Meeting of the Parliament 26 November 2015
I begin by thanking all members of the Welfare Reform Committee for their work on the report. We all know that the recession has had a devastating effect on Scotland and the whole of the UK, but it has particularly affected certain groups—the young, disabled people and women. It has affected their prosperity and their sense of wellbeing. At that difficult time, instead of our welfare system offering relief and support to women across Scotland, the welfare reforms have made the situation more stressful. The system has disproportionately failed vulnerable people and it has disproportionately failed women in our society.
The committee has done a fantastic job of illuminating the failings of the system. For example, the report on sanctions pointed out that the system has led to a climate of fear rather than encouraging people back into work and the report on food banks revealed the direct correlation between the use of food banks and the welfare reform programme. In addition, it was the research from the committee that illuminated the fact that some 80 per cent of households affected by the bedroom tax contain a disabled adult.
The report that we are discussing today very much continues in that powerful vein. I was struck by some of the statistics in it and I think that they are worth repeating. Colleagues have already mentioned this, but since 2010 some £26 billion-worth of cuts have been made to benefits, tax credits, pay and pensions and 85 per cent of that has been taken from women’s incomes. That is a staggeringly disproportionate impact on women.
The committee went on to quote figures from Engender, Close the Gap and many others, revealing that women are twice as dependent on the social security system as men, they have fewer financial assets and they are far more likely to be lone parents and carers.
It is right that we make common cause across the Parliament on the issue. Austerity and the welfare reform programme are bad for our economy and bad for the prosperity of individuals and communities. This is not, frankly, the kind of society that many of us wish to see. We want to see an end to punitive sanctions, to discrimination and to blaming people who are in need for their misfortune.
However, I hope that, this afternoon, we will do more than that. If all that we do is to blame the Conservatives and the UK Government, we will not be facing up to our responsibilities, nor will we be using the powers that are at our disposal for the purpose that I believe they were intended to have.
Like many members, I lived through the Thatcher years and I was frustrated by the fact that we would elect representatives of one particular party in Scotland and a party of a different hue would be elected in another part of the UK, but the answer to that is the Scottish Parliament. It is difficult to imagine the poll tax being introduced now that we have the Scottish Parliament, and the committee’s work has revealed that the UK Government cannot impose reforms on this country with us being powerless to do anything about it. The bedroom tax in particular has revealed that. In fact, the committee’s analysis showed that our mitigation of the bedroom tax particularly benefited women in Scotland.
I want to give a couple of examples. First, I want to comment on Motability. I do not know whether other members have recently received a letter from Motability, but changes are under way and a transition scheme is in place. As most members will know, the Motability scheme allows disabled people to lease a new car, scooter or powered wheelchair by exchanging their Government-funded Motability allowance. People qualify if they get the higher-rate mobility component under DLA or the new enhanced rate under PIP.
I made some inquiries and I discovered that 519 people in my Eastwood constituency use the Motability scheme, and 1,700 people across East Renfrewshire. I asked how many are expected to lose their allowance. Motability could not say exactly, but it said that, of the people who have been reassessed so far, 12,300 have been awarded the same level of support and retained membership of the scheme but 9,000 have lost eligibility. That is almost 40 per cent. A huge number of people have lost out on the Motability allowance. Disability News Service has pointed out that more than 100 people a week are losing their Motability vehicles because of the change from DLA to PIP.
I was very struck by what the committee’s report had to say about the impact of that on disabled women. According to Close the Gap, disabled women are particularly affected by social security reform, because they are far less likely to be in full-time employment than non-disabled people. Moreover, Close the Gap said that the employment rate for disabled men is almost 90 per cent, compared with only 40 per cent for disabled women.
Inclusion Scotland said in its written evidence to the committee that in Scotland more than 55 per cent of people in receipt of the higher-rate mobility component—in other words, the people who qualify for a Motability car—are women, and concluded that women are therefore far more likely to lose out.
Why does that matter? I think that we all know that the point of welfare reform is to encourage people to access work, and the whole point of Motability is to enable people to access work and childcare.