Chamber and committees

Does the minister agree that universal credit is fundamentally flawed and that all its parts need to be reformed? Such reform is about more than just one policy, as abhorrent as the policy is. It is about making universal credit a proper safety net for people who need it, and it is about ensuring that work pays and that it pays well.

Will the minister take an intervention?

I thank Mr Doris for his supportive comments on the new deal for working people. I hope that he might convince members on the front bench to back our amendment and those proposals. I do not recall using that language; I will need to check the Official Report. I am not sure that that is what Mr Marra and I said. We have said that we are committed to a fundamental reform of universal credit—of all parts of the system—to ensure that it works for people and to remove those punitive methods from it. A Tory Government—

If the cabinet secretary will allow me to make some progress, I will give way to her in a moment.

As I have said, the next Labour Government is fundamentally committed to reforming universal credit, because the current system is not working and we need wide-ranging reform. It is not just about changing some social security policies; it is about changing the whole system. Fundamental change is what Labour does when it is in power. I will give way to the cabinet secretary.

We meet this afternoon in the middle of challenge poverty week, and, as I have said before in the chamber, there are few issues as important as tackling poverty. It should be the focus of far more of our time in this place, particularly in terms of how we use the powers of this Parliament to take action.

The Government has chosen to bring a very limited debate today on a very pernicious part of the universal credit system, which it is entitled to do. However, given that it is challenge poverty week, and given the scope of that week, the Government could have used its time to have a much wider debate about all the roots and facets of poverty and about how we use our collective energies far more in tackling it. The Government has chosen not to do that, so perhaps it is more interested in the political context in which we meet today than in—

I am coming on to speak about why universal credit does not work and why it needs to be fundamentally reformed. We need to see wide-ranging change, because it is not helping people; it is failing people. The member is right in her assertion that those policies are failing people, because the life chances of all our people are crucial to how we thrive as a society and as a world. It is clear that we need a change of approach at UK and Scottish levels to lift more people out of poverty.

Scottish Labour campaigned against the introduction of the two-child limit, and we continue to oppose it, along with the cruel direction of 13 years of this Tory Government. The Tory Government has demonstrated its unfitness to govern through the financial chaos that it unleashed on the country last year, driving more and more people into poverty. Given the further chaos, including the adulation of Liz Truss and her acolytes this week in Manchester, it is clear that the Tory Government has learned nothing and takes no responsibility for its actions.

The next Labour Government will fundamentally reform universal credit, ensuring that it provides a proper safety net for those who need it.

I am not entirely sure what the cabinet secretary is driving at. Angela Rayner and Keir Starmer, in conjunction with the TUC, have endorsed the document. He will back to the letter the policy that the document outlines, which we will deliver when in government. I have no idea what the cabinet secretary is driving at in her contribution today.

Let us be clear that this is a transformative opportunity to raise people out of poverty wages and into secure work. We know that the SNP has not got the best track record when it comes to things such as paying the living wage in Government contracts or using zero-hours contracts to recruit campaigners. Just a few weeks ago, the SNP abandoned the parental transition fund of up to £15 million a year to tackle the financial barriers that are faced by parents who want to enter the labour market.

In the debate today, we will, no doubt, hear again calls along the lines of, “If only we had more powers, things would be better,” and, “If only independence was here, things would be better.” Perhaps the SNP should first explain why it is not using the powers that it has. It is not just me saying that. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation highlighted this week that the SNP Government simply complaining about the powers that it does not have is

“to deny its direct responsibilities for things like employability, economic development, skills, and so on.”

If the SNP does not want to listen to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, maybe it should listen to its own Poverty and Inequality Commission. In May 2023, in relation to the child poverty delivery plan, it said that it is

“concerned that there does not seem to be the necessary clarity or sense of urgency about delivery of these actions.”

It is time for fundamental reform of universal credit. It is time for a new deal for working people, to drive up wages and standards and to lift people out of poverty. It is time to move on from two failing Governments and deliver real change for people across Scotland and the United Kingdom.

I move amendment S6M-10716.1, to insert at end:

“; notes that an estimated two thirds of children in poverty live in working households, 10 per cent of all employees in Scotland are stuck in low pay, and that 72 per cent of that group are women, and welcomes, therefore, the proposal for a New Deal for Working People, which has been endorsed by the TUC and includes plans to ban zero-hours contracts, outlaw fire and rehire practices, and raise the minimum wage in order to tackle insecure work and to make sure that work pays as a key route to ending poverty.”

Can the cabinet secretary explain to the chamber why, in April 2019, she said to The Times:

“It’s not our policy to alleviate the two-child cap”?

Indeed, she has not advocated the Government’s mitigating the two-child cap in taking the action that she has called us on.

The member speaks about “little hope”, but does she accept that, as I outlined in my contribution, universal credit is fundamentally broken and needs to be reformed in all its facets? Does she accept that Labour’s new deal for working people will be a huge game changer in getting people into well-paid work and lifting people out of poverty?

Thank you. Both responses were helpful in understanding the importance of data.

My next question is about barriers. Many of the groups that we have spoken about this morning are, in a broad sense, represented by organisations, but often there are barriers to getting everyone’s point of view. The committee is keen to understand what you feel the barriers are to people feeling that they are part of a representative voice. How might we address that better and how might we get to the root of people’s issues?