HC Deb 01 December 1970 vol 807 cc1173-82
Mr. S. C. Silkin

I beg to move Amendment No. 3, in page 2, line 4, after 'but', insert: 'save as in section 6(2) of this Act provided'.

Mr. Deputy Speaker

I suggest that it will be for the convenience of the House to discuss at the same time the following two further Amendments: Amendment No. 5, in page 2, line 10, at end insert: 'and may restrict or otherwise qualify the power in section 6(2) contained'. Amendment No. 15, in Clause 6, page 2, line 39, at end insert: (2) Where it appears to the Supplementary Benefits Commission that in the particular circumstances of any case it would be in the interests of the family as a whole that any member of the family capable of remunerative full-time work should not be engaged thereon, it shall have power, subject to such conditions as it may think proper to impose, to determine as the amount of the family income supplement an amount higher than the maximum amount specified in section 3(1) of this Act or in any regulations which may have increased the said amount.

Mr. Silkin

The purpose of these Amendments is to deal with an important problem which was raised in Committee by my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams). After complimenting the right hon. Gentleman for his helpfulness, which has been invariable, my hon. Friend put to him a certain hypothesis: Let us take the case of a woman whose husband is, to some extent, mentally handicapped, and the only kind of work he can do is unskilled … full-time work. Let us take it that he could earn only £9 a week in his occupation and that the woman could earn £12 at a similar occupation. Because of the limitation of £3"— that is, the maximum amount payable under the Bill— if the family consisted of several children it might well be better off if the woman went out to work, earned £12 and was able to claim the full amount of £3—the whole amount to which she was entitled—rather than that the man should go out to work for £9 a week and so be able to claim £5 but, because of the limitation, would be entitled to only £3. There are tens of thousands of people who are to some extent mentally handicapped and limited in the jobs which they can do. A number are bound to be married to a woman who might be able to earn more. The right hon. Gentleman was good enough to say: I think I must take time to look at that example, and I will look at it."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1970; Vol. 806, c. 1125–26.] We have also looked at it and it appears that the case simply cannot be met so long as the £3 limit is maintained in all circumstances. Whether it should be maintained as a general rule at all is another question, argued at length in Committee. Clearly the higher the limit the fewer will be the special cases. If there were no limit, as many argued in Committee, then most if not all of the special cases would disappear. Conversely, the more the Government insist on having a limit the greater is the need for some way of dealing with special cases.

8.0 p.m.

The right hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) accurately and concisely put his finger upon the point when he said: But when one superimposes on that principle an arbitrary limit of a particular figure—and not a very high figure—of £3, one seems both to cast some doubts on the main principle of the Bill and, I believe—I shall be interested to hear what my hon. Friend says, of course—to inflict a considerable measure of particular hardship on certain categories."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1970; Vol. 806, c. 1249.] We entirely agree. The only real reply made to that in the course of the debates in Committee was given by the Under-Secretary when he said: I was suggesting that there is a danger of abuse if there is no limit. I do not put it higher than that. One of the things that could happen, for example, is collusion between a man and his employer."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th November, 1970; Vol. 806, c. 1265.] So we accept that we must guard against abuse and collusion. We have had those factors in mind in considering how an Amendment to the Bill could be drafted to meet the special case and at the same time avoid abuse. Of all the special cases, that which I am certain will appeal to the generosity of all hon. and right hon. Members is the case of the mother with young children. I hope and believe that all hon. Members will agree that financial considerations should not force the mother to go out to work where there are young children to look after. I am not speaking now of making "pin money", I am speaking of going out to work for the necessities of life.

We on this side feel this most strongly and I do not believe that we are alone. There are already far too many cases of this kind. If the House will bear with me for one moment I will give an instance from my own knowledge. It is a case concerning a family of husband, wife and two children. One child is aged 6 and goes to infant school and the other is aged 2. The husband, unhappily, is not a very reliable earner. To ensure that the children have the bare necessities of life the mother feels obliged to go out to work.

With a child aged 2 she cannot go out to work by day. What does she do? She waits until the 6-year-old child comes back from school and as soon as that child returns from school, off she goes to work, leaving the 6-year-old in charge of the 2-year-old. In theory the husband is due to return home within the hour, but theory and practice do not always match up. That is the sort of situation where poverty bites deepest. Those children are losing their most priceless need, the company and loving care of a mother at the very time when they most need it. They may well become the problem children and the rebels against authority of the future.

