On 26 March 1998, the Government published the Welfare Reform Green Paper, New Ambitions for Our Country – A New Contract for Welfare, and launched what it described as one of the biggest consultations of its kind ever undertaken by a Government.

In the foreword to the Green Paper, the Prime Minister stated:

Our objective is to build a genuine national consensus behind change."

Although the Government has stated that the principles that underpin its plans for welfare reform have received overwhelming support, they initially refused even to publish their analysis of responses but did offer to make copies of the 1050 written responses they received available on request!

With the limited resources available to me, it was clearly not possible to read all 1050 responses. However, I did prepare a summary of submissions representative of the whole range of organisations and individuals that responded.

After I pointed out that the DSS was contravening Cabinet Office guidance on Government consultations, which states that Government Departments "should produce and make available a summary of views and information collected from the consultation exercise" the Government's own analysis was made available to me. Whilst this is much less detailed on individual submissions, there is compatibility between the civil servants’ assessment and mine.

Both analyses fail to support the Government’s claim to have won overwhelming endorsement for their principles. Respondents as diverse as Age Concern and the Catholic Board for Social Responsibility pointed out that the Green Paper falls well short of being a comprehensive review of the Welfare State, advancing Government proposals without discussing alternative principles. They said there was a lack of clear thinking by the Government on the role of social insurance, universal benefits and means-testing within the social security system.

Many respondents pointed out that means-testing penalises financial planning and acts as a disincentive to work and to save, as well as encouraging fraud. The contributory system enjoys great public support and extending, rather than means-testing universal benefits, would address many of the Government’s concerns. There were many calls for the scope of the national insurance scheme to be expanded to include the low paid, part-timers and atypical workers and concern about people losing benefit rights because of caring responsibilities.

As the Association of British Insurers pointed out:

"The interrelationship between state benefits and what insurance companies can offer needs to be properly understood by government, by insurance companies and by the public. A stable framework is needed in which people can make plans which will not be disrupted by a subsequent change of government policy. People naturally are resentful if, for example, having saved for a specific welfare need, they then discover that they have been wasting their money and that they would have obtained the same benefit from the state for nothing. Conversely, if people have reasonably expected that the state will provide, they are aggrieved if suddenly the state decides not to provide."

It is in this context that many Labour MPs like myself are unhappy about provisions in the Welfare Reform and Pensions Bill to increase means-testing and reduce contribution rights to receive Incapacity Benefit. As a consequence of the Government’s proposals, someone unemployed for two years before becoming disabled, who has paid contributions for 30 years previously will not qualify, but someone unemployed for 30 years who has worked for one of the last two years will qualify for Incapacity Benefit.

The offending Clauses in the Bill were removed in the Lords after the Government refused to accept a compromise position put forward by Labour peer, Jack Ashley. Instead, they have attempted, rather unconvincingly, to rubbish Jack’s proposals by citing the example of a person with two children, retiring through ill health at the age of 35 with a pension of £39,000. If any such person existed, they might just be entitled to a tiny amount of benefit.

Realising that he has little time to get the Bill through the legislative process before the Queen’s Speech on 17 November, Alistair Darling is telling Labour MPs that he will ‘look into the details’, but if he is to avoid another major rebellion he will have to come up with substantial concessions. Even if he wins the vote, Labour members in the Lords tell me that the mood there could lead to a further defeat and the Bill being lost altogether.