Shadow DWP secretary Mel Stride urges Labour MPs to ‘look to your conscience’ and vote against winter fuel payments cut
Mel Stride, the shadow work and pensions secretary, is opening the debate.
He started by suggesting that the government did not tell the truth about its plans at the election.
He said the Conservatives stand “full square behind our elderly”.
But Labour is means-testing the winter fuel payment, despite saying during the election campaign they had no plans to change it, he said.
Under the plan, nine out of 10 pensioners would lose up to £300, he said. He accused Labour of suggesting only the wealthy would be affected. But two thirds of pensioners living below the poverty line would lose the money, he said, and there are 880,000 pensions eligible for pension credit who do not get it, he said.
He said the only report into this proposal has come from a Lords committee on secondary legislation. That report says:
We are unconvinced by the reasons given for the urgency attached to laying these regulations and are particularly concerned that this both precludes appropriate scrutiny and creates issues with the practicalities of bringing in the change at short notice.
And he ended by urging Labour MPs to look to their conscience. He said:
Can I … make an impassioned plea to those sitting opposite. Look to your conscience. These measures, you know in your heart that these measures are wrong. You know in your heart that [Labour] has broken their promises and that these measures are going to lead to untold hardship for millions of elderly and vulnerable people right up and down this country.
You now have an opportunity to join with us and put a stop to it.
Key events
Wendy Chamberlain, the Lib Dem welfare spokesperson, says this decision is simply wrong.
Nobody is disputing that years of Conservative mismanagement have left the public finances in crisis. But this cut is simply wrong. It is wrong to strip support for many of the poorest pensioners just as energy bills are set to rise again. It is wrong to force vulnerable elderly people to make that choice between heating and eating this winter, and it is the wrong answer to the challenges that we face.
She says the Lib Dems will be voting with the opposition on this.
Debbie Abrahams is the first Labour speaker to express concern about the policy. She says there are many pensioners in poverty who do not quality for pension credit and so will not keep the winter fuel payment.
She says she would like ministers to consider how the means-testing could be made more generous, or what else could be done to raise the £1.4bn needed. “Please, we must protect our most vulnerable citizens,” she says.
Edward Leigh (Con), the father of the house, is speaking now.
He says he would welcome a debate about the case for changing welfare arrangements for pensioners. He says in the past he questioned some aspects of the triple lock. If welfare payments to pensioners just keep going up, he says, “that is the way, ultimately, to bankrupt the country”.
But Leigh says this debate is different. He goes on:
We are debating the action of a government which has not just gone against a manifesto commitment. There was no manifesto commitment to do this. They actually gave a specific promise that they would not do this. And this surely is a question of public trust … and this is why I think people are so upset.
(This is not strictly true; during the election Labour implied they would not change or means-test the winter fuel payment, but they were very careful not to make an explicit commitment on this.)
He says this is about Labour delivering a “punishment beating” to pensioners. He suggests the Labour claim about there being a £22bn black hole in the budget is bogus, and he said the government decided to deliver “a punishment beating” to make its case.
Meg Hillier, the Labour MP who has just been re-elected unopposed as chair of the Treasury committee, is the first Labour speaker. She is talking about the general funding crisis facing the government, and says she will vote for the cuts on the basis that the government needs to raise extra money.
(Normally the minister speaks at the start of a debate, but the procedure is different in debates on secondary legislation and Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, is going to speak at the end.)
Shadow DWP secretary Mel Stride urges Labour MPs to ‘look to your conscience’ and vote against winter fuel payments cut
Mel Stride, the shadow work and pensions secretary, is opening the debate.
He started by suggesting that the government did not tell the truth about its plans at the election.
He said the Conservatives stand “full square behind our elderly”.
But Labour is means-testing the winter fuel payment, despite saying during the election campaign they had no plans to change it, he said.
Under the plan, nine out of 10 pensioners would lose up to £300, he said. He accused Labour of suggesting only the wealthy would be affected. But two thirds of pensioners living below the poverty line would lose the money, he said, and there are 880,000 pensions eligible for pension credit who do not get it, he said.
