A senior Labour MP has said the government needs to take “corrective action” over planned disability cuts – as Sir Keir Starmer faces a growing backbench rebellion.
Tan Dhesi, chair of the influential Commons defence committee, told the Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge the “disappointing” local election results show the government must listen and learn, particularly over welfare reforms.
The government has proposed tightening the eligibility requirements for the personal independent payment, known as PIP.
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A claimant must score a minimum of four points on one PIP daily living activity, such as preparing food, washing and bathing, using the toilet or reading, to receive the daily living element of the benefit.
Mr Dhesi, the MP for Slough, said “corrective action” needs to be taken but insisted if the government changed tact, it would not be a U-turn as the disability cuts were only proposals.
“A government which is in listening mode should be looking at what the electorate is saying,” he said.
“And we need to make sure that it’s our moral duty, responsibility, to look after the most vulnerable within our community, whether that’s in Slough, whether that’s elsewhere across the country.
“So, I hope that the government will be taking on board that feedback and many of us as MPs are giving that feedback in various meetings happening here in Westminster and then we need to take corrective action.”
Minister Alex Davies-Jones told the Politics Hub a Labour government “will always seek to protect the most vulnerable” and it wants to “listen to people who have got real lived experience”.
She added she has the “utmost respect for Tan, he’s a great constituency MP and he’s doing exactly what he should be doing, is representing his constituency”.
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Sir Keir is facing a rebellion from Labour MPs, with about 40 in the Red Wall – Labour’s traditional heartlands in the north of England – reposting a statement on social media in which they said the leadership’s response to the local elections had “fallen on deaf ears”.
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Several backbench Labour MPs also spoke out against the plans during a debate on PIP and disabled people in parliament on Wednesday.
Ian Byrne, MP for Liverpool West Derby, said he would “swim through vomit to vote against” the proposed changes and said: “This is not what the Labour Party was formed to do.”
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Bell Ribeiro-Addy, the MP for Clapham and Brixton Hill, said she feared tightening PIP eligibility would cause deaths, adding: “Lest we forget that study that attributed 330,000 excess deaths in Britain between 2012 and 2019 to the last round of austerity cuts [under the Conservative government].”
Diane Abbott, the longest-serving female MP, accused the government of putting forward “contradictory arguments”.
“On the one hand, they insist they are helping the disabled by putting them back to work,” she said.
“But on the other hand, they say this cut will save £9bn. Well, you can’t do both.”
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However, fellow Labour MP David Pinto-Duschinsky, said MPs cannot “ignore this issue” of health-related benefit claimant figures rising at “twice the rate of underlying health conditions”.
Responding for the government, social security minister Sir Stephen Timms said PIP claims were set to “more than double, from two million to over 4.3 million this decade”.
“It would certainly not be in the interests of people currently claiming the benefits for the government to bury its head in the sand over that rate of increase,” he added.
