McVile: I’m still behind the rape clause
SEE PAGE 5
BENEFITS axewoman Esther McVey was slammed last night for claiming her hated rape clause strikes the “right balance”.
Under the clause, women who conceive a child through rape have to reveal their ordeal to avoid the Tories’ two-child cap on tax credits.
McVey had been challenged to ditch the policy on her first day in the job as Work and Pensions Secretary.
Two months later, she finally responded to the call in a letter to former Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale, which has been seen by the Record.
McVey said there is no time limit on seeking the “non-consensual conception exception” – an official term for the rape clause.
And she said criminal conviction details can be used instead of women having to go to a professional third party or Government official to make the case.
McVey added: “We believe this approach strikes the right balance between ensuring claimants in these circumstances get the support they are entitled to in a manner that respects the sensitive nature of the disclosure they are required to make to a relevant professional to obtain the exception, whilst at the same time providing reassurance to the Government that the additional support is going to those for whom it is intended.”
McVey also pointed out that Holyrood have powers to “top up” reserved benefits – a challenge to the SNP Scott i sh Government to cover the Tory child tax credit cut.
Her position was heavily criticised by opponents and a leading support charity yesterday. Sandy Brindley, of Rape Crisis Scotland, said: “We totally reject the idea that the rape clause is fair. “Forcing a woman to choose between poverty or disclosing rape is inhumane. “There are still no third-party agencies in Scotland willing to act as assessors in these circumstances because the policy is so beyond anything we can support. “We urge the Westminster Government to reconsider. The whole family cap needs to go.” McVey was brought in to the DWP post in Theresa May’s shambolic Cabinet reshuffle earlier this year. She was previously dubbed “McVile” for her hardline approach when she worked at the department under Iain Duncan Smith, the chief architect of Tory welfare reforms. As Scottish Labour leader, Dugdale read out a heartbreaking letter from a rape survivor during a debate on the clause. Last night, Dugdale said: “Esther McVey’s response is deeply disappointing and shows a callous disregard for the impact of the rape clause. “I wrote to the Minister in the hope that she would put party politics aside and agree that this abhorrent clause needs to go.
“Instead, she has responded by claiming that it ‘strikes the right balance’.
“I’m disgusted that she can think forcing women who conceive a child through rape to reveal their ordeal is ‘ the right balance’.
“She should be thoroughly ashamed of defending one of the most abhorrent policies of a government in my adult lifetime. A Labour government will end the vile rape clause.”
Dugdale, in her first letter, reminded McVey of previous promises.
McVey had claimed: “The reaching out and supporting one another now needs to lead the way.
“We have laws against discrimination and they must be enforced. But helping women and offering support has to be the new feminism.”
The rape clause policy has also been condemned by SNP MP Alison Thewliss, who called for it to be scrapped when McVey was appointed.
She said at the time: “I believe that women having to prove they had been raped to DWP employees in order to receive social security payments is morally wrong and would cause needless additional trauma.”
McVey was widely criticised for her stint as minister for disabled people in 2012-13.
She cut the disability living allowance and brought in medical tests for applicants.
McVey was promoted within the DWP to be second to Duncan Smith as minister of state from 2013 to 2015. In that role, she championed the bedroom tax.