Blair pledges to reform incapacity benefit
Tony Blair has said that Labour is determined to reform incapacity benefit so that no one is “written-off”.
The Prime Minister said that the current system, in which people receive more money the longer they are on incapacity benefit, penalised those who wished to work.
He said the Government wanted to deliver a welfare system that was fair and rewarded those who chose to work.
Mr Blair’s comments come ahead of a more detailed announcement by the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Alan Johnson, tomorrow.
Speaking in Manchester, Mr Blair said the most important thing was to have a system people feel is fair.
“We want a system that rewards work, rewards learning, targets abuse and has respect for the local community in which we live running through everything we do.”
He suggested that there are one million people on incapacity benefit who wanted to work and encouraging these people back in to the labour market was part of the Government’s “re-engineering” of the welfare system.
Reform of incapacity benefits was “part of the bigger picture”, where “those who play by the rules get the help, and those who don’t play by the rules should start to”.
The Conservatives though described the speech as “classic Blairism”. David Willetts said the speech “sounds good, but the Prime Minister has made these promises before and hasn’t delivered. His words today were aimed at winning headlines instead of winning the battle to get people back to work.
“Conservatives aren’t about to get into an auction with the Government over which party can cut benefits for disabled people the most. The key test is whether benefit reform encourages people back to work.”
But, in a sign the issue of welfare will be key in the next general election, Mr Johnson hit back saying that: “The Tories can have no credibility on incapacity benefit when it was under the Conservatives that the large rise in incapacity claimants took place. And today, the Conservatives are committed to scrapping the support we are providing to help people back into work, such as the New Deal, a move that would increase both inactivity and unemployment.”
