Iain Duncan Smith says Labour use benefits to “buy votes” – as research shows his welfare cuts will hit poor hard

Department for Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith has accused Labour of having “always used benefits as a way of trying to buy votes”. This comes as the free market Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) slammed the Tories’ welfare reforms as “extremely unfair”.

Duncan Smith said that when Labour had raised tax credits, which top up wages for the low paid, it had been for electoral advantage. The DWP minister made his claim as David Cameron announced the Government would be cutting tax credits, and refused to rule out further cuts to disability benefits.

Director general of the right wing leaning IEA Mark Littlewood said that while he supports both reforming tax credits and welfare cuts, current plans “looks set to be extremely unfair on the working-age population”.

Former Tory leader Duncan Smith made the comments in the House of Commons, and said that they wanted to see the cuts to tax credits made up by companies higher wages. Shadow Chancellor Chris Leslie has hit back at this claim, saying: “The Government have a clear choice – will they tackle low pay or will they hit the low paid?”

Unite the Union also attacked the plans to cut the welfare budget by £12 billion. Assistant general secretary Steve Turner said:

“The prime minister says that he wants people to be supported by better paid work – which is an ambition we all have, but the reality is that austerity economics have built a low pay, insecure jobs market where nearly 700,000 are on zero hours contracts and many thousands more on short-hours contracts.”

The Times have this morning called on the Tories to “embrace the living wage” in their leader column (£).