The need for welfare reform - Mel Stride MP writes...
By Richard_Penny | Tuesday, March 15, 2011, 12:59
As I prepare this piece for posting on Okehampton People, I'm listening to Jeremy VIne on Radio 2. He's about to discuss the plight of Okehampton's jobless (now national news) and particularly the time it takes to receive any benefits. There have also been many references on Okehampton People to just how complicated - and often unfair - the whole benefit system has become.
-
MP for Central Devon Mel Stride
So when Okehampton's MP Mel Stride writes about the government's plans for welfare reform, it has particular relevance locally...
Welfare Reform
The Welfare Reform Bill had its Second Reading on Wednesday. I put down to speak but despite sitting in the chamber for many hours missed being called by a matter of minutes. I was next on the Government side but the debate ran out of time. It is frustrating when this happens because whilst it is useful to listen to what other members have to say much of this is repetitive and there are many things that you could otherwise be doing with the time (including looking after constituency issues).
Had I spoken I would have congratulated the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Iain Duncan Smith on the work he has carried out – the quest to understand how best to deliver social justice has been a long and worthy journey for Iain and along the way he has collaborated positively with many including politicians from across the political spectrum including Labour MP Frank Field, a man I admire greatly. The background to the bill is stark.
There are 5 million people of working age who are on out of work benefits with 1.4 million having been on them for a decade. Expenditure on these benefits has risen from £52 billion in 1996/97 to £74 billion today. At a time of austerity these amounts are difficult to carry.
But the arguments for welfare reform are not simply about cost. They are about making changes to a system that currently provides some perverse incentives and is in many ways unfair. The perverse incentives include the fact that for many, the loss of benefits on going into employment mean that they are simply better off not working. For some the effective marginal tax rate involved (taking into account benefit loss) can be as high as 96%. Hardly a fair rate when you consider that it is usually the poorest who face this situation. And that does not take into account the cost of getting to and from work. Another issue is the sheer complexity of the benefits system – it is often impossible for someone to even work out if it is worth their while getting a job and it can take the average Job Centre an hour to make the calculation for them. The result is that people get stuck on benefits when they would otherwise be working. This can be especially tough on those children who grow up in workless households (around 1.9 million at present).
The Government is simplifying the benefits system by creating an easier to understand Universal Credit that will replace the current myriad of benefits. This new approach will ensure that those taking work are always financially better off by doing so. This will be achieved by withdrawing the Universal Credit gradually through time rather than as soon as someone takes up a job. Full and proper support for finding work will be provided but those who are able yet decide not to take appropriate jobs will have their benefits withdrawn. Those who are not able to work or face a situation where work is not available will quite rightly continue to be supported within the benefits system. I strongly support these measures.
Comments
Shocking pece of back-slapping Tory aggrandisement.
Please reply, Mel, and give us 3 things that you do that for the Okehampton residents, the lost jobs, the littered streets, the restless teenagers given poor starts in the future market.
Keep it real and gain our respect. Don't use an honest forum for political gas.
By Gillanco at 11:45 on 17/03/11
ReportI was going to comment on this when it was first posted. But resisted, believing that perhaps I had misread Mel Stride MP as being on the useless side. But every article supports that view. Waiting around hours to ask a question on a matter that ran out time, yes OK could happen to anyone. But when you see that the question was just a matter of congratulation and sucking up to those higher on the political food chain, you being to wonder. Yet again this turns into a history lesson and stating the obvious. Will Mel Stride MP ever use his unique position to tell us something we don't know? Efforts being made to bring jobs to the area or even fibre optic broadband, that can underpin home based businesses.
By pobox112 at 10:47 on 17/03/11
ReportThis pointless piece from Stride is a political puff that has no relevence to what is happening to people now. What exactly does our MP Mel Stride do other than hire himself out to Tory councillors who tip him off for endless photo opportunities? His website is no help as the last entry is 25th October when he notes that enjoyed some bird watching at the RSPB’s Exe Estuary reserve.
Where is he while more than 350 redundancies have occurred in his constituency in the last few weeks and 200 hundred hungry people a week in Okehampton are having to depend on a food bank supported by locals? The Big Society?
This appalling indictment of government policies is happening on his doorstep while Mr Stride is publicly welcoming the Government's new welfare system as marking the beginning of a new era of 21st century welfare. Mr Stride is quoted as saying: "These reforms show that this government is on the side of people who want to get ahead…. these measures will get people into work “
But Mr Stride seems to have decided to adopt a 19th century paternalistic approach to his constituents, He seeks to establish himself as the all round caring good egg who will without question attach himself to a local issue as long as it doesn’t dent his credentials as an ultra government loyalist and is totally uncontroversial.
In this way he is following in a grand Tory tradition, adopting the role of the local squire, who would invariably have been the figurehead for any local good cause. The loan of whose name and face would be a sure-fire seal of approval.
Perhaps Mr Stride feels that his photographic presence in local newspapers is reassuring, however together with his bland notes from Westminster and press releases that also appear in some sections of the local Devon press, his attitude to the electorate can only be described as condescending.
Where is Mr Stride when it comes to real issues that affect local people: cuts in frontline policing and bus subsidies; youth unemployment, the scrapping of the EMA, the cost of fuel, the removal of security for many council house tenants on benefits, the reduction in forces pensions and cuts in children’s and young people’s services, now unemployment and hunger at the heart of his constituency
Perhaps he doesn’t see any photo opportunities attached to these issues however, comfortably seated behind Cameron on the government benches, he is probably more concerned with a possible future call-up to a junior ministerial post.
By noPRplease at 23:04 on 16/03/11
Report