Commission for Social Justice: Welfare menu created for Blair's taste: This report falls short of being an independent review. Rather, it is a convenient prop for Labour, argues Norman Fowler

I confess that when I heard Sir Gordon Borrie had been asked to chair an 'independent committee' to review social policy I felt a twinge of envy. Ten years ago, I embarked on a similar exercise. I also gathered outside experts around me. I also took evidence around the country and laboured hard to provide a cogent case for reform.

I, of course, had both the advantage and disadvantage of being a government minister. The advantage was that if I could argue my proposals past my ministerial colleagues and then through Parliament, they would reach the statute book. The disadvantage was that I had to win that argument.

For several months a cabinet committee chaired by Margaret Thatcher pored over the detail. The Treasury protested at the cost and other ministers brought along their departmental briefs, which were not always helpful to my case. At a crucial moment one of my most sensitive proposals was deliberately leaked and a cabinet meeting to approve the proposals was cancelled at the last minute.

I emerged from the process bruised and battered - and I had not even begun the parliamentary process. In the end, much of the original report remained, but some of it perished along the way.

How good, I therefore thought, to be in Sir Gordon's position: to have the freedom to set out what you really feel. No cabinet committee, no Chancellor of the Exchequer, no statement in the House.

Alas, it does not take long to realise that, whatever else, Sir Gordon and his colleagues have not sought to provide an independent assessment. The endorsement on the cover of the report says it all: 'Essential reading for everyone who wants a new way forward for our country' - the words not of some eminent social policy expert, but of Tony Blair.

This is emphatically not a new Beveridge Report. It is a deeply party political document, written as much to reconcile past pledges of the Labour Party as to aid social advance.

Take the basic state pension. For years Labour has advocated the uprating of the pension by earnings, not prices. It has been a flagship policy. Where does it stand now? Well, the Borrie committee certainly agreed that 'an across-the-board increase in the basic pension is expensive'. So it advocates a new pension guarantee which would top up the basic pension and be paid to those on income support. The pension guarantee would then be uprated in line with average net earnings. How the basic pension would be treated is left unclear.

The unspoken truth is that the Borrie committee is constructing an escape route for Labour from one of its most expensive pledges. The pledge is being ditched - and without any clear idea what the new one will cost.

The most obvious question for the Borrie committee is: what is the cost?

For, even given the plentiful supply of fudge, there are also firm proposals in the report. The pension guarantee is one. A new 'modern social insurance system' guided by a minimum income standard is another. Universal pre-school education for three- and four-year-olds and new investment in child care add to the list.

We will not receive any meaningful replies on the cost questions. Both Sir Gordon and Mr Blair will speak in unison. This report is about the principles to be followed, they will say, and should not be confused with the sordid question of how it can be afforded.

So are there any new principles that can be welcomed? There is certainly one. For years Labour's social security spokesmen have spoken about 'targeting help' as if it was the work of the devil. They ignored the inescapable conclusion that it is impossible to provide universal benefits, irrespective of need, in all circumstances. If you try, you end up with inadequate universal benefits - such as the old death grant to which Labour was so attached - and prevent proper help going to those who need it. That was one of the main proposals of my review.

Now, ever so gently so as not to offend anyone, the report accepts the principle. The pension guarantee implicitly accepts that we cannot afford the cost of earnings upratings of pensions for everyone.

But the biggest change of heart comes on child benefit. The conventional wisdom has been that child benefit was a replacement for a tax allowance, and that it would be ironical, not to say wrong, to make it taxable. Now the Borrie commission is prepared to abandon that position on the ground that it sees no case for state help going to wealthy families. It intends to target child benefit on those who need it.

And are there any lessons for the Government? Again, I think there is one.

While Labour agonises, seeking to reconcile the irreconcilable conflicts in its pensions policy, we have the opportunity to act.

Improved occupational pensions and new options such as personal pensions have transformed the financial position of many families living in retirement. But there remains the position of retired people living on just their basic pension. I have long advocated that their position should be improved by a new pension credit scheme. I would keep the basic pension uprated by prices, but for those without the advantage of an occupational scheme or substantial savings I would pay an extra credit.

Perhaps, then, Sir Gordon has provided one useful service, in helping to start a fresh debate on the future of the welfare state and what should be provided by the taxpayer and what by the individual. As for the report, I fear it is little more than a long political menu from which Mr Blair will be able to choose courses when and if he desires.

The writer is Conservative MP for Sutton Coldfield and former Secretary of State for Social Services (1981-87).

(Photograph omitted)