Welcome to this blog
Following the Cabinet re-shuffle Jim Murphy has moved on to take up the post of Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The Welfare Reform blog is now closed to new posts but you can still read old ones.
I've started this blog because I want to involve you in our plans to reform the welfare state and eradicate child poverty. You'll find more about our plans here. These are big challenges for the future. If you want to know why, read my first post. But we'll only succeed by continuing to listen to your views.
So this blog will be your chance to tell me what you think directly and, on occasion, my colleagues, Anne McGuire MP – Minister for Disabled People, Lord McKenzie – Minister for Child Support, and James Plaskitt MP – Minister for Benefits. To take part all you have to do is reply to one of our blog entries. We'll read all your comments. Although we won't be able to answer them all, we'll discuss them and respond to the most popular issues.
You can find out more about me here.
I'm looking forward to hearing what you have to say.
Jim Murphy
18 May 2007
I am visiting the North West today to discuss Welfare Reform, but last night I was in Westminster Hall in the Commons taking part in a debate on the Government’s employment strategy following a report by the Work and Pensions Select Committee on the same subject.
We have talked here several times about our aim to meet our target of an 80% employment rate and the reforms that we are bringing in to ensure that people who want to work can work and how our welfare reforms will help us to do this, but the debate was a chance to outline why these changes are needed.
The UK economy will continue to face a number of challenges over the coming years. As our society ages, for example, by 2050 there will be only 2 people working for every pensioner, when in 1950 the figure was 10 for every pensioner. Alongside this the economies of China and India will continue to grow. The message is clear, the UK can not afford for people who can make a contribution not to do so.
But it is not just a question of cold economics. Work is good for your health and mental well-being. The vast majority of people I have met both as an MP and as a Minister want the chance to work. They want the chance to contribute to society and to be able to bring up their families through their own endeavours. As Lisa Harker’s report showed, helping people into the workplace also will help us eradicate child poverty.
The bottom line is that whilst getting 2.5 million more people into work and reducing the number of people on benefits by 900,000 are clearly good things, we need to always be thinking what more can we do. How can we make sure the welfare state is able to help those people furthest from the market to get those jobs, to make sure that we can provide the skills and training that fit individuals?
The committee were right to highlight the importance of making our services flexible enough to be accessible to all, of ensuring that focusing on job sustainability and increasing the employment rates for youngsters. I believe that our programme of reforms can deliver a welfare state that can provide all of this and more. You can read what was said in the debate here.Â
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8 May 2007
Part of my bank holiday weekend was spent in Dresden attending the G8 Employment Ministers summit on Sunday and Monday. The main topic of discussion wass globalisation and the impact upon the European job-market, which is something that all economies are having to look at as they consider the right policies to help provide employment opportunities and support.Today I’m in Denmark to meet with their Welfare minister and look at a couple of employment programmes they have. The Danes have a much higher employment rate for their lone parents as we’ve discussed on the blog before, so I’m looking forward to see first-hand an example of the work that their Government is undertaking. I’ll let you know how I get on.
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4 May 2007
As you will have seen the Welfare Reform Bill was given Royal Assent yesterday meaning the measures contained within it will become law and I promised to add a bit more detail to what I said yesterday.The main change I mentioned will be the introduction of the Employment and Support Allowance which will replace Incapacity Benefit and Income Support based on incapacity or disability next year. This will bring to life a fundamental change in the welfare state that we have been talking about on this blog in some detail, namely the move towards your ability to work, not your incapacity to work.
The new Personal Capability Assessment will mean this approach is embedded into the system and I think we can look forward to more people getting better, targeted help in getting them back to work.
For the majority of people, this will mean additional responsibilities to be actively preparing or looking for work. It is a fair deal - the state providing better more appropriate help and the individual, taking the steps required to get back to work. We have seen this principle in the successful Pathways to Work pilots running up and down the country.
I have often stressed, and am happy to do so again, for those whom work is not realistic due to their health or disability, there will be a higher rate of benefit, which will be rightly exempted from work related conditions. But, those people can still take advantage of the programmes on offer to get some form of work if they wish. I do not want to dissuade anyone who believes they have something to offer an employer from developing the skills to do so, and the welfare state will be able to facilitate this.
So is this the end of the welfare reform line? Not at all. The Freud Review has provided plenty of food for thought on the next stage of reform, and you can continue to post your thoughts here throughout.
There will be final details to come forward over the coming weeks and months and I will keep you updated of them on the blog.
In the meantime, thanks to everyone who posted here over the last few months, keep them coming.
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3 May 2007
Today the Welfare Reform Bill was given Royal Assent meaning the Bill now becomes the Welfare Reform Act 2007 and will become law.
