Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Housing and Local Government – in the Senedd at 2:34 pm on 13 November 2019.

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Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 2:34, 13 November 2019

I think, again, we agree on the base—obviously, the way out of poverty is to give people more money. Their chance to earn it, in good, fair employment, is obviously the best way to do that, so that people are not reliant on benefits—so, paying a real living wage, and all that sort of stuff. So I think we're on the same page on that. We are awaiting a piece of research, but I'm afraid I just can't recall when it's due back. We want to be sure what would happen if we take over the administration of benefits, what that means for us in terms of cost, and whether we can administer the benefits properly, without having to administer some of the, frankly, appalling mandation and sanctioning regimes that are currently perpetrated by the DWP, with which I know she disagrees, and I also vehemently disagree with people having their money stopped because their bus was late, and so on—a completely heartless way to go on. So, we want to just be sure that, if we take over the administration, we aren't just having a series of unintended consequences as a result of that, in terms of the cost to the rest of the public purse, because I agree with her in the principle of administering it, but what we want to look at is what the practice would look like. Apologies—I should be able to remember, but I can't remember, when that research is due, so I will write to you about it.FootnoteLink