Scottish government minister says UK welfare reforms should be abandoned
Ahead of the crunch vote, Sir Keir Starmer ditched a mainstay of his welfare reform agenda as he battled to get the draft laws through the House of Commons.
In a major concession as MPs prepared to vote, the Prime Minister shelved plans to restrict eligibility for the personal independence payment (Pip), with any changes now only coming after a review of the benefit.
Under Scotland's devolved social security system, Pip is currently being replaced by the Adult Disability Payment.
Shirley-Anne Somerville (Jane Barlow/PA)
Reacting to events at Westminster, Ms Somerville reiterated the Scottish Government's pledge not to cut that benefit.
'Despite the panicked, last-minute concessions they have made, if the UK Government presses ahead with cuts to disability support they will plunge more people into poverty,' said the SNP MSP.
'That is unconscionable.
'Their approach also risks creating a deeply unfair two-tier system, pushing the impact of cuts onto future applicants for disability benefits.
'The UK Government needs to stop balancing the books on the backs of some of the most vulnerable people in society.
'They need to properly listen to the overwhelming criticism their proposals have generated and do the right thing by disabled people by abandoning this bill entirely.
'I want to reassure disabled people in Scotland, that the Scottish Government will not cut Scotland's Adult Disability Payment, we will not let disabled people down as the UK Government has done.'
The decision to remove the Pip changes from the Bill was announced just 90 minutes before MPs voted.
The legislation passed by 335 votes to 260, majority 75.
Despite the late concession, there were 49 Labour rebels, the largest revolt so far of Sir Keir's premiership.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Starmer wins vote on UK welfare reform but suffers damaging rebellion
LONDON, July 1 (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Keir Starmer won a vote on his welfare plans on Tuesday at significant political cost as he suffered the biggest parliamentary rebellion of his premiership and was forced to back down on key parts of the package. After his lawmakers pushed him into a series of embarrassing U-turns to sharply scale back plans to cut benefits, lawmakers in the House of Commons gave their initial approval to a package of measures Starmer says are vital to securing the future of the welfare system. But the scale of the rebellion - with 49 Labour lawmakers voting against the reforms - underlined the prime minister's waning authority. A year after winning one of the largest parliamentary majorities in British history, Starmer has seen his personal approval ratings collapse and been forced into several policy reversals by his increasingly rebellious lawmakers. "It's been a bumpy time tonight," work and pensions minister Liz Kendall told reporters after a session of parliament when lawmakers took turns to mostly criticise the planned changes. "There are definitely lessons to learn from this process." Starmer came into office last year promising his big parliamentary majority would bring an end to the political chaos that defined much of the Conservative Party's 14 years in power. But the revolt over the welfare bill underlines the difficulty he has pushing through unpopular changes. In the run-up to the vote, ministers and party enforcers known as "whips" had been locked in frantic last-ditch lobbying of undecided members of parliament to try to win their backing. In a further concession to rebels about two hours before the vote, the government said it would not finalise changes in eligibility for a key benefit payment until a review into the welfare system had been completed. Paula Barker, a Labour member of parliament, called the attempt to pass the plans "the most unedifying spectacle that I have ever seen". In the end, the government suffered by far the biggest rebellion of Starmer's premiership, eclipsing the 16 members of parliament who opposed an infrastructure bill earlier this month. Mel Stride, the opposition Conservative Party finance policy chief, described Starmer's team as "a government that's lost control", only able to pass the legislation by having "ripped the heart of it out". Labour lawmaker Henry Tufnell said by agreeing to the concessions Starmer had shown "he's willing to take on board these criticisms that people have raised." Almost 90 disability and human rights groups before the vote urged lawmakers to vote down the legislation. The proposed reforms are designed to reduce the cost of Britain's growing welfare bill, which the government has described as economically indefensible and morally wrong. Annual spending on incapacity and disability benefits already exceeds the country's defence budget and is set to top 100 billion pounds ($137 billion) by 2030, according to official forecasts, up from 65 billion pounds now. More than half of the rise in working-age disability claims since the COVID-19 pandemic relates to mental health conditions, opens new tab, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies think-tank. The government had initially hoped to save 5 billion pounds ($6.9 billion) a year by 2030 by tightening rules for people to receive disability and sickness benefits. But after the government conceded to pressure from its lawmakers, it said the new rules would now apply only to future applicants, not to the millions of existing claimants as had been proposed. Analysts estimated the savings would likely be closer to 2 billion pounds. It was not clear how the additional last-minute change would impact the hoped-for savings in the welfare reform package. Opposition politicians said the government would now have to raise taxes or cut government spending elsewhere to balance the public finances in the annual budget later this year. The government has said there would be no permanent increase in borrowing, but has declined to comment on possible tax rises. While Starmer is under no immediate threat, and the next election is not expected until 2029, his party now trails behind Nigel Farage's populist Reform UK in opinion polls. John Curtice, Britain's most respected pollster, said this week that Starmer was the most unpopular elected prime minister in modern British history, and that voters still did not know what he stood for a year after he was elected.