He said the only report into this proposal has come from a Lords committee on secondary legislation. That report says:
We are unconvinced by the reasons given for the urgency attached to laying these regulations and are particularly concerned that this both precludes appropriate scrutiny and creates issues with the practicalities of bringing in the change at short notice.
And he ended by urging Labour MPs to look to their conscience. He said:
Can I … make an impassioned plea to those sitting opposite. Look to your conscience. These measures, you know in your heart that these measures are wrong. You know in your heart that [Labour] has broken their promises and that these measures are going to lead to untold hardship for millions of elderly and vulnerable people right up and down this country.
You now have an opportunity to join with us and put a stop to it.
MPs debate means-testing winter fuel payments
In the Commons MPs are now starting the debate on means-testing the winter fuel payments.
The government is implementing this measure via a piece of secondary legislation (the social fund winter fuel payment regulations 2024). Normally secondary legislation like this does not get debated in the Commons because it can become law without a vote.
But the Conservatives tabled a motion “praying” against the regulation (a mechanism to register their opposition) and the government scheduled a vote (which it did not need to).
David Lammy and Antony Blinken announce joint trip to Ukraine
David Lammy, the foreign secretary, and Antony Blinken, his US counterpart, have announced they will travel to Ukraine this week, PA Media reports.
It will be the first joint UK-US trip to the country as both countries seek to reaffirm their commitment to supporting Kyiv against Russia’s invasion. Blinken said the trip would indicate the “strong transatlantic support” for Kyiv.
Sir Paul Marshall has sealed a £100m takeover of the Spectator magazine as the backer of GB News completes the next stage of his ambition to control a significant swathe of the UK’s conservative and rightwing media outlets, Mark Sweney reports.
Public sector workers in Wales to get above-inflation pay rises
Hundreds of thousands of public sector workers in Wales are set for above-inflation pay awards, the Welsh government has announced. PA Media says:
The Welsh government has accepted the recommendations from independent pay review bodies in full.
It means teachers will receive a 5.5% award and NHS staff on Agenda for Change terms and conditions will also get a 5.5% rise.
Doctors and dentists, including GPs and salaried GPs, will receive a 6% pay award, with an additional £1,000 for junior doctors.
The Welsh Government has also agreed up to an average 5% award for civil servants and for staff at a number of other public bodies, including Natural Resources Wales and the Development Bank of Wales.
Commenting on the announcement, Eluned Morgan, the new first minister said:
People across Wales have told us over the summer that public sector workers are the backbone of the services we all rely on – from the nurses in our NHS to teachers in classrooms across Wales.
They want them to be fairly rewarded for the vital work they do. These pay awards reflect how we value them and respect their hard work.
But the public has also been clear they want to see improvements in public services – especially in the NHS and education. We will work with these services to deliver on what people have told us over the summer listening exercise.
The announcement from the Labour-run governemnt in Wales mirrors what the new UK government announced in July, when Rachel Reeves said it was accepting recommendations from pay review bodies for public sector workers to get rises of 5/6%.
Early release of 1,700 inmates start of ‘rescue effort’ for prison system, says justice secretary Shabana Mahmood
Around 1,700 prisoners are being released early from jails in England and Wales today, because the overcrowding crisis means they need to go to free up space for new people being sent to jail. These releases are in addition to the 1,000 or so inmates released every week anyway.
During justice question in the Commons, Shabana Mahmood, the justice secretary, said this was the start of a “rescue effort” for the prison system. She said:
On taking office two months ago, it was immediately clear that we had inherited a prison system at the point of collapse.
That is why our emergency action, which will see certain offenders leave prison a few weeks or months early, has proved necessary. This measure takes effect today …
This marks the beginning of a rescue effort, one which will, in time allow us to rebuild and reform our justice system in the years ahead.
The BBC is running a good live blog covering the releases in detail.
Richard Adams
The University and College Union has accused the Labour government of allowing universities to “decay” by not removing restrictions on international students imposed by the previous government.
