Debate contribution: Welfare Supplementary Payment (Universal Credit) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2025

Debate contribution by Mr Gerry Carroll on 18 March 2025.

MLA

Mr Gerry Carroll

Party at the time

People Before Profit Alliance

Date

18 March 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Executive Committee Business

Heading

Welfare Supplementary Payment (Universal Credit) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2025

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4860316

Read the official Assembly record

Text

The extension of welfare supplementary payments is testament to the tireless work of anti-poverty campaigners, including the Cliff Edge Coalition, as the Chair has stated. I pay tribute to its work. Welfare mitigations are an example of successful superparity, where the North has made policy choices that diverge from other parts of the UK. Welfare mitigations have shielded citizens here from some of the worst aspects of Tory welfare reform, but that does not mean that they have been totally immune. It is worth remembering that three out of four Executive parties voted in favour of welfare reform, back in 2015. Extending the mitigation payments must be an admission of regret for that awful decision. However, since we all now seem to agree that the impacts of welfare reform are so harmful that they justify mitigation, maybe we can also reflect on the brutality of our wider social security system. The benefits system has been cut to the bone by successive Tory Governments, the now Labour Government and Ministers here. Obviously, they are obsessed with a system of sanctions. They are intent on cracking down on extremely rare instances of benefit fraud rather than going after tax-dodging multi-million- and billion-pound corporations and obscenely wealthy individuals. The austerity state is hell-bent on punishing the poor rather than expanding the social safety net for the sick, elderly and disabled people whose lives depend on a strong and reliable social security system. The latest assault on the sick and disabled comes from the Labour Government who, last year, called food banks:

"a moral scar on our society."

Now, they are seemingly cutting benefits to pieces — something that will, surely, increase reliance on emergency food parcels. It is no coincidence that the British Government are desperately making cuts to the welfare system while planning to boost defence spending. Keir Starmer and his party are taking money from the pockets of the poor and marginalised people to give to the billionaire shareholders of arms companies. They announced those decisions in the exact same week. There is nothing subtle about it: it is an attempt to strip away welfare in order to fund warfare. Now is the time to build on the success of our existing welfare mitigations, which helped some 38,000 households last year. We need to mitigate the two-child limit — a cruel policy that disproportionately harms women and children here, especially in my constituency. We also need to prepare to mitigate the disastrous welfare cuts, which are, probably, to be announced this afternoon. I would appreciate it if the Minister could provide an update on whether his Department has engaged with the British Government on that issue and on what contingency plans his Department intends to make if the Labour Government continue down their disastrous, cruel path. Will the Executive parties learn from the lessons of the past and break from the punitive Westminster welfare reform or will they continue to follow their austerity path? We wait to see.

497 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:08 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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