Debates on welfare always provoke in me, as I am sure they do in many others in the chamber, conflicting emotions. First, I feel a sense of regret that our welfare state, which is so often held up as one of the defining achievements of the union, is being systematically dismantled, causing real and additional hardship to those in society who most need our help. There is now strong evidence that the Tories’ so-called welfare reforms are failing people right across Scotland and that their cuts are having a devastating impact on some of the most vulnerable individuals, families and communities in our society. Indeed, when the Secretary of State for Scotland said, as he did in April, that we are part of “a fantastic system”, he demonstrated just how out of touch he and indeed the other unionist parties are on these vital issues. Regret and a heavy heart are what I inevitably bring to any debate on welfare.
However, standing as we are just five weeks from the referendum, I also feel a real sense of hope. We have before us a precious opportunity to change course and build, not overnight but over time, a social security system that meets our needs—one that supports the needs of our economy by equipping people better for the world of work, one that supports the needs of individuals by ensuring that those who work get a decent wage for the job that they do and one that supports the needs of the vulnerable by ensuring that we have the decent safety net that I believe, and I know many people agree, is one of the hallmarks of a civilised society.
Today’s debate is an opportunity to crystallise the choice that is on offer—the choice between, on the one hand, increasing austerity and division under the present system and, on the other, a different, better, more progressive and more supportive path with independence.
As people consider the choice that will be before them on 18 September, they should do so in the knowledge that further Westminster cuts are still to come—cuts that will impact most on women, children and the disabled. As people consider that choice, I am confident that the policies that we have outlined and the vision that we put forward will encourage them to vote to take these powers into our own hands.
A perfect illustration of that choice, and a topic that we have discussed many times before in the Parliament, is the bedroom tax. Yesterday, the Welfare Reform Committee considered and, I am glad to say, agreed to support the section 63 order to transfer to the Scottish ministers the power over expenditure on discretionary housing payments. That welcome step means that we can now ensure that no person in Scotland need be adversely affected by the bedroom tax. However, it is, is it not, a democratic outrage that a tax that had no political or popular support in Scotland was ever introduced here in the first place?
Make no mistake: all that we are able to do with the bedroom tax is mitigate. We can only take money from other parts of the Scottish budget to mitigate a policy that, had this Parliament had a say, would never have been introduced. A section 63 order will not end the bedroom tax; only by this Parliament having the power to decide will we be able to do what the majority—I believe the vast majority—of people in Scotland want, which is to abolish the bedroom tax.
That is the nub of the debate that we are having today. With the United Kingdom parties now battling to outdo each other on how tough they can be on welfare, it is becoming clear that independence is the only way for us to achieve a system that treats people with dignity and respect. In “Scotland’s Future” we set out a vision and a range of measures that will start to ensure that we have a welfare system that is more suited to Scottish needs. We have said clearly that, if there is a yes vote, we will halt the roll-out of the universal credit and personal independence payments, we will abolish the bedroom tax and we will ensure that welfare payments increase in line with inflation to avoid the poorest families—those in our society with the least—being plunged deeper into poverty. We will increase the carers allowance to recognise the contribution that carers make and to end the situation whereby carers currently get the lowest rate of benefit of everyone who claims benefits.
All those policies will directly and positively impact on people’s financial circumstances and on their quality of life. If there is a no vote, no matter how hard we try—and we will—we will be unable to stop the rise in poverty that Westminster policies will cause.
There is no doubt that the impact is being felt most by the most vulnerable people—in particular, those with health conditions and disabilities. Rather than helping to support individuals, Westminster is ploughing on with flawed systems such as the work capability assessment, which has now been reviewed five times. I warmly welcome the report by the expert working group on welfare, which recommends that the current work capability assessment be scrapped. The Government has committed to doing that when the powers to do so are in our hands.
Just this morning, we have published a research paper that lays bare the impact of the UK Government’s reforms on disabled people. It finds that disabled people in Scotland are likely to experience significant and disproportionate loss of income due to the Westminster cuts. It is expected that, of the 190,000 existing claimants of disability living allowance who will be reassessed for personal independence payments, more than 100,000 will lose some or all of their disability benefits by 2018, with a loss of at least £1,100 each a year. People who get enhanced mobility support could lose up to £3,000 a year. Important though the money is, let us remember that, for people in those circumstances, that loss could take away more than pounds and pence—it could take away their very independence. In my view, making cuts of that magnitude on the backs of disabled and sick people is flatly wrong, and I believe that it is time that we got the powers to do something about it.
Independent research has recently concluded that the cumulative impact of welfare reforms on income is particularly severe for households with disabled children and adults, at about £1,500 per year on average. That impact is more than double the average reduction faced by non-disabled households, although we all know that disabled people are already more likely to be in poverty and face higher costs of living than non-disabled people. It beggars belief that, in modern Scotland, we are prepared to stand by and watch the situation get worse.
