§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what plans she has to reform the jobseeker's allowance. [1466]
Mr. BradleyOur 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. As the main benefit for the unemployed, Jobseeker's Allowance will have a major role to play in the transition from benefit to work, and an extensive programme of monitoring and evaluation is under way to enable us to ensure that it is achieving these objectives.
In addition to this major evaluation exercise, we shall also keep the individual benefit rules under consideration as we develop our plans.