Welsh Labour MP clashes with think tank he used to run over benefit cuts
Martin Shipton
A Welsh Labour MP involved in driving the UK Government’s benefit cuts affecting disabled people was confronted on TV with criticisms made by the anti-poverty think tank he used to head.
Torsten Bell was elected as the MP for Swansea West at last year’s general election and is now Pensions Minister in the Department for Work and Pensions.
On the evening of March 18 he went on the BBC’s Newsnight programme to defend cuts that will deprive many thousands of people of disability payments. The cuts are being imposed in the hope of saving £3bn per year by 2030.
Mr Bell was challenged by presenter Victoria Derbyshire about the impact of the cuts on disabled people.
‘Worse off’
Asked who the losers were from the announcement, he said: “Well there will be some people who lose out from today’s announcement. We’ve got a system where our disability benefit , the personal independence payment, is seeing 1,000 people a day coming on to it, and that’s far higher than was ever intended, so we are having to reduce the eligibility for personal independence payments, and those people will be worse off.
“But what we’re making sure we do is to protect those people and make sure they get more support, both if they’re people who are already receiving personal independence payments, but also for those who aren’t receiving it in the future. We need to make sure people have the support, not just to work, but for daily activities, for volunteering, and at the moment they get far too little of that.”
Ms Derbyshire asked Mr Bell whether he was OK with making people worse off. He said: “I’m OK with saying the system has to change. In the long run I think it will make people better off.”
He was asked about the assessment of the cuts made by the Resolution Foundation, the think tank he ran until becoming an MP. It said: “The Health and Disability Green Paper will boost Universal Credit for up to four million families without any health conditions or disability by about £3 a week – that’s 43p a day. But these tiny gains are overshadowed by reforms that risk causing major income losses for those who are too ill to work or those who no longer qualify for disability benefits.”
‘Tightening eligibility’
Mr Bell responded: “The number of people claiming PIP will still be rising after these changes, so will the total spending on personal independence payments. It is true that we’re tightening eligibility, so the rate of growth in the number of people paid PIP will slow … But people who are defending the status quo are defending a system that is writing off millions as too sick to work when many of them want to work.”
It was put to Mr Bell that young people under 22, who will no longer be able to claim PIP, would be expected to live on around £70 a week. Asked whether he could afford to live on such a small amount, he said he couldn’t, but that he had a mortgage. Young people would get housing benefit on top of the £70.
Geraint Davies, who preceded Mr Bell as the Labour MP for Swansea West, said: “These cuts are particularly going to hurt people in Swansea West who he is supposed to be the voice for.
“A recent report showed that people in Britain are among the hardest hit by the fallout from Covid. Before Covid we had a higher employment participation than other European countries. Now it is lower because other countries provided more Covid protection and have better funded healthcare systems.
“We are now penalising people who previously did work and now have Long Covid etc. Forcing them to work will increase mental ill health.”
Pressure
In the Commons debate that followed the welfare cuts announcement, Ann Davies, the Plaid Cymru MP for Caerfyrddin, said: “Wales will be hit hard by these cuts, with the second-highest proportion of disabled people of working age in the UK. Stripping £5bn from the system will only increase pressure on other services. Has the Secretary of State secured the approval of her Labour Welsh Government colleagues, as they will be the ones who will have to shoulder the cost of these damaging cuts?”
Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall responded: “Welsh Labour wants to see more people having the chances and choices to get good jobs. That is why we have a modern industrial strategy to create good jobs in every part of the country, why we are building 1.5 million new homes and why we want to see clean energy support. All those things will make a huge difference. We do not believe that the status quo is acceptable or inevitable. That is why our plan for change will create more good jobs in every part of the country. I hope that the Hon Lady and her party will welcome that.”
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Torsten Bell MP was very poor and unimpressive on Newsnight last night. Running with the hare and the hounds.
