Pat McFadden MP: speeches

Speeches

• 8 Dec 2025 · Welfare Spending: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  The Conservatives’ zeal for change is very touching; it is just a pity that they only discovered it the day they stopped having any responsibility for running the welfare system. Let me remind the hon. Lady that this is the system that they created, and these are the gateways to benefits that they created. The reform that they put forward was struck down by the courts, and the incentives in the system that she attacks are the ones that they legislated for. Now we have begun to change the system, with the first change in universal credit incentives for years, more support for the long-term sick and disabled, and a youth guarantee that offers hope where previously there was only neglect.

• 8 Dec 2025 · Welfare Spending: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  We inherited from the Conservative party a welfare system that forced too many people out of work and on to long-term benefits, while leaving millions of children in poverty. We have begun to address that through reforms to universal credit, increased employment support, more help for children in poverty and, now, a youth guarantee to offer work and training to young people who are unemployed.

• 8 Dec 2025 · Welfare Spending: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  We have a very different approach to the issue of NEETs from the Conservative party. We are not going to sit and look at the graph rise year by year without offering young people hope and aspiration for the future. That is why we brought forward a package, with £800 million of backing, to offer training or work to the young unemployed, and ensure that they have options in life rather than a life on benefits.

• 8 Dec 2025 · Welfare Spending: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  The Conservative party watched the number of those who are not in education, employment or training grow year by year and did nothing about it. The hon. Lady will find that, at the Budget a couple of weeks ago, the Office for Budget Responsibility projected that the levels of people in employment will rise in every year of the forecast.

• 8 Dec 2025 · Welfare Spending: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman will find that the welfare budget had risen three times as fast as a proportion of GDP as it is projected to rise under this Government. We have begun to make changes through the reform to universal credit—that is more change in the system than his party introduced in many years—and, critically, to employment support for both the long-term sick and disabled and the young unemployed.

• 8 Dec 2025 · Welfare Spending: Economic Impact · Hansard source

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  It is estimated that the child poverty strategy we published on Friday will lift more than 500,000 children out of poverty by the end of this Parliament. Critically, most of the children in poverty are living in households where someone works, so setting up the working against the non-working is completely contrary to the facts on child poverty.

• 8 Dec 2025 · NEET Young People · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to point out that the issue of youth opportunity is also an issue of inequality, and that the rate of NEETs is often highest where deprivation and inequality are highest. That is why it is essential that we have an active policy, through the youth guarantee, to offer training, work experience, subsidised employment and more apprenticeships for young people.

• 8 Dec 2025 · NEET Young People · Hansard source

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  I hate to sound repetitive, but the rates of absence from school rocketed when the Conservatives were in power. Again, this is something that we have begun to address, because children cannot achieve unless they are attending school. That is why absence from school really matters, and why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education has rightly made attendance such a high priority for herself and her Department.

• 8 Dec 2025 · NEET Young People · Hansard source

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  When this Government came to power, we inherited a situation in which almost 1 million young people were not in education, employment or training. As we have said, the number rose by 50% in the last few years of the Conservatives’ time in government, and they did nothing about it. That is why we are acting. In the Budget we announced a youth guarantee, with £820 million of investment, to offer hope where previously there was only Tory neglect.

• 8 Dec 2025 · NEET Young People · Hansard source

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  If the hon. Gentleman cared about young people and opportunity, he might regret the fact that there was a 40% decline in young people’s apprenticeships over the last decade, when his party were in power. As well as the introducing the youth guarantee, we have brough forward £725 million more in investment for apprenticeships—again, to provide hope where there was previously Tory neglect.

