Labour MPs set to rebel over permanent cap on welfare spending

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/mar/25/labour-mps-rebel-cap-welfare-spending

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Ed Miliband will come under fresh pressure on Wednesday when as many as 20 backbench Labour MPs prepare to reject the leadership's call to vote for a permanent cap on welfare spending. The shadow chancellor, Ed Balls, said that the party would vote for the cap, pointing out Labour had been the first to suggest this form of public spending control last year.

Labour also claimed overall spending on social security was set to be £3.5bn higher in 2013-14 than ministers had forecast in the November 2010 autumn statement. Overall, such spending had been £13bn higher than ministers had planned in 2010.

The Labour rebellion came as David Lammy, the MP for Tottenham and a potential Labour candidate for London mayor, said the party still did not look like a government in waiting. "We have to spell out to the country what our positive offer is for them to vote for us. That has to connect, it has to be relevant, it has to inspire and motivate," he told the BBC. "I think we've been a very effective opposition, but in the next 14 months we have to cross that Rubicon to being a government-in-waiting."

Hazel Blears, a former home office minister, said the party needed to make faster progress in translating policy ideas to relatable policies. The soul searching has been prompted by a post-budget Labour dip in the polls, a fall in inflation and uncertainty over the central themes in the party election manifesto.

Lammy said: "The big question is: do you trust Labour to run the economy, to fix your living-standard problem? I think that that gets you back to big structural questions about the nature of our economy – the shrinking amount of jobs in the middle for people, very low-class, low-quality jobs at the end, which means we have these proxy debates about living standards."

Diane Abbott, the Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, urged Miliband to step up the pace of his reform programme.

Despite the rebellion, Labour believes it has neatly sidestepped a trap set by the chancellor, George Osborne, to be seen voting against an overall cap on welfare.

Balls said: "Ed Miliband called for an overall cap on social security spending last year, so we will support the welfare cap in the House of Commons today. But George Osborne has already broken his own targets in this parliament. His failure to tackle low wages, deal with the cost-of-living crisis and get more homes built means he is set to spend £13bn more on welfare than he originally planned.

He added: "George Osborne has scored an own goal by highlighting in today's vote his fiscal targets for this parliament which he has broken. The budget confirmed that national debt will be rising, not falling, in 2015-16 and the chancellor's pledge to balance the books by 2015 also lies in tatters."