MSP says we must scrap benefit cuts ...and trust people
A PROMINENT Nationalist MP is calling for benefit sanctions to be banned – because those claiming welfare should be trusted to ‘tell the truth’.
Mhairi Black, who sits on Westminster’s work and pensions select committee, says the penalties – when people’s state handouts are docked if they do not do enough to find a job – are unfair.
She has launched a private members Bill appealing for the system, which was introduced in 2012 and has been credited with helping more people back into work, to be scrapped.
On ITV’s Peston on Sunday show yesterday, she said: ‘This idea that we have these economic troubles and therefore it’s the poorest in our society that it should fall upon is ridiculous.
‘Philip Green and these people who avoid paying tax, I would rather see us chasing after them than the vulnerable.
‘What my private member’s Bill is recognising is the fact I would like to get rid of sanctions.’
Asked if people could be trusted to ‘tell the truth’ about their benefits, she said: ‘Look at the figures: 0.8 per cent, I believe, of benefits were fraudulently claimed and yet the general public thinks it’s a third of all benefits.
‘What the private member’s Bill is trying to do is sort out one of the problems, which is that the DWP only commissions guidelines for Jobcentres to deem when someone should be sanctioned and when not.
‘Guidelines can be interpreted however you want and it depends where you are, what Job Centre you’re in, the mood of the person you’re dealing with.’
Between October 2012, when sanctions were introduced in Scotland, and the end of 2014, 153,848 Scots had their benefit payments cut.
Scottish Conservative social security spokesman Adam Tomkins said: ‘No system like this will stand a chance of working without the use of sanctions.
‘The SNP won’t be able to continue this rose-tinted rhetoric on welfare reform much longer. Soon it will be in charge of designing a benefits system for Scotland and then it’s going to find out how difficult that can be.’
Changes introduced today by the UK Government mean no household can receive more than £20,000 in state handouts.
The lowering of the ‘benefit cap’ from £26,000 is expected to impact on thousands of Scots.
Last week, the Scottish Daily Mail revealed more than 4,000 people in Scotland have had payments cut since the benefit cap was introduced in 2013.
Seven households were receiving more than £46,800 – equivalent to a £68,000 salary when tax is deducted.
Writing in today’s Mail (see below) Work and Pensions Secretary Damian Green says the cap ensures ‘people are always better off in work than on benefits’.
He states that, if it opposes welfare reform, the Scottish Government now has power to act, adding: ‘It’s for the Scottish Government to decide if and how it delivers these new powers.’
‘Rose-tinted welfare rhetoric’