Welfare Reform Bill

The hon. Gentleman is saying that we would have liked the pace to be faster. I would certainly have wanted more disabled people to move into work, but at least we have made some progress; in fact, we have turned the corner in terms of the number who are on incapacity benefit. Instead of a trajectory that was ever upwards, it has flattened and is now coming down. I agree that we have not done enough with the stock; perhaps we should have been more radical. It is worth remembering, however, that there were often voices from the Opposition saying that we were being too hard, too nasty and too coercive in what we were doing, and perhaps we should have given a bit more support. We are beginning to hear the echoes saying, ““Now we've got the economic downturn we should write disabled people off because they will be too difficult to get into work.”” That is what has got us into this situation. Because we had written people off, it was incredibly difficult to get them re-engaged with the labour market and back into work, which has made the Government's job much more difficult. That is not what I was intending to say, but I wanted to put it on record that although we may be disappointed in some ways, what the Government have done has been second to none; no other Government have done it. I do not want to repeat everything that my right hon. Friend the Member for Stirling (Mrs. McGuire) has said, because she says it an awful lot better than I, in welcoming the broad thrust of the Bill and giving the reasons why Labour Members, and I suspect Members elsewhere in the House, are generally supportive of its provisions and the opportunities that it will provide. I should like to concentrate on two things that are not in the Bill but perhaps should be. They are both the subject of early-day motions in my name, the first of which has already been alluded to by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett). Early-day motion 340 proposes that the Government should consider giving the higher rate mobility element of disability living allowance to people who are sight-impaired. Hon. Members may want to join that campaign. It would be appropriate to provide for that in the Bill, because it is very much about getting disabled people into work, and those who are sight-impaired or blind have a higher rate of unemployment than any other group of disabled people. If we are to allow blind people to have the confidence to go out into different environments, it is important that they receive that help through DLA. The Government argue that they can always get help with travelling to work through Access to Work, but that will apply only to the time when they are going to and from work, whereas part of making employment work for people is opening up all sorts of other opportunities in terms of their social life. I hope that the Government will look at this favourably and consider bringing forward provisions to allow sight-impaired people to qualify for the upper rate of DLA, although criteria must be laid down to ensure that they are the most severely disabled. The other aspect that I want to see in the Bill is the subject of early-day motion 397, which proposes that the Government should consider giving grandparents national insurance credits if they are involved in child care on behalf of their children. Let me explain how that would help. The Government are absolutely right to try to get lone parents back into work. I do not think that anyone would argue about that, apart from the hon. Member for Northavon (Steve Webb), who seems to think that we should not be proactive in encouraging lone parents into work and they should make up their minds for themselves. I have some difficulty with that idea, because when I speak to lone parents I often find that they do not know what is on offer for them, especially those who left school at 16, have not really worked and have been bringing up children for the past 10 or 15 years. It is too frightening for them to make that decision wholly on their own—they need support. The Government propose to take them into Jobcentre Plus, sit them down and talk through the options with them. In many cases, they would not do that on their own.