Mid Wales MP to rebel against his own party and vote against PIP plans
Speaking to the Cambrian News, Mr Witherden said: 'There are some welcome changes in the Green Paper, including abolishing three-yearly assessments for the most severely disabled, proposals on Unemployment Insurance, a billion pounds for helping people get work, no freeze in PIP, the ruling out of the voucher system the Tories desired and a 'Right to Try', allowing disabled people to see how they cope with work without losing their support.
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Telegraph
4 hours ago
- Telegraph
‘Perverse' benefits system is unsustainable, warns Liz Kendall
Liz Kendall has said 'perverse incentives' in the benefits system must be tackled as she resists pressure from Labour rebels to water down her welfare reforms. The Work and Pensions Secretary said the Government needed to take 'urgent action' to get people into work and warned that the rise in claims for personal independence payment (Pip) was 'not sustainable'. In a letter to Debbie Abrahams, the chairman of the Commons work and pensions select committee, Ms Kendall said: 'Reforms are needed now to make the system sustainable, while supporting those people with the greatest needs. 'Our plan to rebalance the rates in Universal Credit will remove perverse incentives that trap people in benefit dependency.' The comments come as Ms Kendall's plans to cut personal independence payment (Pip) and the health element of universal credit face mounting criticism from Labour MPs. Last month the MPs' committee urged Ms Kendall to delay the implementation of her reforms, citing concerns about 'the impact of the proposed cuts in universal credit health support on employment, poverty and health outcomes'. Backbenchers have also been calling for the proposals to be dropped. Dismissing their concerns, Ms Kendall wrote: 'We urgently need welfare reform to give people a better future – to stop people from falling into inactivity, restore trust and fairness in the system.' As it stands, those who are permanently signed off work because of sickness and claim universal credit health top up receive more than twice as much as those on the basic level of universal credit. Those signed off sick do not need to look for work, while those on basic universal credit do. Ms Kendall and others argue that this encourages people to claim sickness benefits and puts them off trying to find work. A report from the Resolution Foundation found that 'changes to the benefits system over the last decade have strengthened the incentive to claim incapacity and disability benefits'. The changes to the welfare system include stricter eligibility for claiming Pip and reducing payments for new claimants of the health element of Universal Credit. They are forecast to save £5bn by 2030. The Work and Pensions Secretary said the reforms were necessary as the current rise in Pip cases was outpacing the increase in disability prevalence. Even after changes to disability benefits, the number of people on Pip is still forecast to grow by 750,000 by the end of the parliament, according to government estimates. The cost of Pip is poised to rise from £15bn before the pandemic to £37bn in real terms by the end of the decade, while the overall cost of sickness and disability benefits is expected to climb to £100bn. Pip is the main non-means-tested benefit for those with health conditions or disabilities, with payments of up to £9,500 a year to help people with living costs and getting around. 'With Pip caseload and costs forecast to continue rising, reforms are needed now to make the system sustainable, while supporting those people with the greatest needs,' said Ms Kendall. Under plans announced in March, the Government will tighten the eligibility criteria for people to claim Pip. A separate but linked concern are worries about the high level of unemployed young people. The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show that 923,000 people aged between 18 and 24 were not in employment, education or training (Neet) in between January and March 2025. There are concerns that many will find themselves stuck on benefits without help. Alison McGovern, the employment minister, told the work and pensions committee on Wednesday: 'The situation for young people – well, it's a big worry for me at the moment.' Ms McGovern added that the high number of Neets meant there were 'nearly one million young people effectively on the scrapheap. They need a start, they need a chance for a career'.
