Sebastian Payne

Iain Duncan Smith ties himself into universal knots over welfare reform

Will Universal Credit ever become universal and will the lowest paid still face an effective tax rate of a sometimes outrageous 76 per cent? Iain Duncan Smith took a grilling over his plans for welfare reform on the Sunday Politics today, but didn’t give a clear answer to either of these questions regarding his reforms.

Firstly, on the progress of implementing Universal Credit, the Work and Pensions Secretary claimed that ‘Universal Credit is already rolling out and the IT is working’, despite just 6,000 people currently on the ‘Pathfinder’ stage. In his initial plans, a million people claiming six existing working-age benefits were due to be on the Pathfinder stage by April 2014. IDS said it was his decision to slow down the roll out:

‘I changed the way we rolled it out over a year and a half ago. There was a reason for that. Under the advice from someone from the outside, he said you’re better off Pathfinding this out, make sure you learn the lessons, roll it out slower and gain momentum later on.’

He also sparred with Andrew Neil on how much money has been wasted on Universal Credit so far. The Public Accounts Committee reported £140 million has been written off, whereas IDS claimed this is only £40 million, plus general depreciation costs. In comparison to the private sector, IDS pointed out 'IT programmes write off 30-40 per cent because that’s the nature of such projects’. He may be right but more scrutiny is to be expected with taxpayers' money.

When will UC be finished? IDS said he expects everyone claiming the six existing benefits to be on Universal credit by 2016 — assuming the next government doesn't abandon the project — but it will not entirely universal until 2018; eight years after the implementation of the project began.

Already a subscriber? Log in

Keep reading with a free trial

Subscribe and get your first month of online and app access for free. After that it’s just £1 a week.

There’s no commitment, you can cancel any time.

Or

Unlock more articles

REGISTER

Comments

Don't miss out

Join the conversation with other Spectator readers. Subscribe to leave a comment.

Already a subscriber? Log in