To be fair to the chancellor and her close colleague Liz Kendall, secretary of state for work and pensions, this cannot be what either of them joined the Labour Party to do – and it was clearly not why their party won the general election last July.
Yet all the signs are that the social security budget is simply too large a target for it to be ignored as the Treasury looks for savings in government expenditure. The briefings from government have been unmistakable and fairly obvious attempts to “roll the pitch” for cuts. Ms Kendall has for some months been talking about getting people on long-term sickness and disability benefits back to work.
