The Labour welfare rebellion advances further, with Helen Goodman tabling a ‘reasoned amendment’ to the Welfare Reform and Work Bill. She says she has the support of 40 Labour MPs for the amendment, which reads as follows:
‘That this House declines to give a Second Reading to the Welfare Reform and Work Bill, notwithstanding its potentially useful provisions on apprenticeships, because the Bill would have the effect of ignoring the plight of children in low income working households, removing the concept of child poverty from the statute book, increasing the number of children, especially those from large families, living in poverty, worsening work incentives for people whose incomes are below average and reducing the incomes of sick and disabled people.’
Goodman supports Yvette Cooper’s campaign for the Labour leadership, but the Cooper camp say that this was not something they helped draft and it is ‘100 per cent nothing to do with us’. Cooper does want a reasoned amendment to the Bill, but this is a decision that the Labour leadership has to take, rather than something backbenchers push for.
So many Labour MPs, including new members, are preparing to vote against the Bill next week that it looks impossible for Harriet Harman to stick to the current line of abstaining on the legislation without tabling a reasoned amendment. Most expect that they won’t, in the end, have to rebel on the Bill because their leadership will relent and table an amendment. This move from Goodman adds to the pressure for Harman to do just that.
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