Groups representing the disabled have mixed views on what happened this evening. While Mencap issued a statement welcoming the dropping of the Pip elements of the bill (see 6.43pm), other charities highlight their concerns about what is left in the bill.

Charlotte Gill, head of campaigns and public affairs at the MS Society, said:

The government has been forced to listen to disabled people at the eleventh hour. And that’s thanks to people with MS who have sent thousands of emails, made hundreds of phone calls, and had countless conversations with MPs to make their voices heard.

While we’re relieved that the government are dropping some of their most catastrophic plans for PIP, and committing to a review before any changes go ahead, we still believe this bill risks causing harm to disabled people.

Pushing through cuts to those on Universal Credit who are unable to work is unfair and cruel.

And James Taylor, executive director at disability equality charity Scope, said:

It’s right to consult and engage with disabled people before making sweeping changes to Pip. Changes that would have made hundreds of thousands of claimants worse off. Changes that could have been avoided altogether.

We now need cast-iron confirmation that future reforms will be genuinely co-produced with disabled people, as promised.

However, this bill still includes measures that will strip thousands of pounds in support from disabled people.

Our analysis shows disabled households will face almost £15,000 a year in extra costs by 2030. Under these changes, more than 700,000 future universal credit health claimants would receive on average £3,000 less support each year than claimants do now.

Q: But what is left in the bill?

Kendall claimed there were some “really important changes” to universal credit left in the bill. And the right to try changes were important, she said.

Q: But you made an argument that current welfare spending was unsustainable – and now you’re not going to save any money?

Kendall claimed the measures in the bill would still help to get more people into work, saving the government money.

Q: Haven’t you found out that, even with a whopping majorty, Labour is fundamentally unwilling to reform the welfare state? Your plans are in the skip. They’re dead, they’re buried.

Kendall said reform was important, and Labour was starting to deliver change.

Q: How do you assess the PM’s authority?

Kendall said people are “100% behind a prime minister who secured the first Labour government in 14 years”.

But there are lessons to learn, she said.

Q: What is the key lesson to learn? This has been an unedifying week for the government.

Kendall said welfare reform was always difficult, perhaps particularly for Labour governments.

She said it had been “a bumpy time tonight”, but the party would go forward together.

Chris Mason opened his interview by putting it to Liz Kendall that this process had been shambolic.

Kendall replied:

I wish we had got to this point in a different way, and there are absolutely lessons to learn, but I think it’s really important we’ve passed this bill for second reading. It puts in place some really important reforms to the welfare system.

Q: Is your position tenable? You’ve been humiliated.

Kendall replied:

I think listening is actually a strength in politics, as indeed it is in life, and I’ll continue to listen to colleagues, absolutely.

What was very interesting was how much support there was for the principle of reforming the welfare state, that those who can work should work, but need help to do so, and that we need to protect those who can’t work.

Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, has recorded a pooled interview with Chris Mason, the BBC political editor.

She has ruled out resigning, saying she wants to carry on.

The division list for the second vote is now up on the Commons’ website. It shows that 49 Labour MPs voted against.

The bill has passed by 335 votes to 260 – a majority of 75.

Here are the numbers of MPs from each party voting for the Rachael Maskell amendment.

Alliance: 1

DUP: 4

Greens: 4

Independents: 10

Labour: 42

Lib Dems: 70

Plaid Cymru: 4

Reform UK: 4

SNP: 9

TUV: 1

UUP: 1

The Conservatives abstained on this vote.

The government has won this easily. The rebel amendment to kill off the bill has been defeated by 328 votes to 149 – a majority of 179.

Paul Holmes (Con) says the bill was originally meant to save £5bn a year, and that went down to £2.5bn. How much will it save now?

Timms says that will be set out in future in the usual way.

Barry Gardner (Lab) asks again the question John McDonnell asked (see 6.50pm) – will any changes to Pip being made as a result of the Timms review be made in primary legislation or secondary legislation? He says this is important because MPs can amend primary legislation, but not secondary legislation.

Timms says ministers will need to await the outcome of the review before they can answer that.

Peter Lamb (Lab) says he was planning to vote against the bill today. He says he is delighted the Pip plans are being dropped. But he asks for an assurance that the Timms review is not be carried out in “a spending envelope”.

