Osborne has set Labour a trap. As Rafael Behr clearly explains, either Labour supports the benefits changes that see devastating real-term cuts to the most vulnerable, or they are left arguing in the Commons in support of people on benefits, playing into the hands of the worst stereotypes of the party in terms of public spending and supporting so called “scroungers”. So what to do?
The party has to be clear about one thing. Work is the best way to support people out of poverty and get the economy moving again. Labour. The clue is in the name. Talk to some members, and you would think the worst news from the Autumn Statement for poorer people were the benefit cuts. It wasn’t. The worst news for poorer people was that growth will be negative this year and stagnate for much longer than we thought. Without jobs, there is no hope.
The first point the party has rightly emphasised is that most people being hit by these benefit cuts will be in work. Ed Balls has been good at articulating this so far, breaking down the false stereotype the chancellor presents us with between “strivers” and “scroungers”.
But I’m not talking about that argument, which I believe we’ve already won with the public. I’m talking about how we defend benefits for those who are out of work. The “strivers” who spend eight to ten hours a day applying for jobs without so much as a word back. How do we make their benefits seem fair to the working person who lives next door?
One answer – which I’m putting out for discussion rather than a definitive solution – is a jobs guarantee. If someone capable of working has been unable to find work in a year, then the state guarantees them a job and pays them at least the minimum wage. Labour shouldn’t support any further erosion of benefits in parliament until that promise has been kept.
Evidence suggests that this scheme worked well under the Future Jobs Fund, which offered a six month placement to unemployed young people until the government axed it. In fact DWP’s own research showed it delivered a net benefit of £7,750 per participant. Others such as Stephen Timms and Richard Layard have researched what it would be like to extend it to all ages.
Putting this suggestion to someone in Ed’s office, they reasonably argued that it still does nothing for those people who are in work on benefits. That’s true, and a devastatingly sad reality for those struggling to afford Christmas and pay their bills in the new year. But as I’ve argued before, pushing the living wage is a much better way of helping the working poor than subsidising low wage jobs through tax credits, particularly when money is tight.
Obviously the most important reason for a jobs guarantee is that it gives people a chance to help themselves. But it also has strategic advantages. It shows that Labour is being constructive and allows us to defend benefits from a position that resonates with the public. At a time when there are so many more claimants than jobs, it shows the Conservatives up for hitting people who are desperate to find work but can’t find it. And on a deeper and more fundamental level, it may even cause a rebellion among the Liberal Democrats and give them cause to side with us in the Commons, defeating the government’s present measures altogether.
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