• 27 Nov 2025 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman should be supporting our changes because they have done two things: they are removing a number of luxury brands from the system and they are ensuring that more British-made cars are part of the scheme, and that will continue going forward. By the end of the decade, we will have provided an additional £1 billion for employment support for the long-term sick and disabled through the pathways to work programme, so that people are not just signed off and written off—more reform that we are carrying out that the Conservative party did not. We are fixing the long-running injustice to carers that they ignored for years, which is more reform that we are carrying out that the Conservatives did not. There is more reform in this Budget than the shadow Chancellor implemented in his 20 months as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. But I know that we have to go further, because the greatest crisis is among the young. We inherited a situation with close to a million young people not in employment, education or training. That is terrible in human terms, expensive in financial terms and deeply unequal, because the numbers are often highest in the most deprived parts of the country. Those are often places where there are already multiple problems and where the loss of hope seems the deepest. Addressing this problem is a cause around which we should rally. That is why in this Budget we offer a youth guarantee, with £820 million of investment, that will offer the young unemployed a training place, work experience or ultimately a job, giving hope and opportunity where previously there was none—more reform that we are carrying out that the Conservative party did not.

• 27 Nov 2025 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  I note the right hon. Gentleman’s request for more public expenditure and I am coming on to the growth and skills levy in a moment. What we will do with that is tilt it more towards young people and towards more short courses, and this Budget puts a further £725 million into that, which will enable the full funding of apprenticeships for the under 25s for small businesses. That is good for young people and good for employers. It is important, because no matter where they are from, what their background is or who their parents are, every young person should have the chance to make the most of their life. I want the country’s young people to know that through our youth guarantee, the apprenticeship support and the other measures outlined in the Budget and outside it, we will support them, we believe in them and we want them to succeed. Even after that, I know that we need to go further, and that is why I have asked former Health Secretary Alan Milburn to report in the new year on the issues of young people, work and inactivity, looking across departmental boundaries and recommending policy responses that will offer young people more opportunity and a better chance in life. After the Conservatives either neglected all that or opposed that which they did not neglect, what have they got left? Arguing that instead of our approach, people’s wages should be lower. We saw where that led during the last Parliament. The shadow Chancellor talked about living standards—during the last Parliament, living standards declined more than at any time in living memory. Now living standards are rising in this Parliament and wages have risen more in a matter of months than they did in 10 years when the shadow Chancellor’s party was in office. As people sometimes remind me, I have been around for quite a while. I am proud to have served in the last Labour Government, which lifted 600,000 children out of poverty—and almost all the measures delivered were opposed by the Conservative party. In fact, the Conservatives’ record was a rise in child poverty of 900,000. Their argument was that the two-child limit would force people to make different choices about the number of children that they would have, but that is not what happened; it simply forced more children into poverty. The real indictment goes deeper, because, as the right hon. Member for Central Devon knows, the two-child limit was not really a welfare policy at all. In the end, it was not even about saving the money. The truth is that it was about political dividing lines. It was a device used by the Conservative Government, in which children were the weapon of choice. That is what it was about, but not any more. Tackling child poverty is an investment in the future of those children and in the country, because children who do not grow up living in poverty will have a better life. This policy is not just about the distribution of money; it is an investment in opportunity. That is why the Chancellor announced the abolition of the two-child limit in the Budget. As my hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Josh Fenton-Glynn) said, the clear majority of households that will gain from this measure already have someone in work. The policy will lift 450,000 children out of poverty, and that number will rise, thanks to other measures, such as the expansion of free school meals, help with energy bills, and the expansion of free childcare so that more parents can take up work. This will be the largest reduction in child poverty over a Parliament since records began. As the Chancellor spelled out, it can be funded by a combination of tackling fraud and error in the system, the Motability and other changes, and the changes to online gambling taxation that she announced yesterday. We understand that the health and welfare systems are deeply connected, so we will continue to get waiting lists down, and to treat more patients. We announced 250 new neighbourhood health centres in the Budget. Waiting lists and waiting times rocketed when the Conservatives were in office, and that was not just a health issue; it was an economic and benefits issue. A system that treats people more quickly, rather than having them wait in pain, is good for the economy, too. Through the reforms that we are making on incentives and support in the system, and on opportunity and tackling poverty, we are beginning to change the welfare state from a passive distributor of benefits to a platform of opportunities to get people back into work. However, we need to go further, and we will. No one on the Labour Benches underestimates the scale of the challenges we face. There is no escaping the fact that the OBR’s decision to downgrade its assessment of productivity is the official verdict on the Conservatives’ years in office. They left this Chancellor with a £16 billion hole to fill. That hole is not because of the decisions she took, but because of the scarring effects of the Conservatives’ time in power. A botched Brexit deal, austerity that impoverished the public realm, and cuts to capital investment—the OBR is clear that they all caused long-term damage to the UK’s productivity and economic growth. That has to be owned by the Conservatives. The shadow Chancellor attacked the Budget in the strongest terms, and he is right that it is a contrast with the Conservatives’ record, because they took the country to the very precipice of economic disaster. They used the British public as a test bed for a giant ideological experiment that saw mortgages go through the roof. The Bank of England had to launch an emergency rescue package for the country’s pension system. The Conservatives shook international confidence in the UK economy and destroyed whatever economic credibility they had by their own hand. There is a difference in our approaches—a very welcome one. We have trade agreements with the world’s biggest economic powers—agreements that eluded the Conservatives. We have a reformed planning system, which will get the country building. Public investment is at its highest level for four decades, and inflation is coming down faster, as a result of the measures that we are taking. It will come down by a full 0.4 percentage points next year, according to the OBR. Borrowing is down in every year of the forecast. We are keeping corporation tax at the lowest level of any G7 country. We have help for high streets, and permanently lower tax rates for 750,000 businesses. We are doubling eligibility for our enterprise tax incentives, so that new businesses can not only be created, but can grow and scale up here in the United Kingdom. We are cutting energy costs for 7,000 businesses to make manufacturing more competitive. We are providing help with the cost of living through the first rail fare freeze for 30 years. We are freezing prescription charges. Energy bills are being cut by £150 per year. We are raising the national minimum wage for millions of workers, as recommended by the independent Low Pay Commission. We are expanding free breakfast clubs, and there are free school meals for all children in families on universal credit. This is a Budget for the whole country. It helps with living standards and helps people to meet their monthly bills. It fixes some of the problems of the past, and gives the country strong foundations for the future. It is a Budget that believes in maintaining the public square, and it continues the progress that we have made on the NHS. That progress is, for us, not just a social goal, but an economic goal. It is a Budget that protects the state pension and raises its value by £575 next year. It is a Budget that continues with welfare reforms, reduces child poverty and offers hope to young people for the future. That is the difference, and that is why we should support the Budget today.