This will mean the introduction of the Employment Support Allowance and the new Personal Capability Assessment next year amongst other measures contained within the bill.
I’m up in Scotland at the moment and will provide you with a few more thoughts tomorrow, but in the meantime, thanks to everyone who posted their thoughts on the blog as the Bill “went through the House”.
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30 April 2007
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation today issued a series of reports looking at the issue of employment and poverty rates amongst the country’s ethnic minority communities. Their reports make for interesting reading especially on the question of how the employment gap affects the level of poverty in ethnic minority households.
This is something that the department has been looking at as well. Back in Feburary we issued a report that looked at the barriers facing ethnic minorities in trying to get into the workplace and it showed is that amongst different communities there are different levels of expectations and of course different barriers preventing people getting into work.
Things have got better, with an additional 250,000 people helped into work through the work of Jobcentre Plus for a start and poverty rates amongst ethnic minority communities have fallen, by up to 15%, but I know this is not enough.
It can not be right that an Asian women who has just started work as a doctor for example, will have retired before the UK’s ethnic minority community will have the same employment chances as everyone else.
That is too long to wait. That is why we have introduced policies like Cities Strategy that will be able to help local communities specifically with employment and skills programmes that will bring together local providers and experts who can address the specific needs of local communities whether they be Afro-Caribbean or Pakistani or Bangladeshi in origin.
Our welfare reforms will be key as well. If you are able to offer an individual the help they need to get into work, as opposed to the individual trying to make the best of the old one size fits all approach, they will get the help they need - whether it be linguistics skills, confidence building or specific skills development.
I believe that we can narrow the employment gap and reduce poverty in our local communities, but as the JRF point out, it is not an easy task and one that demands our ongoing commitment and hard work. Â
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18 April 2007
The latest monthly unemployment figures were released this morning. The figures show that yet again the number of people who are claiming benefits such as Jobseekers Allowance or Incapacity Benefit have fallen. This is obviously welcome news, as it shows that people are taking advantage of the help and support out there to get them off benefit dependency and into the work place.
A common theme to much of what is discussed on this blog is the importance that we place in helping people off benefits not forcing them off. This is about building on the fact that the vast majority of people who sign on to a benefit do so in the expectation that they will come off it and get into work sooner rather than later.
The stats for this month have also shown a slight increase in unemployment. Despite this it must be looked at in the context of record levels of employment over the last decade - 2.5 million more people in work than ten years ago and a labour market that has continued to grow in the last 12 months. Indeed the number of vacancies recorded this month has increased, with currently over 635,000 vacancies in the economy according to the ONS.
Overall today’s figures show the economy and labour market continues to perform well, the challenge is still for us to match people to those vacancies that are out there, developing skills and providing help and assistance. We also have to make sure that people are better off in work than on benefit. This is a challenge I am still very much up for. Let me know your views.
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12 April 2007
Thanks to Paul, Raymond, Vanessa, Frances and Peter who have all made interesting points in relation to David Freud’s recent report. Your emails have been passed on to the team who’ll be co-ordinating our response to the Freud Review in the summer. As you’re aware this was an independent report not a Government one. Although, David wouldn’t have been able to consult everyone, I understand he listened to a range of views – from people on benefits, lobby groups, think tanks, academics and international experts. We’re now considering David’s recommendations carefully and we’ll respond in due course. Meanwhile, we’re keen to hear people’s views so if you have any further comments on the report then please email them to adelphi.welfarereform@dwp.gsi.gov.uk or post comments as a contribution to the discussion.
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28 March 2007
In case you missed today’s webchat (or felt you’d rather watch Countdown instead!) here’s the full transcript.
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28 March 2007
I didn’t have a chance to post on Monday after hosting our international conference on welfare reform. How do other countries do things? What can we learn from them? Opening our eyes to other ideas will help us shape our own policies. So that event was about listening to what people had to say, learning from their experience and generally sharing good practice. Delegates attended from across the world and among the experts providing the insights were Jutta Allmendinger, Director of the Institute for Employment Research in Berlin, Mark Greenberg, Executive Director of the Taskforce on Poverty at the Center for American Progress and Ron Haskins, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution – who I met last week in Washington. The conference also gave people the chance to familiarise themselves with the Danish, Australian and New Zealand approach to welfare. One other important item of note was John Hutton’s announcement  that the Government will be seeking the views of all those interested in shaping welfare reform. All responses will be taken on board before we release our official response to the Freud report in the summer.
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28 March 2007
If you’re around today at 3pm don’t forget our webchat on the Number 10 site. I’ll be taking questions on child poverty issues following yesterday’s report and on more general welfare reform matters.
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