Speeches by Kendall.

“We want to give people like Charlie the chances and choices in life that he deserves. Our Connect to Work programme will do everything from helping people access health treatment to providing work placements and building their confidence through training, skills—whatever meets their individual needs. That is the key to…”

“The Conservative party failed on welfare because it failed on work. The reason why we inherited such a dire situation with sickness and disability benefits is that the Conservatives failed to get people into work. We are turning that around, and it is about time the hon. Lady and Opposition Members put forward a proper…”

“I am not often called understated, but I thank the hon. Lady for her comments. Welfare reform is always difficult because it involves real people and real lives, and it is a complicated and personal issue. However, we are investing £3.8 billion in employment support to help sick and disabled people into work, we are in…”

“One in eight young people are not in education, employment or training. That is bad for them, bad for businesses and bad for our country as a whole. Our west of England youth guarantee trailblazer, which covers my hon. Friend’s constituency, is helping to remove barriers to work for young people, including by providing…”

“My hon. Friend raises a really important point. Throughout its work, the DWP is already looking at how to narrow the gaps between different parts of the country and different groups of people. We have set our jobcentres and employment systems new targets for reducing those gaps, and we are taking cross-Government actio…”

“My hon. Friend is right that people have different needs in different parts of the country. We need to tailor employment support to the needs of individuals, so alongside measures like our youth guarantee, we are overhauling our jobcentres to provide that more personalised support and introducing measures such as mobil…”

“We have begun to tackle those disincentives with the change in UC health combined with this really substantial employment support. I should say here that it is absolutely essential that we get the employment support right, based on the evidence of what actually helps people move towards and to get work. Together that i…”

“I have always believed in getting the welfare bill on a more sustainable footing. As I said in my earlier comments, that for me remains essential because I want to see a welfare state that is really there for people who need it in future. As more of us live longer with long-term conditions and there are more disabled p…”

“We are not driven—”

“In fact, from the very day after we published the Green Paper—in the next couple of days—Stephen Timms and I had roundtables with disabled people and the organisations that represent them. We will just have to agree to disagree on this. I do not believe that we have failed to consult disabled people on the “Pathways to…”

“We did not ignore—”

“We are not ignoring disabled people. They will be at the heart of the Timms review.”

“Well, I have answered that question. You might not like the answer, but the answer is that we were consulting with Parliament, and Parliament took a different view. Now, going forward—”

“Because we were passing it through Parliament.”

“But we are now, going forward.”

“We are, on many aspects.”

“Well, there was with Parliament, and Parliament took a different view.”

“Because, at the time, it was going through in primary legislation, and we were obviously consulting with Parliament about that. I do not agree that the “Pathways to Work” Green Paper as a whole somehow lacked consultation with disabled people. We have five collaboration committees on many different aspects of that Gree…”

“I have never given—well, I have never believed it, because it is not true, and that is not the argument I made. The argument I did make was that we need to make sure that this absolutely crucial benefit is sustainable for the future. If the doubling of the number of people on PIP over the last decade were to continue i…”

“I am fully aware that it is—”