• 27 Nov 2025 · Budget Resolutions · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to open today’s debate on behalf of the Government, and to respond to the shadow Chancellor. He went through his lines and, as I expected, he talked a fair bit about welfare. If only he had ever been in a position to do something about it. That is the essential problem with the position of Conservative Members. It is not even that they failed to reform the system, it is that they created it in the first place. Their system created the fork in the road between those judged fit to work and those judged unfit to work. Their system forced people into a choice between poverty and being declared incapable of work, often permanently. It is their system that left millions of people with no contact and no support from the system, other than the payment of benefits. Perhaps most damningly, it is their system that saw the huge growth in inactivity among the young, about which they did nothing while they were in office. As the shadow Chancellor knows, there is a wall in the Department for Work and Pensions, carefully placed between the microwave and the toilets, on which there is a very fetching portrait of the shadow Chancellor, along with portraits of all his predecessors as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. They all sat in the same chair, in the same office as I do. They saw the same trends and the same graphs that I see, but they did absolutely nothing about the situation. He talked about the changes that he proposed to the work capability assessment, but he was a little quieter about those changes not happening, because they were so incompetent that they were struck down as being unlawful by the courts. He then said that he would have done more but he was interrupted by the general election—the Conservatives had 14 years and the election was called at a time of their choosing. The shadow Chancellor is asking the House to indulge the fantasy that, having been relieved of the duties of ministerial office, he has suddenly stumbled upon the answer to the problem, like a reverse Nostradamus, granted a magical power that enables him to identify the solutions to problems, but only at the moment when he ceases to have responsibility for fixing any them. The Conservatives remind me of a messy 16-year-old who has turned his bedroom into a tip, but when his exasperated parents come in to clean it up, the teenager says, “I was about to do that.” No one believes the teenager and no one should believe the Tories, because they had their chance and did nothing about it. On their watch, welfare spending went up by almost 1% of GDP over the last Parliament, the equivalent of about £22 billion a year. When they left office, did the OBR think that they had a credible plan to change the system? No, they did not. The OBR predicted that costs would rise by a further £100 billion. Sometimes the Tories say that they want more face-to-face assessments, which I want too. However, in September 2023, a little over six months before the election was called, they signed off a new set of contracts allowing 80% of the assessors to work from home. Who was the Secretary of State when those contracts were signed? We do not need ChatGPT to tell us—we just need to look on that wall between the microwave and the toilets, because it was the shadow Chancellor. And that was long after the covid pandemic. The Conservatives created the system, but they did not change it when they had the chance and they increased the number of children in poverty by 900,000, so it falls to us to begin to change the system. We have begun. We are reducing the gap in universal credit between standard unemployment and the sickness rate, a change that the OBR estimates will get 15,000 more people into work and that starts to address the incentives for sickness built into the previous Government’s system, reform that we are carrying out that the Conservatives did not. Changes to the Motability scheme will focus on value for money and ensure that if the UK taxpayer is paying for new vehicles, more of them are made here in the UK—reform that we are carrying out that the Conservatives did not.