Although disabled people are being hit disproportionately, they are not alone in bearing the brunt. We know from children’s charities that up to 100,000 more children will be pushed into poverty by 2020 if we stay on the Westminster path. In March, we published our child poverty strategy, which set out the progress that we are making on childcare, education and youth unemployment. It showed that, since devolution, under the current Administration and the previous one, there has been a real improvement in the rates of child poverty in Scotland, which is to be welcomed. We may disagree about the best way to combat child poverty, but everyone in the Parliament is united in wanting to see it eradicated within a generation. However, the latest figures show that the reduction in poverty that we have seen in recent years is now being reversed. Westminster cuts such as the reduction in in-work tax credits are reducing incomes for some of our poorest households.
As we always should, we will do everything possible in our power to ensure that no child lives in poverty or grows up in poverty. However, the bottom line is this: when policies from Westminster are taking us in the wrong direction, when they are undermining all our efforts and are cancelling out all that this Parliament is able to do, the case for us to take these decisions ourselves becomes overwhelming. By doing that, we can combine what we are already doing on education and support for young people with progressive policies on employment, welfare and benefits. With that approach, we can begin to make inroads into not only mitigating poverty but alleviating it for good. It will take time, effort and determination, but we will have the powers and the access to our vast resources—we are, after all, one of the richest countries in the world—that we need in order to make it possible. That has got to be so much better than standing by, powerless, while Westminster does its damage to the most vulnerable and to the very fabric of our society.
I want to start to draw my remarks to a close today by posing some questions specifically to my colleagues on the Labour benches. Labour’s Tory and Liberal Democrat partners in the no campaign support the welfare policies of the Westminster Government. I profoundly disagree with them, but at least I know where they stand. Today, I am pretty sure that Labour members will claim that they do not support the policies of the current Westminster Government. They will say—I suspect more in hope than in any serious expectation—that the answer to the problem is not independence but a stronger Scottish Parliament and a Labour Government at Westminster. Taking that at face value, I want to give Labour the opportunity to answer a couple of straight questions.
The questions that I would like Jackie Baillie to answer are these. First, short of a yes vote, what new powers is the Parliament guaranteed to get that will allow us to stop the assault on the incomes of the disabled, of women and of children? Secondly, even if there is a Labour Government at Westminster, which Jackie Baillie cannot guarantee, what will that Labour Government do differently on welfare, apart from abolishing the bedroom tax? What, precisely, is Ed Miliband going to do that is different from what David Cameron is already doing? Will Labour halt the roll-out of personal independence payments? Will Labour protect the disabled from the cuts that I have outlined, which they stand to face if personal independence payments go ahead, or is the reality that the disabled will face exactly the same cuts under Labour as they do under the Tories? These are important questions if we are to crystallise the choice that faces people on 18 September.
If Jackie Baillie is about to get up and say that, like me, she opposes these cuts but then argue that getting our hands on the decision-making powers is not the best way to address them, I put it to everyone in the chamber that she needs to be extremely specific about what Labour in Westminster will do instead, and then she needs to tell us what will happen if we end up with another Tory Government after all. I suspect—although I hope that I am wrong—that, at the end of her speech, we will still be waiting for those answers. That will prove that, whether the next UK Government is Labour or Tory, if we vote no, the outlook for the most vulnerable in our society will be exactly the same.
It is clear that, under successive Administrations, the UK Government has failed to deliver the changes that are needed to deliver a welfare system that is fair for all. Not only that, the so-called reforms that are currently under way are likely to make the situation worse. It is only with independence that we can create in Scotland a social security system that is fair and treats people with dignity and respect. It is only this Government and this Parliament that can stand in the way of Westminster implementing further measures that will cause poverty—particularly child poverty—to increase. The only way we can guarantee the powers to stop that happening is to take the power to decide those matters into our own hands, so that the future of our welfare system is decided not by Tory Governments in Westminster but here in this Parliament and we can build a better, fairer and more equal society.
I move,
That the Parliament notes the damaging and destructive impact of the UK Government’s welfare policies on women, children, disabled people and communities across Scotland; further notes that the worst of the cuts are still to come and that all three of the main UK unionist parties are determined to pursue this cuts agenda; recognises that an additional 100,000 children will be pushed into poverty, after housing costs, by 2020 as a result of these policies; also recognises that, by 2018, thousands of disability living allowance (DLA) claimants in Scotland will lose some or all their disability benefits as a result of the replacement of DLA with the personal independence payment; welcomes the fact that the Scottish Government has pledged to halt the roll-out of universal credit and personal independence payments, and recognises that only with the full powers of independence can the UK Government welfare cuts be halted.