Don’t forget that young Torsten has “a mortgage to pay” sic. Like a tragic hero in a Wagner opera. And after being suddenly parachuted in from on high and unfortunately landing not on his heels but on his head, suffered severe concussion and awakened as Norman Tebbit. As the former Labour party tracks evermore to the right he is determined to be at the front of the bus. What was politically offensive and grossly immoral yesterday is now morally correct and a duty today, with even more malignance promised for tomorrow. From a war on poverty to a war on… Read more »
The smile in the photo is all that is needed but the narrative is of an aspirational young ‘Homo Superioris’ notice the LMF and Empathy, Compassion and Humanity, But then when you find @Lemmy not Lammy kneeling in prayer with Bannon in Washington the continuum from Call me Dave hanging out with the Right in Eastern Europe to St Patrick’s Day eve in Washington is there… We must assume that those who ‘pull the strings’ wish for a Christian Dictatorship, regardless of who they anoint … When Clark of Kent finally exited the Phone Box it was as I said… Read more »
I’m sorry, but the pepple of Swansea and Cymru only have themselves to blams for voting in these tories. They were warned what to expect
Regardless of what activists and the media said, there were other parties to vote for besides the main two. The Labour party takes their voters for fools, and maybe they are right because over 14,000 voters in Swansea West looked at this boyo from Greenwich and placed a cross by his name.
It seems to me the Labour Party has been highjacked by right wing neo liberal monetarists whose main concern is sucking money up from the poorest and most vulnerable to the already well heeled. There are obviously so many other ways for the government to boost the coffers from a wealth and land tax to closing tax dodging loopholes to printing money to invest in infrastructure. Taking money off the already poor and vulnerable is a political choice.
There is not much difference between Conservative and Labour anymore.
Parachuted in to a welsh constituency he has zero connection with by Labour hq in London and now betraying everything he ever believed in on the instruction of the same labour hq in London – Bell is scum of the earth.
With the greatest respect, some of the ‘local’ north Welsh MPs that i follow are virtually anonymous. They seem to be turning up in primary schools to give a talk, or campaigning on matters that are never going to happen. I would go so far as to say all Welsh MPs have become very low profile over last 10 years. Before Mr Bell, I can’t think of the last Welsh MP who held even a junior ministerial role. Kim Howells, or David Jones? My point is some of our non parachuted MPs are hardly making a case to recruit ‘locally’… Read more »
The irony is. The very Labour politicians like hypocrite Torsten Bell parachuted into Swansea West by authoritarian ruler Labour responsible for pushing through these Draconian benefit cuts affecting the most poorest and vulnerable in society, themselves are claiming thousands in perks & benefits even though receiving £91k a year, one of many jobs they have. The likes of Torsten Bell get a second home on the public purse. Subsidised food. Travel allowance. Help with Council Tax. Gas. Electricity. Free alcohol in the House Of Commons bar. Discounted food, where they only pay £10 for a three course meal at the… Read more »
Him and his brother a senior Civil Servant have been raised in an environment that leads them to these career paths, there are many in political ranks have family that arranged these career paths.
Until these are seen as for what they are, nepotism plain and simple it will go on.
On the other hand Mabon is the only one I ‘trust’ even with other issues that do not seem to be an issue in his case…An outsider bet…
If you look at the PIP’s categories it is now possible for someone who needs prompting to cook a meal, needs assistance with cutting up food, needs supervision for their medical therapy of over 3 hours a week, needs help washing from the waist downwards, needs assistance to dress their lower body, and needs supervision to use the toilet – to not qualify for this benefit. Just think about that, and how disabled someone could be to be expected to get a job! These people will be left destitute under these plans. With the impact of AI removing vast numbers… Read more »
The man is a non entity. PPE at Oxford, editor of a student newspaper, columnist, chief executive of a think tank and then parachuted into a seat he has no connection with. Where is the real world experience?
This is the person who is telling/advising pension funds where to invest (preferably in the UK). Spouting off from his ivory tower on a cool £90,000+ per year with expenses. Has he and his fellow Labour mps invested heavily in UK equities?
Looking at who got one – David Cameron, Matt Hancock, Liz Truss, Rachel Reeves, etc. – the Oxbridge PPE is the ultimate joke degree.
‘I couldn’t live on £70 a week but I’m not one of the poors.’
final para – did you mean ‘per month’?
You ain’t no socialist, bruv!