Sky News
an hour ago
- Sky News
Why govt's promise of 'biggest boost to affordable housing in a generation' may be overblown
Angela Rayner is set to announce plans to build 180,000 new social homes in the next decade, as the government seeks to "turn the tide on the housing crisis". It would be six times greater than the number of social homes built in the 10 years up to 2024 - and forms part of a drive to build 300,000 new social and affordable properties by 2035. The plan is backed by a £39bn investment announced by Chancellor Rachel Reeves in last month's spending review. 2:29 The deputy prime minister called on the social housing sector to "work together to turn the tide of the housing crisis", and said the investment was "the biggest boost to social and affordable housing in a generation". "We are seizing this golden opportunity with both hands to transform this country by building the social and affordable homes we need, so we create a brighter future where families aren't trapped in temporary accommodation and young people are no longer locked out of a secure home," she said. Ms Rayner's target for social and affordable housing is part of a wider long-term plan - also due to be published on Wednesday - setting out how the government will build both more houses and improve housing standards. Here, Sky News looks at what the plan will mean for the country, how it compares to previous programmes, and how it could be affected by the increased cost of construction. 3:17 Crunching the numbers The £39bn 10-year Affordable Homes Programme is an ambitious investment in affordable housing, representing a real terms increase from the previous programme of over £1bn annually. However, claims of the "biggest boost in a generation" may be slightly overblown. When factoring in inflation, the annual investment of £3.9bn falls short of the equivalent £4.5bn annually from 2008 to 2011 under the previous Labour government. This was however a notably short-term uplift, and the sector will welcome the stability of the new settlement which secures funding for 10 years - compared with five years or fewer under previous programmes. The programme sets out to deliver 30,000 affordable homes per year on average, with at least 18,000 of those being for social rent, rather than other tenures such as shared ownership. This would be more than twice the number under the previous programme, which is estimated to have delivered about 8,000 homes annually for social rent by its completion. Similarly, however, it is fewer than were delivered by the previous Labour Affordable Homes Programme, which was over 30,000 a year from 2008 to 2011. A further challenge to the government's goal of a "generational" uplift is the increasing cost of building, meaning they may face diminishing returns on their investment. The previous Affordable Homes Programme initially aimed to deliver 180,000 homes, which was revised down significantly to between 110,000 and 130,000 due to increasing costs and delays. This government can expect to face a similar economic landscape, particularly with an ambition to deliver a greater share of socially rented homes - the most expensive type of affordable housing to build.
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
A humiliating day for Keir Starmer in parliament
It has been a month of U-turns for Keir Starmer's Labour government … but none have been quite as dramatic as this. Helen Pidd heads to parliament on the day the Commons is due to vote on the government's flagship welfare bill, amid a furious rebellion among Labour MPs on its proposed disability cuts. She hears from a series of Labour MPs – from those in support of the bill to those against, and those still undecided – after a week in which the government has offered concession after concession to rebels to try to get its legislation over the line. Yet, as political correspondent Kiran Stacey reports, even as the debate started, senior figures in government were worried they might still lose, prompting the biggest concession of all. So where does this leave Keir Starmer's authority only a year into office, and where can his beleaguered government go from here?