Timms replies:

The review is not intended to save money. That is not the purpose of the review. The review is to get the assessment right and to make sure we’ve got an assessment which will for the future.

Stephen Timms, the welfare minister, is winding up for the government now.

Asked to confirm that clause five will be removed from the bill, he says he can confirm that is the case.

And the parallel provisions for Northern Ireland will be taken out too (section 4 of schedule 2).

In the Commons Helen Whately, the shadow work and pensions secretary, was winding up for the Tories. She said the bill had now “more or less disintegrated”.

UPDATE: And in a press release Whately said:

The economic credibility of this government has collapsed. Labour have abandoned their flagship welfare reforms with a Bill which now achieves nothing.

In an act of cowardice, Keir Starmer has put Party before country. He cannot take the tough decisions necessary. And he has landed his Chancellor with another £2 billion blackhole to fill. This is surely the beginning of the end for Rachel Reeves. This matters because failure to act means we will all be left paying the price.

This table shows to extent to which the four-point Pip eligibility rule was crucial to the Treasury being able to use the measures in the welfare bill to save money. It is the table in the Treasury’s spring statement document with the scorecard for the savings in the welfare reform package.

Kemi Badenoch has accused the government of “utter capitulation”. She says:

This is an utter capitulation. Labour’s welfare bill is now a TOTAL waste of time. It effectively saves £0, helps no one into work, and does NOT control spending.

It’s pointless. They should bin it, do their homework, and come back with something serious. Starmer cannot govern.

Labour MPs opposed to the welfare bill are again calling for the welfare bill to be abandoned. The shambolic nature of the Timms concession (see 5.40pm) is being cited as a reason why the case for dropping the bill is even stronger.

This is from Nadia Whittome, a leftwinger who has been strongly critical of the bill.

This is a complete mess. The government is promising new changes, new concessions, 90 minutes before MPs vote.

None of this is written down. The Bill we are voting on tonight is unamended.

This is an unacceptable way of making laws. Just pull the Bill.

And this is from Cat Eccles, another critic of the bill.

Minister Timms intervened mid debate to announce he’s pulling Clause 5 (PIP clause) from the Bill at Committee. So why are we still debating and voting?
This isn’t how we make legislation. Pull the Bill.

And this is from Bell Ribeiro-Addy, another leftwinger.

This legislation will have life-altering consequences for disabled people.

Briefing last-minute changes without time to debate, scrutinise and consider the effects shows desperation to rush it through and disregard for those impacted.

Even now, we still have time to scrap it.

Here is the Commons library briefing on the bill. It explains what all parts of the bill do. All the elements relating to Pip are in clause five, and without clause five, this bill will not affect Pip eligibility – now or in the future.

The DWP may have an aspiration still to impose the four-point rule for Pip eligibility. But it has, in effect, delegated that decision to the Timms review, and if, as it say, that review is going go genuinely be co-produced with disabled people, then it is very hard to see the four-point rule being revived.

And here is the text of the bill itself.

Although this is the bill that will pass tonight, if MPs vote in favour, the Timms announcement means that, with clause five removed, all that will be left will be a bill affecting universal credit.

In the Commons Anna Dixon (Lab) has just intervened to say the Timms review should be brought forward.

Andrew Pakes (Lab), who has the floor, says he agrees. He says he would like to see Duracell batteries inserted into the review.

At this point Stephen Timms, the social security and disability minister, intervenes, to make the concession reported earlier. (See 5.18pm.)

He says:

I want to make this point to [Pakes] that he and others across the house during this debate have raised concerns that the changes to Pip are coming ahead of the conclusions of the review of the assessment that I will be leading.

We have heard those concerns, and that is why I can announce that we are going to remove the clause five from the bill at committee, that we will move straight to the wider review, sometimes referred to as the Timms review, and only make changes to Pip eligibility, activities and descriptors following that review.

The government is committed to concluding the review by the autumn of next year.

That is another big concession. It has two implications.

It means there is a chance that new Pip eligibility rules will not come into force in November 2026. (The government said it wanted the Timms review to report in the autumn of next year, and that it would implement its recommendations as quickly as possible, but legislating for welfare reforms is never quick.)