South Wales Argus
10 hours ago
- South Wales Argus
Nigel Farage and the thousands funding Reform UK's campaigns
The big donors included Bassim Haidar, the Nigerian-born Lebanese entrepreneur who gave the Tories more than £670,000 under Rishi Sunak, was there, as was Arron Banks, the former UKIP donor who spent millions campaigning to leave the European Union. Farage was given a rousing introduction by Oswald's owner, clubland impresario Robin Birley, who donated £25,000 to Reform a few weeks before the general election. Reform reportedly took in more than £1m that night at Oswald's in an event that was part of a wider strategy of attracting big money. 'Reform is where the money is going now,' says former Conservative donor Mohamed Amersi, having paid £25,000 to attend the Oswald's fundraiser. Using millionaire money England to fight the Welsh Senedd election, using English-developed policies and with an English MP as its current leader and main campaigner in Wales. A long way from being the man of the working classes. Andrew Nutt, Bargoed
Spectator
10 hours ago
- Spectator
Rachel Reeves, the Iron Chancer
Gordon Brown may not be every teenager's political pin-up. But as an Oxford student, Rachel Reeves proudly kept a framed photo of him in her bedroom. It was Brown who introduced the first multi-year spending review in 1998: the kind of big political set-piece speech which he relished. Reeves's speech on Wednesday showed the level of constraints facing the Treasury this decade vs the 1990s. Chess, not poker, is the Chancellor's chosen game of recreation. As a player and a politician, she prides herself on making decisions guided by skill, care and thought. Yet this week she staked her government's future on a series of political bets. Her tax rises and changes to Treasury rules gave her some £300 billion to spend across Whitehall – including £113 billion in capital funding. This is proof, her supporters say, that Reeves offers the kind of long-term thinking so absent under the Tories. But her exposure to risk means she is less 'Iron Chancellor', more 'Iron Chancer'. Her first bet is on the UK's finances holding strong until October. Her fiscal headroom is just £9.9 billion, a buffer that could prove insufficient against further economic shocks. Domestic growth is sluggish and the global economy is set for its worst decade since the 1960s. Within the Treasury there are predictions of another nervy summer spent watching the bond markets. In the past year, UK ten-year gilt yields are now higher than after the Liz Truss 'mini-Budget' which the Chancellor so disdains. The high UK risk premium means yields have risen more than their equivalents in any other G7 country this year, bar Japan. Reeves is waging that the City views her plan as credible both now and when the OBR reports in the autumn. The bond markets need only be lucky once; she will have to be lucky always. Then there is inflation, which is at 3.5 per cent. One aide involved in the last spending review, back in 2021, suggests the subsequent erosion of Whitehall budgets should serve as a 'cautionary tale' for ministers cheering this week. 'Labour is running a looser policy. It just shows all of this is for naught if you don't have a wider grip,' they said. Rachel Reeves has staked her government's future on a series of political bets Reeves's second big bet is on health, the winner of the review. Wes Streeting's department received a £29 billion rise in its day-to-day spending budget: 60 per cent of the cash increase available to Reeves. 'If we don't fix the NHS, we won't win re-election' is the argument Streeting made to the Treasury. More money, though, won't guarantee results. As Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies – and one of Reeves's favourite economists – noted this week, 'very, very big increases' in the number of doctors and nurses in NHS England between 2019 and 2024 yielded a 'much smaller increase in measured activity'. On current trends, the health service will employ almost 10 per cent of England's entire workforce within a decade. An ageing population will only increase its demands for state spending. The third bet is on her party's stomach for spending cuts. Citing the jump in spending from 2026/27 to 2028/29, Reeves told the House: 'In place of chaos, I choose stability. In place of decline, I choose investment.' But her words will give little encouragement to her backbenchers. Labour's U-turn over the winter fuel payment, which dominated so much of the pre-review coverage, concerned just £1.2 billion (0.4 per cent of welfare spending) in a state that is projected to spend nearly £1.5 trillion by 2029. While the Chancellor goes all in on public services, others are placing their bets elsewhere. Some senior Tories, jaded by their time in office, argue privately that Britain's woes will be fixed only by an overhaul of Whitehall's power structures. It is not just the post-Blair constitutional settlement that needs reversing, but the post-Brown Treasury set-up, too. While No. 10 and the Treasury slugged it out over the precise wording of Reeves's speech on the day before the review, Richard Tice, Reform's deputy leader, met 15 hedge fund leaders for breakfast. It was the kind of smoked salmon schmoozing that Reeves did in opposition not so long ago. 'I think they call it a vibe shift,' remarks one aide. That change in the pace of politics is precisely why Labour MPs are urging the Chancellor to 'get the money out the door as quickly as possible'. Colleagues cite Joe Biden's failure to convince voters that they were better off under him, arguing that the British electorate must feel any benefits from new spending within the next year. Reeves can point to quick measures such as public sector pay increases and 500,000 more children getting free school meals. The £13.2 billion warm homes plan was ring-fenced, much to Ed Miliband's delight, to try to bring down energy bills. Long-term infrastructure schemes, such as £14.2 billion for Sizewell C, have been balanced against £15.6 billion on local projects. Yet such was the level of concern about MPs' reaction that Reeves began briefing them a full 24 hours before delivering her statement. The Chancellor's more generous colleagues recognise the immense strain she is under. Reeves must contend with two things that Brown's Treasury never faced: a stuttering economy and the end of the Cold War peace dividend. Defence spending will rise to 2.6 per cent in April 2027. 'Gordon never had to face a review like this,' remarks one veteran, citing Brown's persistent and vocal demands for Reeves to lift the two-child benefit cap. Another Labour MP notes that any political consensus tends to last 30 years: 'We might now be coming to the end of the Third Way consensus.' At cabinet, prior to heading to the Commons, Keir Starmer told ministers that the spending review 'marks the end of the first phase of this government'. It was a remark intended to signal a line in the sand after a difficult first year in office. Yet if, as expected, Reeves hikes taxes again in the autumn, voters may struggle to see the difference. The Chancellor's figures rest on the hope that growth will be strong enough, inflation tame enough and tax receipts robust enough to last until October. Will her plan pay off? Don't bet on it.
