Leading article: Now is the time to tackle the abuses of our welfare system

The present recession provides no excuse for delaying reform

When it comes to the stubborn political challenge of reforming our benefits system, all good ideas are to be welcomed. Yesterday's report by Professor Paul Gregg, commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions, fits that bill.

Professor Gregg argues that there should be a strict requirement for just about everyone claiming benefits to prepare themselves for a return to employment. Only lone parents of very young children, people with severe disabilities and full-time carers should be excused this responsibility.

The Government has already indicated that, by October 2010, lone parents whose youngest child is aged seven or over will have to work. But Professor Gregg is suggesting going still further. He wants lone parents with children who have passed their first birthday to be required to prepare to re-enter employment in exchange for benefits.

The other major proposal in the report is for new, clearer, penalties for those who repeatedly refuse to cooperate with attempts to get them into work, ranging from the withholding of benefits to community service.

Professor Gregg's guiding principle is "conditionality": that everyone should be expected to do something in exchange for benefits. This focus is entirely correct. There is nothing progressive or liberal about allowing hundreds of thousands of able-bodied adults to languish indefinitely on welfare. This is a policy of neglect – and one that that has helped cultivate a terrible poverty of aspiration in too many of our communities.

The Work and Pensions Secretary James Purnell promised to respond by the end of the month. But with Mr Purnell already committed to reducing benefit claimant numbers by one million over the next seven years, these ideas seem likely to receive a receptive hearing. And the Welfare Reform Bill in today's Queen's Speech is expected to contain plans along similar lines.

Yet there is still likely to be a political fight. There exists a hardcore constituency in the parliamentary Labour Party that believes any attempt to reform the welfare system is to "punish the poor". And they have a fresh argument to hand. Because we are entering recession, it is claimed, this is not the time to be tightening the welfare system. Rising unemployment will mean more competition for jobs. Forcing the long-term unemployed into such a market, on pain of withdrawing benefits, is a recipe for disaster.

Though superficially convincing, this argument does not hold water on close inspection. First, the Gregg reforms propose sanctions on those who refuse to actively "prepare" to enter the job market, not those who fail to gain employment through a lack of opportunities. Second, the recession makes the political case for reforming the welfare system more pressing, not less. One of the major costs of this downturn will be spiralling government borrowing and the threat of cuts to vital public services. The £12bn incapacity benefits bill is an obvious and achievable medium-term saving.

Many thousands of people will be made redundant over the coming months through no fault of their own. And they will be desperate to get back into employment. It is for such people that unemployment assistance was designed, not those who, for a variety of reasons, refuse to take jobs. The recession helps illuminate where we have gone wrong as a society. What better time for the Government to embark on a concerted effort to return the welfare system to the humane and efficient principles on which it was established?