Much more importantly, it means that the switch to the four-point Pip eligibility rule may never happen at all. It won’t be in the legislation. And there is no guarantee the Timms review will revive the idea – certainly if it is genuinely “co-produced” with disabled people, as the government promises. The four-point rule was the key instrument that was meant to deliver the £2.5bn savings that, this morning, the Treasury was still hoping to achieve. (It was £5bn savings until last week’s concessions.)

This means MPs are set to pass a bill that won’t necessarily deliver anything like the level of cuts originally planned. It is a huge win for those campaigning against it.

Keir Starmer is set to offer Labour backbenchers a further concession over disability benefits in a last-ditch attempt to limit the largest rebellion of his premiership and get his controversial welfare bill over the line, Jessica Elgot and Pippa Crerar report.

Vicky Foxcroft, who resigned as a Labour whip over the bill, started her speech by saying she welcomed the positive aspects in the bill.

But she had some concerns that still needed to be addressed, she said. She went on:

We need the Timms review to report before the new system is rolled out.

She said disabled people want reform of the benefits system. But they did not want these plans, she said. They should have been consulted from the start.

And she said she wanted to clarify what she meant by co-production. This was a concept that went back to the US civil rights movement, she said. It was developed by by Sherry Arnstein in 1969, she said. She went on:

It should be in place from the start of the process, and all the information should be made available to everyone, and a plan should be agreed together. And there must be the ability to bring in experts. And these experts should be paid for because of their contribution, and treated as valued partners. We should be empowering and upskilling those involved. And I hope that it goes without saying all information should be available in accessible formats, and the valued partners need to be user-led disabled people’s organisations.

At the afternoon lobby briefing Downing Street refused to rule out further concessions on the welfare bill. Asked about this, a No 10 spokesperson said:

I’m not going to get ahead of the vote. There’s a debate going on in Parliament as we speak, and I’m not going to get ahead of the vote this evening.

There’s been a number of discussions over recent days but as I say I’m just not going to get ahead of the vote this evening.

Meg Hillier, the Labour chair of the Commons Treasury committee who tabled the original reasoned amendment to kill off the bill, but who has been won over buy the concessions, said that a week ago people currently getting Pip were worried that they could lose their benefit when they get reassessed. As a result of the government’s changes, that threat has been lifted, she said.

And she said the co-production of the Timms review with disabled people could lead to “profound change”.

She urged colleagues to back the government.

I would always rather see a Labour government. Divided parties don’t hold power, divided parties don’t hold government.

If we want to see our values played out in this country, I think we need to vote for this today.

There is still a lot to do, the Timms review to take place, but major changes were made last week that have significantly altered this bill in a short space of time.

I think we bank that and continue to fight with the passion that members have demonstrated today for the rights of disabled people.

Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader, has said he is voting against the welfare bill.

Confusingly, the Conservatives have criticised Reform for this – even though they are also voting against the bill.

In a statement issued by CCHQ, Mel Stride, the shadow chancellor, said:

Voting against Labour’s chaotic welfare proposals is no substitute for a proper plan for welfare reform.

Reform have shown they are simply not serious about getting the welfare bill down. Their policy of scrapping the two-child limit would cost taxpayers £3.5bn a year.

Farage’s fantasy economics will leave hardworking families paying the price.

Keir Starmer has approved a further concession to the Labour rebels, Jessica Elgot reports on Bluesky.

NEW - I understand another concession to rebel MPs is possible to shore up the welfare bill.

Likely to be linked to concerns around the Timms review which is one of the key remaining issues MPs have.

Still major anxiety about this bill, especially with abstentions

Stephen Timms, the social security and disability minister, is winding up the debate. If there is a further concession before the vote, that is when it will be announced.

Arj Singh from the i has heard something similar. He has posted this.

🚨Exc: ANOTHER welfare concession is being discussed with Labour rebel MPs including in crisis talks with Angela Rayner

Two Labour MPs say a plan to change the eligibility criteria for PIP may be delayed until after Timms review

Rebecca Long-Bailey, who was runner up in the leadership contest won by Keir Starmer,

She says countries are judged by how they treat the most vulnerable.

We all know the famous quote, ‘The true measure of any society can be found by how it treats its most vulnerable members.’ It’s a litmus test, really, for the morality and integrity of our country’s values.

