A cabinet minister compared Labour’s disability cuts to cutting his own children’s pocket money – and was met with a swift backlash.
Darren Jones, the chief secretary to the Treasury, was trying to defend Rachel Reeves’ significant cuts to the welfare budget on the BBC when he made the controversial remark.
The government has decided to cut down on the number of people entitled to personal independent payments (PIP) to try and save around £5 billion of public spending.
Analysis by the Department for Work and Pensions revealed today that these welfare reforms will have a major impact, and lead to an average loss of £4,500 a year for someone on PIP.
But Jones appeared to play down the impact on the BBC’s Politics Live today.
He claimed the DwP’s assessment does not account for the financial benefit someone could enjoy from the additional money the government is putting into training, skills and work.
He said: “For example, if I said to my kids, ‘I’m going to cut your pocket money by £10 a week but you have to go and get a Saturday job,’ the impact assessment on that basis would say that my kids were down £10 irrespective on how much they get from their Saturday job.”
The minister also pointed out that the £4,500 number was an average figure, and he did not want people who receive PIP at home to be “unduly worried” by that.
His remarks quickly sparked a significant backlash, including from two MPs who were previously part of the Labour Party...
... and from people across the internet.