Debates, Speeches and Parliamentary Questions

We are not interested in the Blair Government or the Brown Government; the electorate decided that they should come to an end. We are interested in what this Government are doing. Does the Minister not accept that if people followed his advice and moved into the private sector, far from saving the amount spent on housing benefit, such a move would actually increase it?

As the House may know, I agree with the Government on many aspects of the Bill and I have not always shared the sentiments of Opposition Front Benchers. I regret that, but I have made my position clear. However, I today wish to speak against the Government on their stance and to support my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms). I do so because the change that the...

To ask the Secretary of State for Education pursuant to the answer of 6 February 2012, Official Report, column 41W, on academies, whether he plans that academy schools without post-16 provision will establish post-16 courses within the academy itself to ensure that all Year 11 pupils participate in education or training post-16.

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of the number of people affected by his proposed change to hours worked before claiming tax credits.

It might help the Minister in making these judgments to know about the political composition of Wirral borough council. It is shared among three parties. Going back to the Cheshire Lines building contract, which cost the council £11 million and was authorised without the political say-so of the councillors, the then leader of the council—the Labour leader who currently leads the...

It is a pleasure to open this debate under your chairmanship, Miss Clark. I want to give an apology for my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern), who has just given birth to a lovely baby girl and obviously cannot be here today. However, she was very much part of a meeting two Saturdays ago, when Members saw the chief executive of Wirral borough council, and is committed...

The Minister will know that I am probably the last person to think that politicians should not stand up, take the blame and defend their quarter. In no way do I wish to counter what the hon. Lady has said but, even if we deal with that issue, we have a real problem about the quality of our chief officers. She knows who I am speaking about in this debate. I have not wished to claim privilege...

May I bring the Minister back to the issue of minimum pricing for alcohol? In Merseyside, the city region’s poverty and life chances commission has advocated a minimum price per unit of alcohol. Is that strategy, which is to cover six boroughs, one that he supports?

To ask the Secretary of State for Education what responsibility Academy schools without post-16 provision will have to ensure their graduating students remain in full-time education when the school leaving age rises; and if he will make a statement.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice for what reasons the National Youth Advocacy Service was refused a family contract for 2012.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many young people have been killed on Merseyrail railway lines in each of the last 10 years.

Is not the really big change that we are discussing the fact that when the CSA was first established, the maintenance moneys went to the Treasury to offset what taxpayers were putting up because, generally speaking, fathers were not prepared to do so, whereas now that money remains with the family? Is it not reasonable, in such circumstances, if people are going to get a top-up to their...

If I may, I shall make one comment on the previous contribution. I thought that the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) was going to go a stage further: might there not be a connection between the number of newcomers coming here to work and the extraordinary rise in rents in some parts of the country? That also needs to be introduced to our debate today: we cannot run a welfare...

If my hon. Friend does not mind, I am going to be brief. On the insurance principle, those on the Treasury Bench prayed in aid the public being behind them on the measure. Indeed, the public are behind them on that, but the public are against them on the first group of amendments, which we pushed through. Obviously, the Treasury gave a total that the Department for Work and Pensions had to...

Are not Government Members mistaken on this? We are talking about the existing rules, which encourage parents to put away money—they might have found it difficult to do so—for an endowment for a very disabled child. They will now find that their carefulness in not playing the system but trying to seek independence for their offspring will be penalised by the rules, which they...

When my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) asked a question about a 20-year-old living at home, we did not get an answer. I was just wondering whether my right hon. Friend was trying to find out the answer by osmosis. At what point will disabled young people qualify in their own right for means-tested support, as opposed to having a household means test applied to them?

It is at 19.

Has the Minister talked to the Secretary of State about this? Would a more logical position not be that we get exemptions from the European Court ruling, and not distort our social security system to fit the European Court’s decisions?