After U-turns on school sports and forest privatisation, the new Welfare Reform Bill is yet another piece of unsatisfactory legislation.  I wound up for the Opposition in last Wednesday’s second reading debate.

The Bill’s basic idea is good. It merges out-of-work benefits, like Jobseekers’ Allowance and Incapacity Benefit, with in-work benefits, like Tax Credits.  In future there will be a single benefit – Universal Credit – which will also incorporate housing benefit.  People won’t have to re-apply for benefits when they move from welfare to work, so it should become easier to get off benefit.  The system should be simpler, and easier to understand.

However, these are difficult changes to make, and – unfortunately – the Government hasn’t sorted out how to make them.  Key details are missing.  The Bill could make things worse, not better.  

For example, the Bill does not mention how childcare will be supported.  This is crucial.  Many more lone parents are in work today than in 1997 because the previous Government made sure childcare was affordable.  If we lose that, things will go backwards fast.  And the Bill doesn’t say which families will get free school meals in future.

Disabled people are particularly worried.  I support reform of Disability Living Allowance (DLA).  However, the Bill abolishes DLA, replacing it with something called the Personal Independence Payment.  Nobody knows what that will be.  Contributory Employment and Support Allowance – for people who have paid National Insurance but lose their job through ill health – will be limited to a year for people who can expect to return to work eventually.  But, for many people, returning to work within a year is unrealistic.

So, in the Opposition, we have a lot to do, to knock this Bill into shape.  I’ll lead for Labour at Committee debates every Tuesday and Thursday from next week.