01/02/12

It is right to tackle stigmatisation of people dependant on Welfare Support.

But it is also right to recognise that there is nothing fair about future generations paying for our spending today.

It is not fair that since devolution the Welsh Government has concentrated on the top 2%-3% of the poorest but neglected the most vulnerable, locking them into dependency.       

Over the last decade - and long before recession - the benefits bill was allowed to soar to unsustainable levels, whilst only creating ever bigger barriers.

In the biggest shake up of the welfare system for 60 years, steps to make work pay and put individual responsibility right at the heart of the benefits system were unveiled in the Welfare Reform Bill.

Hence our Amendment which “recognises that worklessness and benefit dependency create ever bigger barriers for those who wish to escape a life on benefits and enter work”.

Even before recession started, one in three working aged adults in Wales were not in work - double the UK rate - and it is a matter of shame that despite spending Billions on Economic Development - including two rounds of EU funds - the Welsh Government failed to tackle this.

Housing benefit  expenditure over the last decade has almost doubled to £20 Billion, over three times more than we pay for policing. 

Without reform it is forecast to reach £25 Billion by 2015  reform the need to tackle the record deficit makes reform even more pressing.

With five million UK people trapped on out of work benefits and almost two million children growing up in homes where nobody works, we cannot afford to simply continue tinkering around the edges of the welfare system.

The entrenched poverty and worklessness we see in too many areas of our country is bad for benefit recipients, bad for communities and bad for society, often leading to higher levels of debt, family breakdown, alcohol and drug addiction and crime

We need to remove the barriers to work in the tax and benefits system identified by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

The Universal Credit will help move claimants  into work whilst keeping more of their income than now.  

The UK Government’s Social Mobility Strategy “Opening Doors, Breaking Barriers”  sets out progressively to tackle the causes of poverty rather than just the symptoms.

It focuses on inter-generational barriers and aims to tackle unfairness at every stage of life, with specific measures to improve social mobility.

The UK Child poverty strategy sets out how the UK Government seeks to break the entrenched cycle of deprivation.

A new UK Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, will strengthen the role of the Child Poverty Commission in holding the Government to account, improving life chances and increasing social mobility.

Almost a year ago, the National Landlords Association told me that  working with social letting agencies and Accredited landlords, that they had already built in new reductions in Local Housing Allowance and that change needs to be managed in local authorities.

“They told me that landlords know how to buy and where, and what is needed to then refurbish up to standard.

“However, they added that supply of properties would only adjust if we did something then, requiring a new way of working and true partnership with the public sector, a period of transition for the supply to equalise.”

Only last week, they told me that with “so much being proposed by the Public Sector for ‘the Private Rented Sector, they   feel that if they’re not fully involved they won't be delivering the maximum value for the "Welsh pound" .

Concern has been expressed regarding proposals to pay rent directly to tenants, rather than directly to the Landlord.

However, the UK Government states that this will encourage people to manage their own budget in the same way as other households, but that they will develop Universal Credit in a way that protects rental income for Social Landlords.

There will be a default mechanism so that when a tenant moves into arrears, direct payments will then be made to the landlord.

The Universal Credit offers landlords the prospect of  better safety than the current housing benefit scheme.

At present, only net housing benefit can be paid directly to the landlord after any deductions.

However, it would be now possible for the full amount of eligible rent to be paid to the landlord.

We must work to ensure that Welfare Reform  is about long term solutions to long term problems, rather than political knock about.