This Amendment and those we are discussing with it are intended to avoid that sort of situation as far as it can be avoided under the Bill. I admit that they are necessarily technical in language, because this is a Bill full of complexities. They necessarily rely upon discretionary powers because the only way to avoid that would be to dispense altogether with the £3 limit and the Government are not prepared to do that. They would enable the Supplementary Benefits Commission to say to the mother, "So long as you leave the wage earning to your husband we will increase the limits to the sum that makes it unnecessary for you to go out to work." That is the sort of condition that we have in mind. It would be for the Supplementary Benefits Commission to decide what is in the whole family's best interests—those are the words we have written into the Amendment—and then to make the appropriate offer.

I emphasise the word "offer" because the Commission would not be telling the family what to do. The final decision would be for the family, as it should be. There would be no dictation, at least the family would be able to make a decision with the right sort of choice before it. It would give the operation of the Bill that little bit more flexibility. In Committee the Secretary of State was at pains to emphasise his desire to see in the Bill a flexible instrument to mitigate the ill-effects of poverty.

We are providing him with a further instrument with which to do this. Whatever we may think of the principle of the Bill, and we believe that it is inadequate to meet the problem of family poverty, we believe that it is our duty to try to improve it as much as we can. This Amendment is a step in that direction. It may be contended that regulations can cover that sort of case. Certainly the right hon. Gentleman is seeking to take very wide powers to deal with the particular classes of cases by regulation. In doing so he is following an Amendment tabled by us in Committee. But this is essentially a human problem, a problem of the individual family.

We do not seek to restrict the power to make regulations. Indeed in our Amendment No. 5 we give express power to the right hon. Gentleman to circumscribe the discretion as he thinks proper. In the end we believe that a matter of discretion it must be in each case. Amendment No. 5 is intended to bring that discretion within reasonable limits. Amendment No. 15 the main Amendment we seek to move, we consider an essential part of the machinery for getting the best results from the Bill.

We doubt if it will be frequently invoked; we doubt if it will cost a very great deal—certainly far less than the gap between the £8 million the Bill is said to be likely to cost the taxpayer and the cost of providing the increased family allowances which the Conservative Party pledged itself to during the General Election. Therefore, I ask the Secretary of State to shake himself loose in this case from the shackles of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and give just a little more aid to some of the lame ducks of our society, and, what is more important, to the ducklings for whom they provide.

Mr. Dean

The hon. and learned Member for Dulwich (Mr. S. C. Silkin), with his usual ingenuity, has tried to meet the argument we put when a similar Amendment was debated in Committee. I am glad to see that he has conceded the point that there might be the possibility of abuse and collusion between the employer and his employee were there to be no limit in the scheme, and therefore he has tried to find another route, as it were, to deal with the sort of families he feels would benefit by having a higher limit than proposed—namely, by taking this discretionary power.

I want first to deal with the practical cases the hon. and learned Gentleman mentioned. He mentioned the case quoted by the hon. Lady the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) with regard to a man who is mentally subnormal and in full-time work. The cases he himself quoted were in similar categories. I suggest that it is this type of family which would be more effectively helped through the supplementary benefits scheme. In the case of the man who is mentally subnormal, or at any rate is in a position where he is not fit and able to be the main breadwinner of the family and to be engaged in full-time work, that family would be better advised to work a shorter number of hours and to have the benefits of the supplementary benefits scheme rather than to become a F.I.S. family.

Mr. Silkin

The whole point of the example quoted by my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) was that, notwithstanding the limited capability of the man for earning capacity, he is in full-time remunerative occupation within the meaning of the Bill.

Mr. Dean

Yes, but it would probably be better from the point of view of the general welfare of that family were he in part-time work and receiving support through the Supplementary Benefits Commission arrangements rather than that it should be a F.I.S. family. That is the point I am making. There may well be instances of this character—indeed, there certainly will be—which are, as it were, on the borderline between supplementary benefit and F.I.S. and where advice will be required. I can quite envisage that sort of circumstance, particularly in such a case as that which the hon. Lady quoted—that of a mentally subnormal man who is in full-time work—where the appropriate advice would be to work a shorter number of hours, to be, in fact, in part-time work and to receive the benefit and support of the supplementary benefits scheme. This may well be the right answer in the case of such families.

I am fairly certain that there will be a number of cases in which this will be the correct approach, in which the family should be receiving not only the cash benefits of the supplementary benefits scheme but other benefits which flow from that, rather than trying to struggle to maintain itself with the man in full-time work.

Mr. Silkin

I appreciate that it may well be better to take advantage of supplementary benefits, but if that is so then such a situation exists today. In such circumstances are the fathers of families of this kind being told not to work full time so that they can take advantage of supplementary benefits?

8.15 p.m.

Mr. Dean

The point is that we now have, in the new scheme, another possibility of helping the poorer families. At the moment, there is no choice. The father is either working full time or, if that is not appropriate and he is unable to do it, is taking supplementary benefits. The point is that there will be a grey area, as it were, between the supplementary benefit scheme as it now is and the F.I.S. The sort of cases which have been quoted may well fall more appropriately into the supplementary benefits net rather than into this net. But I agree that it will be a duty of my Department to advise families which may be on the borderline. That is the practical answer to the sort of case quoted.