Sadly, in recent years, the United Nations has already twice reported on the conditions for disabled people in the UK, finding that there were grave and systematic violations of human rights, and sadly, the bill as it stands today will worsen this situation.

She says the welfare system needs reform. But these proposals have not been subject to proper consultation, she says. And she says there are alternative ways of finding the money.

The sad thing is, is that there are alternatives: introduce higher taxes on extreme wealth; end the stealth subsidies for banks; tax gambling fairly and properly. The list of alternatives is endless.

She ends urging ministers to “pull back from the brink now before it’s too late”.

Lindsay Hoyle calls Steve Darling, the Lib Dem work and pensions spokesperson. And he said that, after Darling has finished, he will impose a six-minute limit on on speeches.

Darling says the Lib Dems are supporting the Maskell amendment.

He says some of the comments from Labour high command about the bill, such as Keir Starmer’s reference to “noises off”, have been concerning.

And he says it is “shameful” the way the bill is being rushed through. “We all know that rushed bills are poor bills,” he says.

He says he is particularly concerned that the bill will create a “two-tier system”, with existing claimants getting more generous benefits than new claimants.

This two-tier approach to this system is wrong, and I and the Liberal Democrats have grave concerns that this is unBritish, it’s unjust …

We’ve heard from the minister saying it’s been done before. But that doesn’t make it right. It is almost Orwellian that we will be having a system where in our law, we say that all disabled people are equal, but some are more equal than others.

Rachael Maskell, the Labour MP who has tabled the rebel amendment, is speaking now.

She says 138 deaf and disabled people’s organisations have backed the reasoned amendments that would kill the bill.

She recalls a constituent visiting her, with his young daughter. He could not work because of his mental health condition. He said, if is benefits were cut, “it would be better that I wasn’t here”.

She says people with fluctuating conditions are particularly worried.

(Liz Kendall tried to address this point earlier – see 2.01pm.) She goes on:

These Dickensian cuts belong to a different era and a different party.

They are far from what this Labour party is for – a party to protect the poor, as is my purpose for I am my brother’s keeper, these are my constituents, my neighbours, my community, my responsibility, and I cannot cross by on the other side for one, let alone for the 150,000 who will be pushed further into poverty.

Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, is responding for her party.

She started by saying

We are staring down the barrel of a crisis that no serious government can ignore. The welfare system no longer works as it should. What was once a safety net has become a trap, a system designed to protect the most vulnerable is now encouraging dependency and dragging this country into deeper debt.

She accused Liz Kendall of perpetrating the “fiction that all of this was caused by the last government”.

The last government reformed welfare by introducing universal credit, she said.

UPDATE: Badenoch said:

By 2030, on this government’s spending plans, we will hit £100bn on health and disability benefits alone, that is more than what we spend on defence, and this should make everyone in this House stop and think, because this bill does nothing to fix that problem, and that is why we cannot support it.

The Conservative party are the only party in this house urging restraint, and unless this house acts … they will bankrupt our children. They will bury the next generation under a mountain of borrowing and debt, and they will do it, not because we had no choice, but because they lacked the courage to choose.

A fundamental and serious programme to reform our welfare system is required, and this bill is not it. This bill is a fudge, and I feel sorry for [Kendall], she looks as if she’s being tortured.

We all know why this is happening, this is a rushed attempt to plug the chancellor’s fiscal hole. It is driven not by principle but by panic. The changes were forced through not because they get more people into work, but because someone in 11 Downing Street made a mistake.

Kendall says the government wants to complete the Timms review by next autumn. And after that its recommendations will be implemented “as soon as is practically possible via primary or secondary legislation”.

And she says that, once those recommendations are in place, any people already getting Pip can ask for a reassessment.

(That means, if the Timms rules are more generous than the rules coming in in November 2026, people can migrate to the Timms rules by asking for a review of their case. This point in part addresses the “three-tier system” claim made yesterday.)

Kendall confirms that the government has abandoned the original plans to apply the new Pip eligibility rules to existing claimants.

Clive Betts (Lab) asks why the government is changing the eligility rules in November 2026, when the Timms review of the Pip assessment may not have finished.

Kendall says she will cover that in a moment.

Toby Perkins (Lab) asks Kendall to give more detail of the Timms review.

