Contribution
There is plenty of investment, starting with the work that needs to take place at the Treasury to stop putting burdens on businesses. We can have the same conversation in the other debate later this afternoon.
Back in 2010, we inherited a fiscal position in which £1 in every £4 spent was borrowed. When up against a weak fiscal position, the Government of the day have a duty to ensure they incentivise work, get more people off welfare and back into work—particularly at a time when unemployment had been rising. [Interruption.] If the hon. Member listens and goes back and looks at how the last Conservative Government did, he will know that is the case.
We saw around 1 million young people who were not in education, employment or training. Within five years, as I said in my intervention on the Minister, the number of workless households had fallen by 600,000. Over 370,000 fewer children were growing up in households where no one had a job. That is really important, because employment levels for single parents and those with disabilities and barriers to employment had also increased. Of course, it was the combination of the Work programme—all colleagues in the House should give some time to look at this—universal credit and welfare reforms that encouraged more people into work and gave them something we should all care about: the security and dignity that comes with having a job.
None of this is easy. This afternoon, we will hear lots of point scoring, but I stood at the Government Dispatch Box along with my hon. Friends to do the heavy lifting on welfare reform. In fact, it was prior to 2010, during the Government in which the Minister served—I think he was in the Treasury; he may correct me if I am wrong—that the Work programme first came into the public domain. We all heard about how the Work programme was all about working with employers and giving them incentives to do much more to get people into work. That also led to young people getting into work and more apprenticeships.
Apprenticeship starts are not straightforward; we have to incentivise them. People with disabilities had been written off—that was why we had Disability Confident, and I am pleased to hear that more work is being done to look at that scheme to get more people into work. All those people had been written off under previous Governments.
In the past, it was easier to sign people off than to create pathways to meaningful employment. We all have a duty to work with businesses in our constituencies to help people get into work. Madam Deputy Speaker, I am sure you saw in your constituency that employment rates increased for those signed off and on benefits. We also saw a halving of youth unemployment. Those are the things that had been achieved under previous Governments. Then, of course, we had the pandemic—we have heard about that—which absolutely changed the situation.
Under previous Conservative Governments, in every debate, every question time and every Budget—this is why I made the point I did to the Minister—our welfare reforms were not supported universally in the House, including by Labour Members. As the Minister does now, I fielded endless questions, urgent questions and Westminster Hall debates from Labour Members who simply could not accept that supporting people into employment and reducing welfare dependency was the right thing to do for those who had become trapped on welfare.
Nothing is worse than seeing families trapped on welfare, with the intergenerational welfare dependency that creates. All credit to colleagues, including former Secretaries of State, who worked hard to tackle that. We have a duty to find ways to reduce the costs for taxpayers and to do more to create pathways to work.