Andy Burnham, a potential next prime minister if he wins the Makerfield byelection, has told the Times newspaper that he would not be squeamish about reducing the welfare bill. However, he ruled out “crude” short-term cuts, instead pointing to long-term plans to “support people into work”.
In the interview last week, [paywall] Burnham said that ““I am not squeamish about saying that the plan would be to reduce the welfare bill. Not at all.”
But he added “It is not the traditional Westminster way of just crude cuts, short-term cuts that then create a backlash and create more political turbulence. It is actually going to do things that will reduce the benefits bill, moving towards a more preventative state that makes the right investments to support people into work.”
He said he was in favour of increased funding for defence but “I would say it’s defence and security but also resilience.”
“We do not have a preventative, productive, growth-enabling state. We are doing the opposite. We end up dealing with crises and spending huge amounts of money supporting people in a crisis situation rather than into much, much earlier intervention to a more positive outcome.”
Burnham agreed with the Milburn report that it was wrong that for every £25 spent on benefits for young people, only £1 was spent on employment support.
One of the things he would change, he said, would be to insist that government defence procurement contracts would include social value, such as apprenticeships and work placements.
“To me the fact that Britain has not had a very strong intentional approach to British procurement is crazy. As Mayor of Greater Manchester, I have deliberately fought against the system to have our buses built in Falkirk and Ballymena. I see other contracts going off to China.”
Burnham’s remarks have caused wide concern amongst claimants that he may be ready to support wider cuts to benefits, although he failed to address the issue of the possible linking of PIP to work, alluded to in the Milburn report.
