Kemi Badenoch is set to unveil a detailed plan to cut £36 billion from the benefits bill, warning that the cost of Britain’s welfare system is “crushing our economy”.
The Conservative leader will propose removing sickness and disability benefits for people with mild mental health conditions and routine back pain, taking an estimated 2.5 million people out of the system.
Foreign nationals from outside the EU would also be prevented from claiming benefits in the UK.
The two-child benefit cap, scrapped by Labour, would be brought back under the proposals, saving taxpayers £3.1 billion a year.
Mrs Badenoch will publish a 52-page report setting out the case for reform and detailing the measures she wants to introduce.
In a landmark speech on Tuesday, the Tory leader will point to the latest official figures showing that working-age welfare costs the country £180 billion a year.
That amounts to around £500 million a day—more than the UK spends on defence, education and policing combined. It costs the average taxpayer more than £4,000 a year and exceeds the entire gross domestic product of Ukraine.
“The weight of this welfare burden is crushing our economy and plunging us deeper and deeper into debt,” she will say. “There is no world in which the current system is sustainable—and not just because of the cost.”
Kemi Badenoch will warn that the scale of Britain’s welfare bill is “crushing our economy”
Mrs Badenoch will argue that the welfare debate exposes a “fundamental difference” between the Conservatives and Labour, claiming that Labour believes “cutting welfare is always cruel” and that “there’s nothing wrong with a life of dependency”.
She will acknowledge that some sick and disabled people “genuinely cannot work” and will always need a welfare “safety net”.
However, she will warn that the current system risks creating a damaging culture of dependency. “If you tell a young person that their ADHD means they are defective and will never amount to anything, that mindset is likely to be more destructive to their future than the condition itself,” she will say. “That is what our welfare system is currently doing.”
Mrs Badenoch will contrast the Conservatives’ detailed welfare reform proposals with the latest delays to Andy Burnham’s 10-year plan for government, which he first promised in the summer.
“It is too late to work out what you think once you’re in government,” she will say. “If you want to change this country, you need to know exactly what you want to do and how you’re going to do it.”
The new plan, titled Welfare That Works, sets out a series of proposals aimed at curbing the rapidly rising welfare budget.
Among the measures is a plan to cut £4.5 billion from the housing benefit bill, which is forecast to reach £42 billion by the end of the parliament—a £10 billion rise in five years. Payments would be linked to rents in the cheapest 10 per cent of the market, rather than the cheapest 30 per cent.
The proposals also include a back-to-work programme, lifting the cap on apprenticeships and halving employers’ National Insurance payments for workers under 25.
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The Tory document acknowledges that its reforms will face “fierce resistance”, stressing that welfare reform is “not easy”.
But it argues that reform can no longer be postponed.
Shadow welfare secretary Helen Whately said the bill was spiralling “out of control”. She added: “Beveridge’s welfare state was a noble ambition: to stand by those who could not stand on their own. But today’s system has grown far beyond anything he envisaged. A safety net designed for a country emerging from war now funds free cars for people claiming for acne and tennis elbow.”
The Government was forced to abandon plans to cut £5 billion from the welfare bill last year after a revolt by Labour MPs.
The Prime Minister has said he is determined to rein in welfare spending “in a Labour way”, while avoiding “crude cuts”.
Reviews of youth unemployment and disability benefits are expected in the coming weeks. Neither is likely to deliver short-term savings, however, with ministers acknowledging that Alan Milburn’s plan to tackle the youth unemployment crisis is likely to require substantial upfront spending.
Chancellor John Healey has warned that the welfare bill will not be reduced before the election.