Mrs. Shirley Williams

The position is, at least according to the supplementary benefits handbook, that where a man is physically capable of full-time work, at whatever level of payment he receives he is not entitled to draw supplementary benefit. This is the sort of example my hon. and learned Friend mentioned—where the man can do full-time work but where the remuneration is so low that it would be in the interests of the family, if he were not to do so. But that is not the present position; nor is it allowed to be. What the hon. Gentleman has advised is not at present possible. Perhaps he will make it so.

Mr. Dean

We have two examples here, and it is well to get the matter clear. One of the cases which the hon. and learned Gentleman quoted was that of a husband who is not physically capable—he quoted the case of a mentally subnormal man—and therefore is probably not obliged to be in full-time work, and it may well benefit that family to receive the support of the supplementary benefits arrangements. There may well be other families, as the hon. Lady has just said, where the husband is physically capable of being in full-time work and, therefore, should be in full-time work. It is these very families which the Bill is designed to help.

I accept that there will be some cases, perhaps only a very few, where a higher limit meant a higher rate of benefit, but that is a course of argument we discussed earlier and in which hon. Members opposite have conceded that we have to have some guard against the possibility of abuse and collusion. The short answer to the hon. Lady's point is that help will be available in the form of a family income supplement which is not available at the present time. That is the practical argument.

Another argument is that to introduce a discretion of this character into the scheme would be very substantially to alter it, to complicate it and to change the entire basis, because at the moment, of course, there is no intention of having a discretionary power. Here I must ask the House, as on other occasions, to accept that anything we introduce into this scheme which would make it more complicated, and anti-simplicity or anti-take-up advice, would be very undesirable, particularly at this early stage. Were we to introduce this discretionary power, it would substantially alter the character of the scheme. It would also mean detailed and searching inquiries into the domestic and financial circumstances of the claimants. Our basic purpose is to provide the framework of an essentially simple and straightforward scheme which potential claimants can readily understand and, above all, in which decisions can be made quickly and with the minimum questioning and inquiry.

For the practical reasons which I have given and because of the substantial change which would be made in the character of the scheme, I hope that the hon. and learned Gentleman will not press the Amendments.

Mr. S. C. Silkin

The Opposition are far from satisfied with that answer and, although we have not had the opportunity of hearing any of them, I hope that many hon. Gentlemen opposite are dissatisfied. What it boils down to is that for purely administrative reasons and for the sake of tidiness and the concept that the Supplementary Benefits Commission should not have any discretion, cases with a particular problem and sometimes with hardship shall not be solved.

We deeply regret that that should be the attitude of the Government in this matter. I fully understand that the hon. Gentleman came to the debate with something in mind as to how to deal with this complex series of Amendments, but now that he has had the opportunity to hear the case fully deployed, not only by me, but by the intereventions of my hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Mrs. Shirley Williams) in his own speech, he and his right hon. Friend should be prepared seriously to consider the matter again.

I am bound to ask the hon. Gentleman to give a specific undertaking that that will be done. We sought such an undertaking in Committee. We again give him the opportunity to give a specific undertaking that he will be prepared to look again at the principle of giving this sort of discretion to the Commission in this sort of case and raising the limits in the kind of exceptional example which I have mentioned. The Opposition will not be satisfied unless we get a clear assurance and undertaking to that effect.

Mr. Dean

By leave of the House; I can reassure the hon. and learned Gentleman on that last point. He asks specifically for an assurance that the £3 limit will be looked at and not be fixed for all time. I readily give that assurance. The Bill contains power to increase the limit by regulation. I assure him that everything said in the debate will be carefully considered. We realise that in the working of the scheme we shall all learn from experience.

However, I doubt whether the sort of discretionary power which the hon. and learned Gentleman envisages for the Supplementary Benefits Commission will be appropriate for a scheme of this kind. It would substantially alter its character. Nevertheless, our minds are not closed to the points which have been made and we shall be ready to consider the working of the scheme and any changes which may be required in the light of experience.

Mr. Silkin

The first part of the hon. Gentleman's reply was not a reply at all. We are not considering possible future uplift, but raising the limit in hardship cases now. However, we are prepared to give the Government the benefit of the doubt and to construe the second part of what the hon. Gentleman said as a general assurance that the Government have not closed their minds to giving certain discretionary powers to the Commission which could operate in the sort of case which we put to the Government in this series of Amendments.

It is on that clear understanding and no other that we shall not seek to divide the House. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Back to
Forward to