More than 22,000 people in Croydon claim PIP or the health element of Universal Credit. So why aren’t Croydon’s MPs opposing the government cuts?
ANDREW FISHER, right, looks at the storm gathering at Westminster for the Prime Minister
Politics is a grubby business, and little is more besmirched than the clandestine world of big votes in Parliament. In Blackadder III, Edmund Blackadder expounds his theory on the origin of the word “politics”: “Poly – meaning many. Tics – meaning blood-sucking parasites”.
House of horrors: Keir Starmer is trying to push through benefit cuts he once described as ‘unfair and unacceptable’
I first started working in Parliament in late 2003, not long after the Iraq War vote. There were still Labour MPs ruing the fact that they had been bullied, bribed and beaten down into voting for the still unfolding disaster.
In my many years working in the Palace of Westminster, by far the proudest moment I can recall was in 2016, when Labour defeated the then Conservative government’s proposals to cut £4.5billion from disabled people on Personal Independence Payments, or PIP.
Knowing you have played a small part in keeping money in the pockets of some of the poorest and often most vulnerable people is something to wear as a badge of honour. After years of austerity and cuts, the then Chancellor George Osborne was forced into an embarrassing U-turn and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Iain Duncan Smith, resigned claiming that even he had opposed the cuts which he had announced just a week before.
Why, nine years on, do I tell this story? Because today, a Labour government is proposing almost exactly the same cuts to the same group of people. And it has provoked a backlash among Labour MPs ahead of next Tuesday’s scheduled vote.
Those Tory cuts proposed in 2016 were condemned at the time as “unfair and unacceptable” – by Keir Starmer. So today, the Labour Prime Minister can hardly be surprised that most of his backbench MPs are also opposed to something for being “unfair and unacceptable”.
Broad opposition: the London Mayor has spoken up on behalf of Londoners
Labour MP for Lewisham, Vicky Foxcroft, has resigned as a government whip (those whose job it is to enforce how other MPs should vote), saying, “I know I will not be able to do the job that is required of me and whip – or indeed vote – for reforms which include cuts to disabled people’s finances.”
London Mayor Sadiq Khan has published analysis showing that Londoners would lose £820million as a result of the proposed changes to PIP and Universal Credit, with 360,000 in the capital affected, mostly disabled people. Khan described the plans as “destroying the financial safety net for too many disabled Londoners”.
At the time of writing, 130 Labour MPs have signed an amendment to oppose the Bill – which is a pretty much unprecedented rebellion less than a year into a new government.
Despite this massive rebellion, not a single one of Croydon’s Labour MPs have signed the amendment. Streatham and Croydon North MP Steve Reed MP is a cabinet minister, while Croydon West’s Sarah Jones is a junior minister. They would lose their jobs if they dared sign the amendment. Croydon East MP Natasha Irons is a backbencher – one of the few so far to still be loyally backing a policy worse than that which made Iain Duncan Smith resign in protest.
Croydon MPs should be thinking of their constituents. Across our borough, more than 22,000 people claim PIP or the health element of Universal Credit – that’s 1-in-12 of the working age population. Nearly every Labour MP in nearby, south London constituencies have signed the amendment opposing the bill: Bell Ribeiro-Addy in Brixton, Flo Eshalomi in Vauxhall, Vicky Foxcroft in Lewisham, Helen Hayes in Dulwich.
Polling by More in Common shows that 58% of the public think the proposed cuts are a bad idea.
Supporters of every party in Westminster and non-voters are all united in opposing these cuts.
It is important to note – and especially important to counter the misleading statements of numerous Labour ministers – that PIP is not an “out-of-work benefit”. It is paid to disabled people to assist them with the additional costs of living with their disability or disabilities.
Therefore, all this talk of getting people off benefits and into work is misleading. Many disabled people are able to work precisely because they receive support from PIP. The barely-discussed risk is that by tightening the eligibility for PIP, the government could force disabled people out of work.
The second problem with this “back to work” mantra is that there simply aren’t the jobs available. There are already seven people looking for work for every vacancy in Britain – and that’s before you start classifying more disabled people as eligible for work.
A High Court challenge to the previous Conservative government’s plans – brought by my recent podcast interviewee, Ellen Clifford – revealed that, of the 457,000 people who would have their benefits cut, only 15,000 were expected to enter employment. And that was according to the Department for Work and Pensions’ own figures.
There is no evidence to suggest that cutting benefits will do anything but send disabled people into poverty. In many cases, into even deeper into poverty. The government’s own impact assessment suggests that 250,000 disabled people (and 50,000 more children) will be driven into poverty.
Ultimately, any MP that votes to do that deserves to lose their seat at the next election.
