Since our last DWP oral questions, I have updated the House on the expansion of our youth employment offer, I have been to an excellent job fair in Glasgow, I have said that the latest unemployment figures show a fall, and last week I went back to university—it was the McDonald's Hamburger University. My Big Mac was not perfect, but I welcome McDonald's as the latest employer to support our youth guarantee. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security and Disability has said that the “right to try” regulations have come into force and, as we have mentioned, we also have the changes on statutory sick pay, which significantly expand coverage and make it available from the first day of employment.

I am happy to ensure that the hon. Member gets a meeting with a Minister from the Department to discuss his constituent’s case.

My hon. Friend is right that we need everyone—not just central Government—to be involved. I would like local authorities, businesses—all of us—to see the youth opportunity challenge as a national endeavour worthy of all our support. I am happy to work with her local authority to try to make it as successful as possible.

The Tories inherited spending on defence at 2.5% of GDP and left office with it lower; they also reduced armed forces size and cut naval vessels significantly. The Labour Government is increasing defence expenditure and reforming welfare, including changes in universal credit and youth employment initiatives.

Face-to-face interviews were normal before the pandemic but collapsed afterwards; previous Government signed off contracts allowing assessors to work from home a year before the election. We are now increasing these interviews for better balance in the benefit system.

A review is in progress to identify approximately 2 25,000 individuals who could have debts cancelled or refunded; if carers allowance was overpaid and should not have been, money will need to be recovered. The issue arose due to incorrect guidance from the previous government which has since been corrected.

The policies that I am advocating are creating opportunity for young people, through offering employers hiring incentives, through promoting youth apprenticeship starts and through the other initiatives that we have set out. We do this because we agree that work is the best answer for young people, and I want to do everything I can to make sure that they have the maximum chance to get work.

Youth hubs are another part of the effort, and the advantage is that we can get the help that the jobcentre can give to where young people are in the community. This also means we can get help to people who are not necessarily signing on for benefits but who are looking for work, and it enables us to give a more flexible response across different services. We hope to expand these hubs to more than 360 locations, where they will be open to all 16 to 24-year-olds, whether or not they are on benefits.

I fundamentally disagree with the perspective of the hon. Gentleman on people who have been here for years, made a contribution and paid their taxes, and then require some help back from a state that they have paid into, sometimes for decades. Not only that, the figure that he uses is a complete conflation and a significant overestimation. He shows his ignorance if he does not understand that it is impossible to suggest that that money has all been paid directly to foreign nationals because the figure that he uses is drawn from the total number of households with a foreign national in them, and many of the individual claimants could in fact be British or Irish citizens.

I have discussed this subject a lot with hon. Members from right across the House, and the issue that the hon. Member raises about transport is raised quite a lot with me. It is important, and I am willing to look at anything that I can do on that front to help people take up available opportunities. We need to bring everything together to give young people the maximum employment opportunities.

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to draw attention to the need for skills for house building. We support those skills through sector-based work academy programmes and last year, the Government announced a £625 million construction skills package to recruit 60,000 workers by 2029.

I welcome the hon. Member's consistent interest in this important topic, and he will know that the SEND reforms have been well received. Our youth guarantee will apply to young people with special educational needs and disabilities, and trailblazers are trying out new approaches.

I thank my hon. Friend and sing a song of praise for the Song School in Southend. He is absolutely right to draw attention to the importance of the creative industries. Our creative industries sector plan provides £380 million of targeted investment, and, as part of the work on the youth guarantee, I was pleased to meet the film and TV industries at Pinewood Studios in January of this year to talk more about the opportunities that they offer young people in our fantastic creative industries sector.

I regularly meet the lead Ministers on disability from all Departments, including the Department for Transport; I know that my colleague there is particularly interested in transport accessibility for disabled people. I would be very happy to pick up with them the point that the hon. Gentleman raises.

I know that the Chair of the Select Committee cares deeply about health inequalities in this country, which are deep seated and long term. As in many areas of our work, I believe that constructive and productive employment is a big part of the answer to tackling inequality and prosperity issues right around the country.

Yes, I will.

Skills and apprenticeships are devolved in Scotland, and I would be happy to talk with her further. However, no specific commitments or actions were mentioned.

Responding to hon. Members' inquiries is important, and I raise that with the Department constantly. The Minister will ensure that specific cases are looked at right away if details are provided.

The hon. Friend is welcome, but no specific commitment was given regarding setting up a youth hub.

The Department prioritises funding in the apprenticeship levy, offers hiring incentives of £2,000 for small businesses taking on apprentices, and fully funds under-25s' apprenticeships through the SME (small to medium-sized enterprises) scheme.

There are lessons to learn from this experience, especially regarding giving adequate notice of changes to the state pension age. The action plan focuses on communication related to state pension age and complaint handling, with collaboration with the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman. The Minister hopes to publish the action plan in the coming months, while also highlighting recent campaigns encouraging people to check their state pension age.

We are increasing the resources available to handle Members’ correspondence, but given the delays that the hon. Gentleman has outlined, if he wants to write to me with those details, I will look into them urgently for him.

I welcome my hon. Friend’s question, and he is absolutely right. We have seen progress in the last 15 years; 23 million employees now save into a pension, and that is restarting the business of workplace pension savings in the UK, but the job is not done. It is not done because of the issue that he raises about the adequacy of the amount saved by those who are saving, and because 45% of working-age adults are saving nothing at all. That is why there has been cross-party consensus that we should bring back the Pensions Commission to look at the question of adequacy, and I am pleased to say that its interim report will be published in the coming months.

There is a three-month period after onset of incapacity or impairment. It aims to ensure long-term incapacity; this matter is devolved in Northern Ireland but usually aligns with England. The hon. Member can have a conversation about this issue.

The steering group aims to deliver a better PIP system. The process was described as 'retraumatising' by someone with multiple sclerosis at a roundtable; the hope is to make it fairer and more humane when reporting recommendations in autumn.

I am very sorry to hear that the system was not properly understood in the case of the hon. Gentleman's constituent. He is absolutely right that there is special treatment for compensation payments of this kind within the universal credit system. I will certainly talk to my officials about ensuring that those arrangements are properly understood in the Department.

As I have said a few times today, I will ensure that my hon. Friend gets a meeting with a Minister. I congratulate him on speaking up for his area and the workers within it.