• 11 Nov 2025 · Pensions · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee for her question; I know that she has taken a long and keen interest in the matter. On timescales, when people hear this statement, I appreciate that they will want to know when the conclusion will happen, but it is right and proper that I look at all the available evidence. As I said in the statement, I have asked the Department if there is any other survey evidence or other kinds of evidence that should be brought to my attention. With that proviso, I can assure my hon. Friend that I will come to a conclusion and report to the House as soon as possible.

• 11 Nov 2025 · Pensions · Hansard source

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  The hon. Lady asks about the nature of this evidence. It is a report from 2007 and, as I said, it is a DWP evaluation. The survey was not drawn to the attention of the previous Secretary of State because its potential relevance to the making of her decision was not evident at the time. I will consider this survey and any other relevant evidence in the process to which I referred in my statement.

• 11 Nov 2025 · Pensions · Hansard source

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  I would like to make a statement on the investigation by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman into the way state pension ages were communicated to 1950s-born women. The background to this issue is well known to the House. It arises from how decisions to equalise and raise the state pension age were communicated over a number of years, and the impact that that may have had on the ability of 1950s-born women to plan for their retirement. It stems from the communication of changes in the Pensions Act 1995, which gradually increased the state pension age for women from the age of 60 to 65 to bring it in line with that of men. The Pensions Act 2011, introduced under the coalition Government, then brought forward the timetable for equalisation, and the rise to age 66 for both men and women. It is important to be clear that the ombudsman was not looking at those policy changes to the state pension age, but between 2018 and 2024, it investigated complaints from 1950s-born women about the communication of changes to the state pension age. In March last year, following a lengthy investigation lasting six years, the ombudsman published its final report. In December last year, the then Work and Pensions Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall), provided the Government’s response to the House. In coming to this decision, she gave the ombudsman’s report full consideration, and looked in detail at the findings, reviewing all the information and advice provided to her at the time by the Department for Work and Pensions. She did her job thoroughly and professionally in weighing up all the information before her, coming to a conclusion and informing Parliament. Since then, as part of the legal proceedings challenging the Government’s decision, evidence has been cited about research findings from a 2007 report. That was a DWP evaluation of the effectiveness of automatic pension forecast letters. Had this report been provided to my right hon. Friend, she would of course have considered it alongside all other relevant evidence and material. In the light of this, and in the interests of fairness and transparency, I have concluded that the Government should now consider this evidence. That means we will retake the decision made last December as it relates to the communications on state pension age. As the House will be aware, the decision announced last December has been the subject of Court action in recent months, and we have today informed the Court of the action we now intend to take. In retaking the decision, we will review the evidence from 2007 alongside evidence previously considered. I have of course asked the Department whether there is any further survey material or other evidence that should be brought to my attention as part of this process. I understand that people are impatient for this matter to be finally resolved, with the ombudsman’s investigation having taken six years before reporting last year, but it is important that we give this full and proper consideration. We will approach this in a transparent and fair manner. However, retaking this decision should not be taken as an indication that Government will necessarily decide that they should award financial redress. The work will begin immediately, and I will update the House on the decision as soon as a conclusion is reached. Mr Speaker, I understand that Members will have a number of questions, but I hope that you and the House will also understand that I cannot say anything today that pre-empts the conclusion of the process I have set out. I commend this statement to the House.