Kendall says it will be co-produced with disabled people. She says she has been a longstanding champion of co-production.

She says protecting existing claimants, while changing the rules in future, “strikes the right balance”.

She says any existing Pip claimant will be reassessed under the currrent rules wheneveer their claim is reviewed.

In response to an intervention from Jim Shannon, a DUP MP, Kendall says that, even if a Pip claimant has a fluctuating condition, they can still qualify as being covered by the severe conditions criteria, which applies to people whose disability is so bad they can never go back to work. Under the bill, people in this group will not face regular reassessments.

Polly Billington (Lab) intervenes, asking about the poverty figures published yesterday. They do not take into account the impact of employment measures. Will the government publish a fresh assessment taking into account the impact those programmes will have.

Kendall says there is evidence that the government’s employment programmes work. She says before the committee stage next Wednesday she publish “further updated impact assessments … spelling this out in more detail”.

Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, is opening the debate.

She starts by making the case for getting more sick and disabled people back into work.

The debate on the UC and Pip bill – or welfare bill, as some are calling it – is starting.

Lindsay Hoyle says he has selected the reasoned amendment tabled by Rachael Maskell.

That means it will be put to a vote at 7pm.

If it passes, the bill will fall.

If government MPs vote it down, there will then be a vote on the main motion, that the bill gets a second reading.

Keir Starmer has defended his government’s record over its first year in office at cabinet, PA Media reports. PA says:

The prime minister insisted at a meeting of senior ministers that his team could look back with a “real sense of pride and achievement” as the 5 July anniversary of his first year in office nears.

The government’s work has focused on giving working people a “chance to thrive, not just survive”, a Downing Street spokesperson said, as Labour backbenchers continue to threaten a rebellion over welfare reforms they insist will have a negative impact on disabled people.

The welfare reform bill will have its first airing in the Commons today and some Labour backbenchers continue to say they will vote to halt the legislation, after a much larger rebellion was quelled by ministers last week.

Starmer opened the cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning by telling senior ministers the welfare reforms are “designed to help those who can work into employment and ensure dignity and security for those who can’t work”, a No 10 spokesperson said.

“He then reflected on the last year in office, saying we could all rightly look back with a real sense of pride and achievement,” the spokesperson added.

No 10 pointed to the three trade deals struck with India, the US, and the EU, the extra investment in the spending review, and a cut in NHS waiting lists among the government’s achievements one year on.

The spokesperson added: “He said the government’s work is all designed and focused on improving the lives of working people and giving them the chance to thrive, not just survive, and the government should be proud of those achievements as a team.”

In the comments some readers have been asking about the timetable for the passage of the bill. Someone posted this.

Some who’ll vote today have made it clear they won’t oppose unless the committee stage doesn’t respond to concerns. A rushed third reading is unlikely. If the Lords are clever and send back mild amendments delaying minor parts of it the government could be in trouble if they rush late votes.

But in fact a rushed third reading is what is exactly what is going to happen. The government has announced that, after tonight’s second reading (assuming it passes), the remaining stages of the bill (committee of the whole house and third reading) will happen on Wednesday next week.

After that, the bill will go to the Lords. But the bill has been designated as a “money bill”, and that means peers are supposed to fast-track it, without trying to re-write it. That is because of the convention that the Commons has total primacy over financial legislation.

This means there is little or no scope for parliamentarians to amend the bill after today – beyond the amendments that the government has already said it will pass next Wednesday to implment the concessions announced last week.

YouGov has published some new polling on the government’s sickness and disability benefit cuts. It was carried out on Thursday and Friday last week, with the polling starting before the government’s U-turn was announced.

Overall, people opposed the cuts by 40% to 26%. Only Conservative supporters were in favour – even though in parliament the Tories are voting against.

People are particularly opposed to cuts to benefits for disabled people unable to work, the poll suggests.

But the poll also suggests that the public are divided over whether people should be able to claim disability benefits for mental health conditions. The rise in mental health-related claims accounts for more than half the increase in disability claims, research shows.

YouGov found 44% of people generally or wholly opposed to these claims being allowed, with 49% generally or wholly in favour.

Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has defended the government’s record on support for sick and disabled people.

