PARLIAMENTARY EARLY DAY MOTION
ESA WORK-RELATED ACTIVITY (4 July 2017)

That this House notes with concern the findings of the Trussell Trust report Financial insecurity, food insecurity, and disability: The profile of people receiving emergency food assistance from The Trussell Trust Foodbank Network in Britain, published in June 2017, which show that 78 per cent of households surveyed were severely food insecure and that 50 per cent had gone without heating for more than four days in the last 12 months; further notes the findings of the report that that almost three times more households who were in the employment and support allowance (ESA) Work-Related Activity group were among food bank users than was the case among claimants in the general population; praises the hard work of food bank volunteers at the Trussell Trust and other food banks across the UK; believes that the cutting of the ESA Work-Related Activity component for new claimants after April 2017 will push more ESA claimants into poverty at a time of rising inflation; notes figures from the IFS in March 2017 that ESA claimants impacted by this change will lose up to £1,500 a year as a result; strongly condemns the Government's position that the abolition of the ESA Work-Related Activity component provides the right incentives for ESA claimants to move into work; and calls on the Government immediately to reverse this cut and reinstate the ESA Work-Related Activity component to ESA as a matter of urgency.

Sponsored by:
Neil Gray (Scottish National Party)