcare allowance, the Government made big steps to enable people to go back into work. However, by making that part of the cap, we have reduced its value. In some parts of the country, and in London specifically, the costs of childcare have gone way above what can be covered by that allowance.”
“Q 210 Sorry, I was asking about the full set of childcare changes to come: the 30 hours offer in universal credit and so on. Julia Unwin: The 30 hours offer, on its own, does not provide enough time to enable a parent to work full-time, and the evidence is that that is what you are required to do.”
“Q 211 I am not trying to put words in your mouth, but it is clearly 15 hours more than 15 hours. The subsidised 70% can therefore come on top of that. Is there also a change coming, to the best of your knowledge, in terms of the proportion of reimbursement under universal credit? Julia Unwin: I am showing my ignorance on the third part of your question. On the first two bits, yes, absolutely. We see those as steps in the right direction and a serious intent about childcare. I am posing a warning about what it might mean in practice.”
“Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field), the Government have brought the vote on the statutory instrument measures to the Floor of the House to allow all hon. Members the opportunity to vote.”
“I beg to move, That the draft Tax Credits (Income Thresholds and Determination of Rates) (Amendment) Regulations 2015, which were laid before this House on 7 September, be approved. I confirm, as required, that the provisions before the House today are compatible with the European convention on human rights. The aspects of tax credits we are voting on today are amendable by statutory instruments, as laid down in primary legislation in 2002 by the then Labour Government. These and other aspects of welfare reform have of course been debated at length in the Budget debate, as well as in departmental questions and elsewhere. The underlying issues will also be debated in the Welfare Reform and Work Bill. In a response to a request from the right hon.”
“Allow me to make a wee bit of progress. Reforming tax credits and other benefits forms the first of five pillars of the Government’s approach to supporting working Britain. The second is the increase in the personal tax allowance; the third is the national living wage, the fourth is the major extensions to child care provision; and fifth is the overall sound economic management that is delivering growth in the number and quality of jobs, earnings and living standards.”
“It is important we see these changes in the overall context. I outlined some of the additional elements that are relevant. I certainly accept that they do not all come into play at exactly the same time, but in the course of time they do and by 2017-18 eight out of 10 households will be better off.”
“I have been talking about some of the other elements, but these are matters on which the hon. Lady has a long track record of campaigning. Northern Ireland has a particular situation with regard to welfare reform and I hope all parties will come together to get through that. Discretionary payments are designed for housing issues in particular and were increased substantially in the summer Budget. It is possible that local authorities can use some of those funds to help out people who find themselves in particular difficulty, but I am of course very happy to meet her to go through this in more detail.”
“Thirdly, the regulations reduce the income rise disregard from £5,000 to £2,500, taking it back to its level between 2003 and 2006 and matching the rate of the income fall disregard. Following the introduction of real-time information, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs has much more up-to-date information on claimants’ earnings, so there is no good reason to have such a high disregard figure. These three changes form part of a wider set of welfare reforms, most of which are currently under consideration in the Welfare Reform and Work Bill.”
“If Opposition Members will allow, I will take some time to set out the regulations. The regulations make three changes to the tax credit system. First, they reduce the working tax credit threshold from £6,420 to £3,850 and the child tax credit threshold from £16,105 to £12,125. Secondly, they increase the taper rate from 41% to 48%, meaning that when a claimant’s earnings reach the new tax credit income threshold, their award will be gradually removed by 48p in the pound, rather than the current 41p, ensuring that state taxpayer help is focused on those who need it most. For recipients of housing benefit, the interaction between the two systems of support means the overall change in the withdrawal rate will be 2p, not 7p.”
“I am afraid that high marginal deduction rates have long been a feature of the social security and welfare system. As many Opposition Members know, universal credit will change that by making a substantive change in the withdrawal rates.”
“For people in receipt of housing benefit, the change in the marginal withdrawal rate will be 2p in the pound. The changes do not reduce the incentive to work, and, as the hon. Gentleman knows, equally important are the incentive, ability and support to work more hours once in work and the fact that there are now more jobs offering more hours. Our reforms to childcare are another key part of our support for people who want to increase their hours. The context to these changes is that, despite making great progress towards balancing the budget, we still ran a deficit of 4.9% last year and are expected to have the second-highest deficit in the G7 in 2015. We need to eliminate the deficit and start cutting the national debt in order to build up our resilience to global economic shocks.”
“With near record employment, rising wages and stronger business confidence, now is the time to put the welfare system on a more sustainable, long-term footing, moving our country to a higher wage, lower tax, less welfare-reliant economy.”
“My hon. Friend is right about the rapid escalation in the cost of tax credits—it trebled in real terms up to 2010—and that we are in the business of getting the country back into balance, because when we lose control of the economy, the people who lose out the most are those on the lowest incomes and in the toughest circumstances. The burden of eliminating the deficit has meant a bigger tax contribution from those on higher incomes and now calls for further reductions in departmental spending while protecting our national health service. A further £5 billion comes from addressing tax imbalances and £12 billion from the welfare budget. That is the mandate on which we were elected.”
“The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to note the hard work done by public sector employees. There are pay restraints going on in the public sector—I do not deny that for a moment—but wages are growing at 2.8% in real terms this year, which is pretty broadly based across the country, while output per head is growing more in the north than the south.”
“It says to businesses, “You will have to pay higher wages, but you will get lower business taxes and a stable economy”; it says to people, “You can get higher pay and lower tax, but with less benefit top-up”; and it says to the country, “We are going to spend less and live within our means”. These regulations are an important part of that, and I commend them to the House.”
“For too long, low pay has been addressed in this country not by genuine reform and driving productivity, but by subsidising it through the tax credit system. In the decade to 2010, tax credit expenditure more than trebled in real terms. The changes introduced in this order will build on the last Parliament’s reforms and return real-terms tax credit spending to its 2007-08 levels—a decade into the Labour party’s tenure in government. It is not a stand-alone measure, but part of what my right hon. Friend the Chancellor called a “new contract” with working Britain.”
“Welfare spending needs to be reformed—for the benefit of those who pay for it, as well as those who use it. We are doing this as part of a package to move to a less welfare-reliant, lower-tax and higher-wage economy. I commend the regulations to the House. One and a half hours having elapsed since the commencement of proceedings on the motion, the Speaker put the Question (Standing Order No. 16(1)) .”