Speaking during Treasury questions in response to a question from Rachael Maskell, who has tabled what is now the Labour reasoned amendment to kill off the bill (see 9.08am and 9.22am), Reeves said:

The government is committed to ensuring that there are fewer sick and disabled people in poverty by helping them into work and getting them off NHS waiting lists.

That is why at the spring statement, we announced the largest investment in employment support in at least a generation. The government has already taken action to tackle poverty including with the fair repayment rate, which lowers the cap on deductions in universal credit.

And we’ve increased the national living wage by 6.7%.

Beyond this, we’re investing to reduce poverty by expanding free school meals, investing in a £1bn settlement for crisis support, and we’ll be setting out our child poverty strategy in the autumn. We’ve invested £29bn in reducing NHS waiting lists, and since taking office, there are 385,000 more people in work.

This is from Pippa Crerar, the Guardian’s political editor, with her latest take on the state of play ahead of the start of the debate on the UC and Pip bill.

Meg Hillier, who tabled the original wrecking amendment to welfare bill, confirms she’ll now vote for it.

“I’ve not always been happy about how No 10 has engaged with MPs in general, but on this they acted in good faith: listened, made an offer and honoured it,” she tells @guardian

Her view reflects that of a chunk of former rebels, while others say they’ll hold their noses to back it at second reading, and try to tweak at later stages.

Of those who’ve already decided to vote against, around 40 have signed Rachel Maskell’s new amendment. Rebel leaders say others are expected to join them in voting lobbies, but not to sign.

But many MPs are yet to make up their minds, and want to hear what Liz Kendall has to say today, after despatch box appearance y’day which made things worse.

Some of them are considering abstaining - which could upend the parliamentary maths. But they’re haunted by criticism of Labour MP who followed Harriet Harman’s whip in 2015 and didn’t vote against Tory welfare bill (they abstained).

“People are in turmoil,” one Labour MP tells me. At this stage, it feels like the government will get its welfare bill through second reading. Just. But it’s not in the bag and today will make all the difference.

The vote tonight is likely to set some sort of record – if only for the biggest parliamentary rebellion during Keir Starmer’s first year in office. Philip Cowley, the politics professor and expert on Commons voting, has compiled this list of previous benchmarks to provide some benchmarks against which tonight’s revolt can be judged. He says:

16 – is the largest backbench rebellion Starmer’s whips have seen so far, earlier this month during the passage of the planning and infrastructure bill.

47 – was the largest rebellion in Tony Blair’s first year, over lone parent benefit.

67 – was the largest rebellion in Tony Blair’s first parliament, over incapacity benefit.

72 – is the largest rebellion by Labour MP at the second reading of their governments’ bills, a record shared by votes in 1947 (national service) and 2004 (university fees)

91 – is both the largest rebellion in the first year of any government since the war (a 1975 vote over the civil list) and the largest rebellion by government MPs at the second reading of any bill since 1945 (House of Lords reform, in 2012)

139 – is the largest backbench rebellion of any governing party since the Corn Laws (Iraq, 2003)

In terms of subject matter, the Blair-era revolts over incapacity benefit reform were closest to what is happening today. Incapacity benefit was a sickness benefit that was replaced by employment and support allowance, which now for some claimants has been replaced by universal credit – covered by today’s bill. Here is the Guardian report of the vote where 67 Labour MPs rebelled against Tony Blair in May 1999.

That revolt carried on into the autumn of 1999. Here is another report from the time about Blair’s efforts to reform incapacity benefit. You will see that a lot of the arguments have echoes of what is happening today.

Ministers have launched a review of parental leave and pay as Labour considers ways to make paternity leave and unpaid parental leave day-one rights, Aletha Adu reports.

Commenting on the review this morning, Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, said:

It’s been decades since there’s been a comprehensive review of parental leave in the UK. I recognise it’s got to be proportionate. We’ve got to have the business voice as part of that, but I think what we have at the minute, there are eight different types of parental leave – it’s confusing, even for businesses. They don’t know what they should be offering or what they need to be doing.

Downing Street has “listened” and “honoured” the promises it made on changes to the welfare bill, one of the key rebels, Meg Hillier, has said, saying she would vote for the bill later today. Jessica Elgot has the story.

Here is the full text of Rachael Maskell’s reasoned amendment to kill the UC and Pip bill (see 9.08am), which has been signed by 39 Labour MPs.

