How many years has Iain Duncan Smith spent in opposition? How long has he had to prepare a blueprint for the future of the welfare state? What does he come up with? Re-assess everybody on incapacity benefit. The former Conservative Party leader is now responsible for pushing the government's Welfare Reform (?) Bill through Parliament over the next few months. Announcing that everyone on incapacity benefit will be reassessed for their ability to work, he said it was a "tragedy" that people on these benefits for more than two years were more likely to retire or die than get a job.
Among other measures, a new Work Programme will be established and older workers will be given assistance to find work immediately rather than having to wait twleve months, as is currently the case. But penalties for benefit claimants who refuse to accept jobs introduced by Labour would be more rigorously enforced. For Labour, Yvette Cooper said tax credits had made many people in low-paid jobs "thousands of pounds better off" but they did not always realise it. Duncan Smith said he was determined to tackle what he considered the UK's culture of welfare dependency by making work pay.
