Pat McFadden – Welfare reform focus needs to shift to helping people to transform their lives

Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden has told GB News that the state benefits system needs to be reformed to focus on helping people to transform their lives rather than simply handing out cash.

His comments came during an in-depth interview in the wake of the release of the Mandelson Files containing his WhatsApp messages about MPs always seeking to raise taxes to pay out more in benefits to their constituents.

McFadden told Gloria De Piero: “I’ve known Peter Mandelson for many years, and these messages are kind of back and forth about politics and government that go on a lot. Politics is a series of constant conversations, and that’s what’s reflected in the material that was produced the other day.

“Having said that, what I did not know was the extent of his relationship with the guy Epstein, and all the stuff that’s come out about that since. This was a year or more ago, when he was still ambassador when these exchanges took place.”

Asked if he thought any of his messages might prove to be controversial when Parliament voted to release the files, he said: “Well, of course, you write things in these messages, and I’m sure everybody does, that they probably, when they wrote them, didn’t expect them to be published. Having said that, you know, I’ve said both in private and in public that we need to change the question that the welfare system asks.

“I said, funnily enough, in a bunch of interviews last Thursday, Friday, and in a speech in March, and many times internally in the department, what I mean by that is we need to move from a question which just asks what benefits are you entitled to, to a question that says how can we help you change your life?

“That is a progressive welfare reform question, because it puts work and opportunity at the heart of what you’re trying to do. I’ve been saying that in public and in private for a long time.”

He said Labour MPs need to think more laterally about welfare reform: “We’ve got to do reform differently. I don’t think you can or should do welfare reform just by saying here’s a sum of money we’ve got to save, and then you graft on the policy afterward. Of course cost matters, but the best way to save money on the benefits bill is to help people get into work.

“Since the day I walked into the department, that’s been my emphasis, particularly with young people, because if they get stuck on benefits, it can be a lifelong effect for them.

“Everything I’ve done, through our youth guarantee that we’ve announced, through subsidies for employers, changes in the apprenticeship system, all of it has been about putting working opportunity at the heart of it, and that’s what I mean by welfare reform. It’s what I mean by asking the right question rather than the wrong question.

“I’m approaching this in what I would argue is a progressive Labour way.”

On Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch claiming in a social media campaign that the files prove that Labour is raising taxes purely to boost benefits payments, McFadden said: “That’s what she did. That’s what her government did. They had the biggest rise in welfare benefits with none of the youth guarantee stuff that we are talking about.

“We’ve been left with a system that they had 14 years where they created it, designed it, didn’t reform it, and then suddenly they say they want all this change. They’re a bit like a builder walking around your house saying, ‘Well, who installed that and who put that in?’, when the answer is they did. So I am changing the system that I inherited from them.”

On the actions of the police in the case of the murder of Henry Nowak, he said: “Oh, it’s awful. I watched it on the news, seeing this young man. There’s just so much that’s wrong there.

“The assumptions being made, he’s saying he can’t breathe, he’s saying he’s being stabbed, he’s not being believed. And in the end he’s handcuffed, and he’s arrested, and I just think this has gone terribly and horribly wrong.

“The first place to start is an investigation into the policing of all this, that’s got to happen. My heart goes out to this young man’s family. I’ve got a son, very similar age, and I think every parent watching that – it is just awful.”