Helen Whately

I beg to move, That this House calls on the Government to commit to bringing working-age welfare spending down in this Parliament. The day after the Budget, we heard the Chancellor on the radio telling the country some good news: the welfare bill would come down in this Parliament. But hold your horses, Treasury spinners hit the phones just minutes later to say that they could not commit to that. Even No. 10 intervened to say that it has never set an arbitrary target or timetable. By 5 pm, the Chancellor had done a remarkably rapid reverse ferret. He popped up on Channel 4 to tell us that the Government will not bring down welfare this Parliament after all. What a mess. It was, “Oh yes, we will,” then, “Oh no, we won’t.” It is a bit early for pantomime season. Seriously, what is going on over on the Government Benches? The bill for working-age welfare is £183 billion a year, and it is set to rise to more than £200 billion. Taxes are up, borrowing is up, the cost of borrowing is up, and the Government cannot tell us how they will fund 3% of GDP on defence, on today of all days. They said that they would not put up taxes on working people, but paying for all that welfare will cost working households £50,000 in taxes over this Parliament. The country cannot afford this Labour Government, but it is what we have come to expect from them—no plan, no conviction and no backbone, just ducking tough choices and leaving working families to pay the price.