Wes Streeting has denied that Labour is “changing into the Tories” with its plan to reform the welfare system.
The health secretary told Sky News’ Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips that it is “not a Labour argument to say that we want people consigned to a life of benefit”.
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The government is expected to unveil a series of measures to cut the benefits bill next week, ahead of Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s spring statement.
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The plan was thought to include cancelling an inflation-linked rise to the personal independence payment (PIP) – but this has reportedly been scrapped due to backlash from Labour MPs.
Mr Streeting would not be drawn on the supposed division – saying we will “have to wait and see the proposals” and the issue “hasn’t been discussed in cabinet”.
However he said that what the government is trying to achieve with welfare reform is to make sure the system “does the two things it needs to do”.
“One is to support people who cannot work to make sure they’ve got dignity, independence, and quality of life.
“And secondly, for those who can, to make sure that the welfare system isn’t just a safety net, that it’s a springboard back to work.”
Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is money for people who have extra care needs or mobility needs as a result of a disability.
Mr Streeting said one thousand people every day are signing on to PIP – saying that’s “the size of the city of Manchester” over the course of a year.
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Asked if people get benefits too easily, the cabinet minister said there is a “presumption in favour of the benefits system” and people “need to have the right support to stay and work wherever possible”.
He rejected the claim that Labour is “turning into the Tories”, saying: “I don’t think that it is a Labour argument to say that we would want people consigned to a life of benefits and not able to go to work when we know that they can.”
Former Tory chancellor George Osborne – the architect of welfare cuts during the coalition years – said on his Political Currency podcast this week that he resisted freezing PIP because he felt it was going too far.
Former Labour shadow chancellor Ed Balls, who co-hosts the podcast with him and is married to Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, also said cutting disability benefits is “not a Labour thing to do…it’s not what they are for”.
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The government’s motivation is the cost of long-term sickness and disability benefits for working-age people, which has risen by £20bn since the pandemic and is forecast to hit £70bn over the next five years.
Ministers have stressed there are currently 2.8 million people not in work due to ill-health, while one in eight young people are not in education, training or employment – prompting fears of a “wasted generation”.
Some of the changes being mooted include making it harder to qualify for PIP and increasing the rate of Universal Credit for those who are in or searching for work to incentivise employment, while cutting the rate for those judged unfit to work.
Many Labour MPs fear drastic cuts to the most vulnerable.
In a post on X, Barry Gardiner, the Labour MP for Brent West, criticised the bankers bonus cap coming to an end and said he doesn’t understand “why it is too difficult to tax a little more those having to manage on £19m a year” instead of cutting the benefits bill.
Laura Trott, the Tories’ shadow education secretary, refused to be drawn on whether she supported disability benefit cuts or not.
But she said the changes were not in Labour’s manifesto, whereas her party did have a plan to do this.
She told Trevor Phillips: “At the election, Labour said we could save no money on welfare.
“They’ve lost so much time when it was obvious to everyone this was a benefit system that needed to be brought under control after the pandemic.
“Labour is coming to this too late without a plan. They were clearly divided on it. And that is not what our welfare system needs.”