That this house, whilst noting the need for the reform of the social security system, and agreeing with the government’s principles for providing support to people into work and protecting people who cannot work, declines to give a second reading to the universal credit and personal independent payment bill because its provisions have not been subject to a formal consultation with disabled people, or co-produced with them, or their carers; because the Office for Budget Responsibility is not due to publish its analysis of the employment impact of these reforms until the autumn of 2025; because the majority of the additional employment support funding will not be in place until the end of the decade; because while acknowledging protection for current claimants, the government has yet to produce its own impact assessment on the impact of future claimants of personal independence payment (Pip) and universal credit limited capability for work and related activity and the number of people, including children, who will fall into poverty or experience worsening mental or physical health as a result, nor how many carers will lose carers allowance; because the government has not published an assessment of the impact of these reforms on health or care needs; and because the government is still awaiting the findings of the minister for social security and disability’s review into the assessment for Pip and Sir Charlie Mayfield’s independent review into the role of employers and government in boosting the employment of disabled people and people with long-term health conditions.

The Liberals Democrats, the SNP, the Greens and the Independent Alliance have also tabled their own reasoned amendments against the bill. They are on the order paper.

Good morning. Keir Starmer faces the toughest Commons challenge of his premiership this evening when MPs vote on the universal credit (UC) and personal independence payment (Pip) bill with all commentators confident he will fact a big revolt. He is expected to win – but, on this point, the Westminster commentariat isn’t 100% confident; it looks very tight.

Governments almost never lose votes and there are good reasons for this. One is that they normally have a majority. (Starmer’s working majority is 165.) But the main reason is that the one person who normally has the best intelligence as to how the vote will go is the government chief whip (Alan Campbell in this administration) and if the chief whip isn’t confident that they have the numbers, ministers will offer last-minute concessions. Starmer has already offered concessions worth around £3.3bn on this bill, but there’s a good chance we might get more during the debate – perhaps relating to when the new Pip rules recommended by the Stephen Timms review next year will start applying.

So Starmer should win. But he has not won yet, and this morning there is fresh evidence that it is going to be very close.

Meg Hillier, the Labour chair of the Treasury committee, has withdrawn the reasoned amendment to kill the bill that was signed by more than 120 Labour MPs. But overnight Rachael Maskell has tabled another, very similar reasoned amendment that would have the same effect. It has been signed by 39 Labour MPs – not enough to overturn Starmer’s majority on their own – but in an interview on BBC Breakfast this morning she claimed that “loads more” Labour MPs supported her. When it was put to her that 39 Labour MPs was not enough, she replied:

There are loads more, loads more … I engaged with so many people yesterday that were saying, ‘I’m not signing a reasoned amendment, but I am voting down the bill.’

There is no guarantee that Maskell’s reasoned amendment will be called. If the Conservative party had tabled one, that would normally have taken precedent, but they haven’t. The Speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, could decide to call none of the reasoned amendment, and just go straight to a yes/no vote on the bill. But that would not make much difference, because all the Labour MPs who would vote for Maskell’s amendment would presumably vote against the bill too.

This morning Sam Coates, the Sky News deputy political editor, told his Politics at Sam and Anne’s podcast that one of the rebels told him last night that they expected 68 Labour MPs to vote against the bill, with 30/40 abstentions. Coates said 68 votes against, and 30 abstentions, would wipe out Starmer’s majority by one. That was not necessarily the expected outcome, Coates said, because things could change during the day.

And in their London Playbook briefing for Politico, Sam Blewett and Bethany Dawson report on this exchange with a Labour official.

Cool heads are not prevailing: One Labour official texted POLITICO’s Dan Bloom last night: “The heat has clearly gotten to the PLP — who are about to shoot themselves in the head and then attempt to blame the same people who got them elected for blood being everywhere.”

Here is our overnight story by Jessica Elgot and Pippa Crerar.

Here is the agenda for the day.

9.30am: Keir Starmer chairs cabinet.

11.30am: Rachel Reeves, chancellor, takes questions in the Commons.

Noon: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

After 12.30pm: Liz Kendall, work and pensions secretary, opens the debate on the UC and Pip bill.

7pm: MPs vote on the bill.

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