- From 2015 to 2019, Andrew Fisher was the Labour Party’s Director of Policy under Jeremy Corbyn
- Fisher is also the author of The Failed Experiment – and how to build an economy that works, and now writes columns for InsideCroydon, the i newspaper and is a regular pundit on BBC and Sky News programmes
As well as his column, Andrew is also conducting podcast interviews, in-depth and informed with specialists and national figures, sharing their expertise with Croydon, and available on Inside Croydon’s Spotify channel
Andrew Fisher’s recent columns:
- Labour’s task looks tough amid finance and membership woes
- Starmer alienates support by adopting the language of Powell
- It’s bad for Starmer’s Labour and worse for Badenoch’s Tories
- What a load of old rubbish! And that’s just inside the Town Hall
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
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Proposed cuts to welfare payments AND increasing defence spending – Starmer is a Tory in disguise !?!
A stark, albeit depressing, warning from Andrew to Croydon’s Labour MPs. I say depressing because it is addressed to the local Labour MPs whose party had founded the Welfare State and the NHS and now enacting policies and ideas that would not go amiss under Thatcher’s regime. As Andrew rightly states PIP is not a ‘out of work’ benefit but an assistance payment and if the Government was serious in giving more employment opportunities to the disabled community countrywide then a policy of re-establishing Remploy workplaces.
Yet the reasoning behind these policies ie national debt and the consequent borrowing and the interest paid on that borrowing was rather undermined when the Government announced selling off of the remaining Nat West shares it was holding at a loss of some £10bn. There are savings to be made in the UK expenditure, some maybe small and others could be large and added all together will help to alleviate the cost of borrowing. The Civil list could be cut altogether with some palaces being adapted for social housing along with the surrounding grounds, something I am sure William would endorse to coincide with his plea for helping the homeless. For income, a Land Tax along with a Robin Hood Tax on shares would be useful.
As for the three Labour MPs, they should heed Andrew’s warning, but will they? Let us take a look.
Re Steve Reed: I have always maintained that it is always policy and not personality. As Reed has neither I keep my clean record.
Sarah Jones: I campaigned for her when she narrowly lost in 2015 and it saddens me that she has slowly but surely drifted to the right. Her decision to put her personal political career in front of the wants and needs of the disabled community is somewhat at odds with her political hero, Mo Mowlam. According to Wiki, the reason she joined Labour was because of the awful speech by Peter Lilley. She is quoted as saying “I thought I am not a problem. I need help at this point in time, but I am not a problem to society. I can contribute.” And about Parliament, “I think everybody accepts that in Parliament the imbalance is still there. There are not enough women, there are not enough BME backgrounds, there not enough people with disabilities…Parliament doesn’t reflect the people that they are there to serve and I think if you have all those different perspectives in the room, you will have a better conversation and better quality results.” I hope Sarah reads and remembers these quotes because they are relevant today.
Natasha Irons: As a new MP she should look carefully before voting for these measures. I am hopeful that she listens to her constituents who are at the sharp end of these cuts, she listens to her conscience and she listens to the various disability groups for a wider and proper prospective. Finally, she should ask herself this, why do those who are fit and able and have an income in excess of £100,000 per year maintain that the country cannot afford at present levels the payments to those who are disabled and earning considerably less than £35,000 per year?
Yet the reasoning behind these policies ie national debt and the consequent borrowing and the interest paid on that borrowing was rather undermined when the Government announced selling off of the remaining Nat West shares it was holding at a loss of some £10bn. There are savings to be made in the UK expenditure, some maybe small and others could be large and added all together will help to alleviate the cost of borrowing. The Civil list could be cut altogether with some palaces being adapted for social housing along with the surrounding grounds, something I am sure William would endorse to coincide with his plea for helping the homeless. A Land Tax along with a Robin Hood Tax on shares would be useful. Hope this helps.
As someone who is still (just) a member of the Labour Party, I am seriously disappointed by the hamfisted way theGovernment has performed ion its first year in power with a whacking great majority. There seems to be no sense that there is anyone leading the party. It seems to do little more than reflect the latest views of focus groups, appearing not to have any confidence of its own convictions, if any.
Regarding the latest changes in the PIP/benefits proposed its seems the latest wheeze to have a sort of two tier system so that if are you receiving these benefits your payments stay the same, but if you are a new claimant you have the newer lower rate. That’s unfair and inequitable. And what happens if you are an existing claimant whose claim for one reason or another ceases, and then you reclaim? Do you go back to what you had before of the new improved and parsimonious rate?
A problem is that during the election the Labour Party boxed itself in by declaring there would be no tax increases, and they still seem to be sticking to this. Perhaps they should have the courage (if they have any) of their convictions and treat the electorate as adults and tell them there was a mess and part of the way to clear it up is to increase taxes.
At the moment the current Govermnent seems like a cheaper and even less competent version of the previous administration
“Labour is committed to championing the rights of disabled people and to the principle of working with them, so that their views and voices will be at the heart of all we do.” How’s that manifesto commitment going?
As for no tax increases, Labour could always start “cracking down on tax avoidance and non-dom loopholes”, one of their “first steps for change”. They could also bring in “a renewed focus on tax avoidance by large businesses and the wealthy”. Could but won’t.
Starmer promised change, but it’s been for the worse
Most Labour members are just clinging on willing an end to this Starmer/McSweeney insanity ASAP and hoping for better leadership to come.