Andy Burnham

I cannot comment today on quasi-judicial decisions, but we will take a pragmatic approach to oil and gas, as I have said before at the Dispatch Box. Let us get to the heart of this question, as the right hon. Lady invites me to do. What is the right way to fund defence and, yes, bring the welfare budget down? She would make crude cuts to housing benefit. As I have said, if £4 billion is taken out in the next few years, families will be made homeless and rough sleeping on our streets will increase. So here is the Labour way—the way that we do it on this side of the House. We have set out plans for the biggest council house building programme this country has seen in a generation. If the right hon. Lady looks at research from the National Housing Federation, she will see that that is the route to save billions from housing benefit. We will shortly respond to the final report of Alan Milburn, who is looking at the issue of young people not in education, employment or training—again, something left behind by the last Government. We will take the Labour way: change education, support our young people, and provide more mental health support. That is the Labour way to get the welfare bill down, and I say to the right hon. Lady that that is the right way to fund defence.