Jobseeker's Allowance (Hansard, 30 June 1997)

§ 3. Professor Webb
To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what plans she has to review the rules governing eligibility for the jobseeker's allowance. [4336]

§ 5. Mr. Mitchell
To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what changes she plans to make to the jobseeker's allowance. [4338]

§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Keith Bradley)
The Government believe that work is the best form of welfare for people of working age. Our welfare-to-work objectives are to provide work incentives, to reduce poverty and welfare dependency and to strike a new balance between rights and responsibilities. A programme of monitoring and evaluation is under way to enable us to ensure that the jobseeker's allowance contributes to achieving our objectives.

§ Professor Webb
In reviewing the jobseeker's allowance, will the Minister examine cases such as that of my constituent, Mr. Peter Free, who is undertaking a worthwhile course and who has been told by the job centre to give it up, despite doing well in the first year of the course, in favour of a dead-end job? Is that the Government's policy, or will they break from the previous Government's policy?

§ Mr. Bradley
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving me advance notice of that constituency case. Clearly, within the evaluation of the jobseeker's allowance, we are carefully considering the way in which education and training interact with the need to return to work. I have considered carefully the constituency case. I do not think that it would be appropriate to discuss the precise details in the Chamber, but I assure the hon. Gentleman that, after questions today, I will discuss the matter further with him to ensure that his constituent is given the correct advice on training and job opportunities.

§ Mr. Mitchell
I am delighted to hear that we are reviewing the benefit, but I wonder whether the Minister—I mean my hon. Friend; I have just got to get into the habit—could help me with a few immediate points. What have we done in the meantime to ease administration of the benefit, to ease the petty meanness, to protect the staff and to ease the strain on them, all of which we exposed powerfully when the legislation was passed?

§ Mr. Bradley
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for asking that question, because it is essential that we give credit to the staff who deal with claimants for the benefit. We have to ensure that it is administered efficiently and effectively, and that it forms a proper platform of our welfare-to-work programme. I assure him that his points will form part of the evaluation.

§ Mr. Forth
Given the Minister's reply to the original question, what will be the difference between his approach to the jobseeker's allowance and that of the previous Government?

§ Mr. Bradley
The most essential part of the jobseeker's allowance is integral to our welfare-to-work programme: that we put forward options that give genuine opportunities for people to return to work, because work 6 is what they want. That is the difference between this Government and the previous Government, who did not put work at the top of the agenda.

§ Mr. Miller
Will my hon. Friend carefully consider the way in which people with learning difficulties are treated in the assessment for the allowance?

§ Mr. Bradley
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I know of his particular concern on this issue from previous correspondence and from the occasions when he has raised the matter in the House. I assure him again that, within the evaluation, the problems of people with learning difficulties will be fully taken into account in our welfare-to-work programmes.