David Cameron defends welfare changes which he says will encourage well paid work
Business for Britain report calls for bigger changes to relationship if UK is to stay in the EU
Iain Duncan Smith faces regular questions in the House of Commons
Labour MP Madeleine Moon tells the House there is "huge fear out there" among disabled people about further cuts to disability benefits.
Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith says disabled people have "no reason [to] be fearful" of the government's plans to cut the welfare bill. He says he will make sure those with disabilities will be "treated with the utmost kindness and the utmost support".
The Daily Politics
There is a war raging on the streets of London, Birmingham, Manchester and other big cities between the black cabbie and Uber, which allows travellers to hail a ride through a mobile phone app.
Daily Politics reporter Ellie Price took to the streets of London with the mood box - an unscientific test with a plastic box and balls - to see what the public had to say about the rivals.
House of Commons
Parliament
In a question about personal independence payments (PIPs), SNP MP Alan Brown says he is concerned about the waiting times for those making claims following the High Court ruling that a delay to two disabled people was unlawful .
Work and Pensions Minister Justin Tomlinson says that most people applying for the payment currently wait only five weeks for an assessment. He says the backlog has been falling month on month since August 2014.
Conservative Philip Hollobone tells the House that his constituent wrote to him to tell him his PIP assessment was totally completed in three weeks and asks: "Is this a record?"
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Image source, GettyA bit more on the return, sort of, of #CallClegg.According to the Guardian,, externalit actually won't be a phone-in - instead, LBC presenter Nick Ferrari will interview the former deputy prime minister for half an hour. Nevertheless, we'll be tuning in...
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House of Commons
Parliament
The first item of business in the Commons today is questions to the Work and Pensions Secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, and his ministerial team.
Question topics are expected to include pensions, personal independence payments and the employment rate of disabled people.
The final section of the hour-long session will be for topical questions.
The Daily Politics
Labour has to "offer something different" and "can't just define ourselves by our opposition to the Tories" said Ken Macintosh. The candidate to be the next Scottish leader claimed the "SNP have copied our policies" but Labour should be willing to work with them.
He is not in favour of a separate Scottish Labour Party, but wants all decisions about the party north of the border to be taken in Scotland.
Watch his Daily Politics interviewWatch last week's Daily Politics interview with his rival for the job Kezia Dugdale
Nick Robinson
Political editor
Taking cash away from people who've yet to receive it by cancelling future entitlements or increases is usually easy to do, particularly when inflation is low and when real wages and the minimum wage are rising. What really hurts - people and governments - is taking cash away from families which have already got it. Read the rest of Nick's blog.
My colleague Gavin Stamp has put together a very helpful breakdown of exactly where the welfare budget is spent, what is already protected and what remains for George Osborne to cut. Check it out.
Image source, PAThe unions are unimpressed with the prospect of cuts to tax credits.
TUC general secretary Frances O'Grady said:
Quote MessageToday the government has smashed the myth that it is the party for blue-collar workers. Tax credits play a vital role in making sure the UK's working families are better off in work. Cutting this crucial benefit will consign millions of hard-working families and their children to living on the poverty line. "
Unite assistant general secretary Steve Turner said:
Quote MessageThe prime minister has confirmed that this is the government that kicks low-waged workers, despite his rhetoric, when he ought to be offering them a helping hand. With £1,400 set to be wiped off the incomes of the poorest-paid thanks to Osborne's cuts mania that Cameron didn't choose to focus on, people will be worried sick about how they will cope with this latest government attack."
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BBC News Channel
BBC chief political correspondent Vicki Young says the Conservatives have been clear that they want to scale back the welfare bill - by cutting £12bn from the £220bn from the budget. But we don't know where those cuts will fall, so it's a matter of "reading between the lines", she says - adding that most people think that tax credits and child tax credits will be in the firing line.
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An apt entry given the last tweet we posted. Politics professors Tim Bale and Paul Webb say people should forget what bookmakers and journalists are saying about the Labour leadership, as "our poll of party members finds it all too close to call". More here., external
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The Green Party has hit out at David Cameron's welfare speech, accusing the government of "kicking people when they are down".
Its work and pensions spokesman, Jonathan Bartley, said spending cuts would "plunge more people into destitution, remove vital support and create additional costs elsewhere".
Quote MessageThe Conservative war on welfare is incoherent, misguided and based on ideology rather than reality. Welfare is an investment which helps people to build a decent life, not something that 'papers over the cracks with a veneer of fairness'. The social security of millions is being threatened in a way we haven't seen since the modern welfare state was set up."
Here's a round-up of the main political developments today:
- David Cameron has promised an end to what he called the "ridiculous merry-go-round" of taxing low earners then handing them money back in benefits
- Some peacekeeping missions are to be counted as defence spending for the first time, the BBC has learned.
- A business lobby group has called for the PM to push for Britain to leave the EU unless other leaders agree to a "special deal" for the UK
- Union leaders have warned that thousands of foreign nurses working in junior posts in the UK could be forced to return home under new immigration rules
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