• 11 Nov 2025 · Pensions · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member is right; this issue has gone on for a long time. I took the view that, in the light of the evidence being cited, the right thing to do was to look again at it and at the decision in the round. I cannot speak for the previous Government’s failure to engage with the ombudsman—that is a matter for them—but I can tell the hon. Member that this Government are engaged with the ombudsman on the action plan discussed earlier, and we will continue to be engaged. As I said, I will come to a conclusion and report to the House as soon as possible.

• 11 Nov 2025 · Pensions · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the hon. Member for at least some of his response. I cannot pre-empt the conclusion of the process that I set out in my statement, because I want it to be undertaken fairly and transparently. I have to say to him that his own Government had many years to consider the matter and did not come to a conclusion, so I take his comments urging us to go more quickly with a little pinch of salt. The hon. Member referred to pensioners. We said that we would maintain the triple lock, and we have kept to that commitment. That will mean an increase of some £1,900 a year in the basic state pension over the course of this Parliament. We remain committed to the publication of the action plan to which he referred. He is right that the previous Minister for Pensions met the WASPI campaigners, but he was a little more coy about the last time a Conservative Minister met the WASPI campaigners. Perhaps a Conservative Member can tell us when that was? I believe it was many years before that and that our Minister was the first to meet the WASPI campaigners for some time. Finally, on the broader economic record, he failed to join me in welcoming the UK having the fastest growth in the G7 for the first half of this year.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  The Spear programme was one of the first organisations to go through an evaluation with the data lab a few years ago. I am pleased to tell my hon. Friend that the findings from that were really positive, and I am delighted that his constituency is located in one of the youth guarantee trailblazer areas. As we have reiterated several times, it is crucial that we do everything we can to help young people into work and address the issue, which we inherited, of people not in employment, education or training.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I recently spoke at an event in Parliament hosted by that organisation. I am pleased to say that its report said there had been a small drop in the use of food banks over the past year. We have put the household support fund, now the crisis and resilience fund, on a proper basis for the next three years to support those families in the most desperate need.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  We have already taken action to reduce child poverty, by extending free school meals to all families on universal credit, and we will of course explore other avenues. We want to reduce child poverty—in stark contrast to the record of the Conservatives.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  It should be no surprise that a Labour party supports better rights at work for people. History is replete with warnings that better employment rights would result in fewer jobs. Those were the warnings the Conservative party gave when we introduced the national minimum wage many, many years ago. Of course, it is important that when legislating on these issues we do it closely in consultation with employers. That is precisely what we intend to do.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I notice that the hon. Lady did not want to clarify the position on means-testing the state pension. Welfare reform is happening all the time. We passed important changes to the universal credit system that were voted through by the House and, as I said, we are putting in place important employment support to help not only long-term sick and disabled people but young people into work through many of the policies that I have talked about today.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  That sounds like an excellent initiative. Of course, if we are to rehabilitate prisoners, it is important that they get training and the chance to get into constructive employment after their sentence. I am sure that that applies not just to the prison in my hon. Friend’s constituency but throughout the country.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  People should not be denied the opportunity to work, which is why the Department has backed the economic inactivity trailblazer in the north-east with £10 million this year and a further £10 million next year. It is testing new ways to help people overcome barriers to work. We are determined to turn around the situation that we inherited from the Conservative party, and we are working closely with the excellent Mayor of the North East to bring these policies together.