Following Keir Starmer’s TUC speech, the UCU general secretary Jo Grady said:
We welcome the prime minister’s acknowledgement that universities are crumbling, but Labour is allowing them to decay. UCU has been raising the alarm about the precarious state of university finances for many months. Yet, Labour still refuses to lift Tory visa restrictions on international staff and students.
The government must do much more to protect our world-leading institutions, including providing emergency funding to protect jobs and prevent any university from going under.
As Jim Pickard from the Financial Times points out, Keir Starmer received a standing ovation from most, but not all, of the delegates at the TUC.
And Lizzy Buchan from the Mirror says that there were a couple of heckles during the speech.
Standing ovation for Starmer’s speech but two heckles during it on wealth tax and pensioners.
— Lizzy Buchan (@LizzyBuchan) September 10, 2024
Standing ovation for Starmer’s speech but two heckles during it on wealth tax and pensioners.
Paul Nowak, the TUC general secretary, has welcomed what Keir Starmer said in his speech to its confererence. He said:
The prime minister set out an ambitious and very different vision for Britain to the chaos and division of the last 14 years.
A Britain where unions, business and government work together to deliver for working people and the common good. A Britain where everyone is treated with dignity and respect at work. A Britain where work pays for all.
Unions stand ready to roll up our sleeves to help repair and rebuild this country.
After justice questions in the Commons, there is a statement on Ukraine. That means the debate on winter fuel payments will not start until around 1.30pm, with the vote likely at around 3pm.
Starmer says child poverty ‘far too high’ and scrapping two-child benefit cap on its own would not solve problem
This is what Keir Starmer said in full when he was asked in the Q&A (see 11.33am) about child poverty, and the government failure’s to get rid of the two-child poverty cap, the Tory welfare policy which is a major cause of child poverty.
Although he did not have anything to announce, he spoke with a level of seriousness and conviction that seemed to go down quite well in the hall.
He said child poverty was “far too high” and that he was determined to bring it down. (It is 30%, meaning 4.3 million children grow up in relative poverty, according to the most recent figures.)
But he also implied that simply getting rid of the two-child benefit rule would not be enough to solve the problem on its own, because the underlying causes had to be addressed.
He said:
Alan, thank you for raising the question of child poverty. It is a really important issue, as you know, as the whole of congress knows, and it matters to this government.
Obviously we’ve had to take difficult decisions given the economic circumstances we’re in, for reasons that I have explained.
But that does not diminish, to answer your question directly, our absolute determination in relation to child poverty. It’s far too high. It is our responsibility to bring it down.
We’ve already obviously set up a task force, but that has to get to the underlying causes as well. This isn’t an issue that can be solved just by one adjustment in welfare, frankly. It’s about housing, it’s about education, it’s about wages, it’s about conditions in which people live, health, mental health. All of that has to be addressed, and we are determined to address it, and are already addressing it.
Because just as the last Labour government brought child poverty right down, so will this government. We’ll will work with you and others and everybody in the room to make sure that we make good on that commitment because it is so important to us.
Jane Jones, president of Usdaw, asks what the government will do to ensure that shopworkers feel safe at work.
Starmer says the extent of violence against shop workers is shocking. He says Paddy Lillis, the Usdaw general secretary, raises it with him almost every time they meet, “rightly”. It is unacceptable and demoralising. That is why it is right to make that a specific offence, he says.
And that’s the end of the Q&A.
Alan Crosbie, a teacher who is national president of The Educational Institute of Scotland, says Labour has not scrapped the two-child benefit cap, which is pushing children into poverty. What is the government doing to tackle child poverty.
Starmer says he has an “absolute determination” to reduce child poverty.
Helen, from the Prospect union, who works in defence, asks what the government will do to make the workplace safe for women. She says a survey of civilian women working in the Ministry of Defence found 60% of them had suffered sexual harassment.
Starmer says that is a shocking figure. Reducing sexual harassment and violence against women and girls is one of his mission priorities, he says.