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Some 39 Labour MPs have signalled they will vote against Sir Keir Starmer’s welfare reforms on Tuesday evening in a tense showdown between the prime minister and his backbenchers despite a £2.5bn U-turn that watered down the package last week.
Starmer’s concessions last Thursday led to the withdrawal of a “reasoned amendment” designed to kill the bill — which had the backing of 126 Labour MPs.
But on Monday evening, Labour MPs tabled a second reasoned amendment with the same intention that quickly garnered 39 signatures from Labour MPs, and a handful from members of other parties.
Rachael Maskell, MP for York Central, said the amendment had been tabled on behalf of deaf and disabled people’s organisations, “giving them a voice in this debate as their agency has not been heard”. She said: “Even loyal MPs who were going to vote for [the government’s reforms] are thinking of abstaining.”
That total could rise over the day, with expectations Tuesday will be a day of frantic last-ditch lobbying of undecided MPs in Westminster.
Some 83 Labour MPs who would probably need to rebel to defeat the bill if all other parties vote against it, given the government’s working majority of 165. The Conservatives, who have said the measures do not go far enough, have said they will vote against the bill.
Ministers still expect to see the biggest rebellion of Starmer’s premiership, eclipsing the 16 who opposed the planning and infrastructure bill earlier this month.
Tony Blair’s biggest rebellion in his first year involved 47 backbenchers, according to Philip Cowley, politics professor at Queen Mary University.
Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds defended the bill on Tuesday, saying it was better “than what we have at present”.
“At the moment we’re spending a lot of money on outcomes that are just not very good,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
Official estimates on Monday showed the revised measures will still push 150,000 people into poverty by restricting access to disability benefits to new applicants.
Talks are ongoing between government whips and Labour MPs, although further concessions before Tuesday’s vote are unlikely, according to people briefed on the discussions.
Liz Kendall, work and pensions secretary, will begin the debate at lunchtime with a vote expected at about 7pm.
Kendall laid out the government’s intentions at the next stage of the bill, including the concessions on Monday, but the proposals still faced heavy criticism from Labour backbenchers, including fears they will create a “two-tier” system with better support for existing claimants.
Starmer is expected to defend the reforms — designed to rein in the ballooning welfare bill while encouraging people back to work — during a cabinet meeting at 9.30am.
The original package was expected to save £4.8bn for taxpayers, but that figure is now more like £2bn after the partial reversal. Chancellor Rachel Reeves will face questions over how she will pay for the U-turn when she faces MPs in the House of Commons in the late morning.
The welfare reforms will make it harder for new applicants to obtain “personal independence payments” (Pip), the main type of disability benefit, although Starmer’s concessions mean the changes will not affect existing beneficiaries.
Debbie Abrahams, a senior Labour MP, told ITV that she would “implore the government to think again” ahead of the vote. “We absolutely recognise these are good concessions, but we’re not quite there yet,” she said.
