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A Labour MP who struggled with mental health disabilities before entering politics has signalled that she intends to rebel against Keir Starmer’s cuts to benefits.
Nadia Whittome, leftwing MP for Nottingham East, told BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme that she “couldn’t look her mum in the eyes” if she voted for the proposals which would save an estimated £5 billion.
But in a sign of deep divisions on the issue, fellow Nottinghamshire Labour MP Jo White from Bassetlaw insisted that changes are essential to incentivise families out of a life of benefits.
Meanwhile, Tory grandee Sir Iain Duncan Smith, who was the last work and pensions secretary to bring serious reform to the welfare system, has warned that Sir Keir will have to use time consuming primary legislation to make the changes he wants – which means he is likely to face a series of rebellions.
Speaking to the Today Programme, Ms Whittome insisted that she was not planning to rebel “for the sake of this”.
Airing the disquiet of a number of her colleagues, she said: “You cannot incentivise people out of sickness.”
She said: “It was wrong when David Cameron cut welfare, it would be wrong for us to do that now. It’s not disabled people who crashed the economy or who are responsible for rising rents or falling living standards. We must not scapegoat them for the failures and the political choices of conservative government.”
She noted that the United Nations has been critical of the UK already for cutting support for the poorest.
But Ms Whittome also spoke of her own experience of needing to be on disability benefits because she suffered from ADHD and PTSD.
“I was on it. My mum had to stop work when I was a teenager to care for me. I represent disabled people, all of us do and we all hear their stories every day and just how scared they are about this, and what a difference these payments make to their lives.
“I can’t look my constituents in the eyes, I can’t look my mum in the eyes, and support this. “It’s my responsibility as a backbench Labour MP to speak out when my party is getting it wrong and we are getting it badly wrong on this.”
Fellow leftwinger and veteran Labour MP Diane Abbott added on X: “So dishonest for ministers to claim they are slashing disability benefits in order to do the disabled a favour. They just want to balance the governments books.”
However, Ms White warned that the benefits system kept families poor for generations because it did not provide incentives for improvement.
She said: “These cuts to welfare would be popular if we are to lift people out of poverty and change the way people live. They need to be in work and I don’t perceive it as a saving. I see it as a moral duty to change people’s lives.
“It’s a generational thing. If families are out of work, they tend to bring up their children to exist on the benefits system and people slide along on that low level of income perhaps dipping into the black market.
“But their aspirations are so low and that the communities do not change and we need to raise skills levels and opportunities and tackling that to the benefit system is absolutely critical.”
Sir Iain, whose introduction of the universal credit and and living wage was the last significant change to welfare, warned Sir Keir he faced problems ahead.
The former Tory leader said: “He will need primary legislation for much of this which will take time and mean he will face rebellions. It is not easy.
“But also you have to wonder why for all that effort he is just hoping to save £5 billion, which is really neither here nor there.”
He added: “Also it is all very well saying people have to go back to work but the changes Rachel Reeves has brought in on national insurance and also making it much harder to employ people part time means that there will be less jobs to go into.
“Most of the people on long term benefits need to go into part time jobs but change on the tax arrangements means there are less of them.”
