If only this was so similar to what the new Work and Pensions secretary said yesterday. Sounds like the new Con-Lib coalition is stuffing the cabinet the same way Bush did. In this case, the secretary is obviously against any social safety net that might somehow benefit those in need. So do platinum parachutes count too? Here comes the nasty side that we've all been waiting for.
Britain's welfare system is "bust", with such penal disincentives to work that many people on benefits regard those who take up job offers as "bloody morons", Iain Duncan Smith, the new work and pensions secretary, says in a Guardian interview setting out the most ambitious welfare reform plans for a decade.
Duncan Smith says he is to propose to the Treasury a radical scheme that includes simplification of the complex benefits system designed to make it financially worthwhile for unemployed people to work, including in part-time jobs.
He claims that at present it is not worth going from the dole into work if the job pays £15,000 or less. He also suggests that it is an imperative that the state retirement age rises because of growing life expectancy. The coalition agreement published last week said the state retirement age should rise to 66, although it added that this would not happen before 2016 for men and 2020 for women.
