Today, with much contrived fanfare, saw the launch of the
government’s flagship welfare reform – the Universal Credit. The aim is to
simplify the benefits system by combining six confusing and often overlapping
entitlements into a single, personalised payment.
It’s a big change – perhaps a little too big – with
embarrassingly humble beginnings.
Not that anyone should be surprised. Over the last few
years, the authorities have had enough trouble implementing new infrastructure
designed merely to bring Britain’s tax and benefits system up to scratch for
the 21st century; this new system has required further investment – and
governments do not exactly have a good track record of delivering major IT
projects.
Consequently, the timescale that has been talked about by the
Work and Pensions Secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, since the election and beyond
has slipped; so have the budget targets. Today, the scheme came into force with
a whimper – a pilot in a single town near Manchester.
That didn’t stop the former Conservative leader trumpeting
the move as the epitome of the government’s strategy to get more people off
benefits and into employment by making work pay; this is to be achieved by
preventing individuals from being able to claim a multitude of benefits that were
intended for the particular circumstances of different groups of people.
The reform, he said, is about “changing people”.
In reality, though, it’s what happens to the benefits
themselves – rather than how they are claimed – that will stimulate changes in
behaviour. Genuinely tough policies such as the (bafflingly controversial)
benefits cap will have a far greater impact on people’s disposable incomes and
hence their cost-benefit calculations.
The minister’s bluster, though, was vastly outdone by his
opposite number, Liam Byrne. “What on earth have they been doing for the past
three years?” he asked, either oblivious or just plain ignorant of the
hypocrisy of his question. (This is the man whose last act as a Treasury
minister was to leave a crass note to his successor informing him that “there’s
no money left”.)
On Labour’s watch, not only did the welfare budget spiral
out of control, but it did so in such a way as to cultivate a deep-rooted sense
of entitlement that is proving far more difficult to tackle than the coalition probably
ever imagined.
Benefits ceased to be helping hands, instead being seen as a
staple of household budgets.
This habit of taking the welfare state for granted grips not
only those who benefit from it, but their sympathisers elsewhere in society and
especially in the media. Any proposed cut to a handout that half of us never
knew existed and which never did exist until the last government decided it was
essential, is met by a public outcry with tabloids full of hard-luck stories about
families plunged into poverty by Westminster pantomime villains.
It’s an appealing narrative, but the poverty is in being trapped
in a livelihood that is dependent on the state, not in being weaned off it – no
matter how abruptly.
Opponents say the welfare state is under attack from the
actions being taken by the current government under the veil of austerity. But social
security was intended to be a safety net, not a lifestyle choice. It is this
manipulation of the values of the modern Labour Party’s forebears that presents
the real danger to the institution’s integrity.
Squalor may have been one of Beveridge’s five ‘giant evils’,
but idleness was another.
Make no mistake, there are many other reforms that are
necessary but which politicians on all sides daren’t even contemplate for fear
of the political consequences; such cowardice the Sage greets with
disappointment but not surprise. If only Mr Duncan Smith would admit that what he
has achieved is merely a scratching of the surface rather than the breakthrough
he proclaims.
“This is not the big shake-up we need in the benefits
system,” bemoaned Mr Byrne. He’s right, but he’s the last person entitled to
say it.
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