Darren Jones ‘clumsy’ to compare benefits to pocket money, says Chancellor

Treasury minister Darren Jones was “clumsy” when he compared cutting benefits to reducing his children’s pocket money, Rachel Reeves has said.

The Chancellor’s deputy sparked outrage on Wednesday for making the comparison as he defended the Government’s cuts to welfare.

The Government’s own impact assessment of the plans warned that some 250,000 people – including 50,000 children – will be pushed into relative poverty by the reforms.

A stricter tests for personal independence payments (Pip), the main benefit for people with disabilities or those with long-term illness to help with extra living costs, is expected to account for the largest amount saved.

At the spring statement, the Chancellor went further, announcing that the universal credit health element – sometimes called incapacity benefits – would be cut by 50% and frozen for new claimants.

Asked if her deputy was right to make the comparison between benefits and pocket money, the Chancellor told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “No, he was clumsy in his analogy, and he’s apologised for that.”

Mr Jones was defending the Government’s plans in light of the impact assessment when he compared the benefits cut to pocket money.

He told the BBC on Wednesday the impact assessment had not accounted for the extra cash available for training for new jobs through the Back to Work programme, as he made the analogy.

Mr Jones said: “Take for example, if I said to my kids, ‘I’m going to cut your pocket money by £10 a week but you have to go and get a Saturday job,’ the impact assessment on that basis would say that my kids were down £10 irrespective of how much they get from their Saturday job.”

The minister later apologised for his remarks.

“I’m sorry about it. It was tactless and it wasn’t well considered,” Mr Jones told ITV’s Peston.