Tory ministers have refused to stop a £20-a-week Universal Credit cut this Autumn - because it would cost “billions more on benefits”.
DWP minister Will Quince today attacked Labour for asking for the lifeline for six million people to be extended beyond September 30.
He claimed “I certainly don’t recognise” that 4million children in poverty are “going to bed at night with no food in their tummy”.
And despite 37% of people on Universal Credit having a job, Mr Quince said the DWP would instead “shift its focus to supporting people back into work”.
Universal Credit is due to be slashed back by £20 a week from October after it was raised for 18 months due to the pandemic.
Charities want to cancel the cut, make the current rate permanent, and extend it to sick and disabled people on “legacy” benefits.
But Mr Quince said Labour were “ask[ing] for many billions more pounds to be spent on benefits after the pandemic”.
He added: “We fundamentally disagree with their approach, an approach that under the last Labour government left a generation trapped on benefits, trapped in poverty, incentivised not to work, children growing up in workless households.
“The difference couldn’t be clearer. The party opposite’s focus is on billions more on benefits - the government’s focus is on jobs, jobs, jobs.”
Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said one in eight workers are in poverty under the Tories - and that will rise if UC is cut. The Labour MP accused the Tories of trying to “level down”.
SNP MP Hannah Bardell added: “What about those people whose jobs no longer exist? A complete dereliction of duty and abandonment of some of our poorest at the worst possible time by this Tory government.”
It is a striking change in ministers’ language.
Mr Quince said in March the government would need “agility” to extend the £20-a-week if needed.
Yet in the Commons today he hailed “significant developments in the public health situation” thanks to the vaccine.
And he clashed with furious Labour MP Barry Sheerman, who asked: “Is this government determined to be known as the most heartless government since the end of the last world war?
“There are four million children in our country in poverty, going to bed at night with no food in their tummy.
“What is this government going to do about that? This is a disgraceful state of affairs, particularly hitting the north of England and people in then towns of West Yorkshire.”
Mr Quince snapped: “I’m disappointed in that question and I certainly don’t recognise the picture being painted by the honourable gentleman.”
Mr Quince claimed the £20 boost was only a “short-term temporary measure” and £7.4bn went into the welfare system during the pandemic.
But Shadow DWP minister Vicky Foxcroft slammed the Tories for leaving legacy benefits out of the £20 rise - “discriminating against millions of disabled people”.
Meanwhile ministers confirmed there are still no plans to extend their flagship Kickstart jobs scheme beyond the end of this year.
That is despite the fact that by late April - seven months into the scheme - just 16,500 out of the hoped 250,000 jobless people aged 18 to 24 had started a government-backed work placement.
Work and Pensions Secretary Therese Coffey insisted: “As hospitality booms, I’m sure many more new Kickstarters will be out there.”
Elsewhere, ministers confirmed a long-planned overhaul to disability benefit assessments is under way.
DWP minister Justin Tomlinson said officials are in the “early stages” of developing a new system for assessing PIP and “plan to test that later this year”.
Former welfare chief Amber Rudd first promised the overhaul in summer 2019.
Separately, a long-awaited review of the cruel “six month” rule - in which terminally-ill benefit claimants must show they have six months to live to get a fast-tracked claim - has finally been “completed”, Mr Tomlinson confirmed.
It comes almost two years after the Tory government first promised to overhaul the Special Rules for Terminal Illness.
Mr Tomlinson said a green paper would go further than the review and “look at the principle” of relaxing rules to remove “unnecessary” assessments and reviews.
But a date for the review’s publication has still not been announced.
