As the Chancellor sets out his plans for the nation’s economy, a benefits warning looms, with the OBR forecasting unemployment will rise to 5.1 per cent in 2027.
Britain’s ballooning benefits bill will also reach an eye-watering £431billion by the end of the decade.
Mr Healey is now looking to cut welfare spending in a “Labour way” but stressed welfare reforms would be introduced early next year following the Milburn and Timms reviews into the worklessness crisis.
Mr Healey said: “When it comes to welfare, the last Conservative government left a broken system which we are changing.
“Bringing back face-to-face assessments, rebalancing Universal Credit so it doesn’t force people to label themselves too sick to work, reforming Motability, and clamping down on those living abroad to access a UK state pension on the cheap.
“But there is more to do. I refuse to write off a million young people, like the last Conservative government. I refuse to see disabled people suffer the indignities of a system that has been found ‘not fit for purpose’.
“And I refuse to allow the burden of paying for this failing system to fall on taxpayers for decades to come.
“As the Prime Minister and I have both said, we will bring down the welfare bill, and we will do it in a Labour way.”
Meanwhile, the yield on 10-year UK gilts, a benchmark for what the Treasury pays to borrow money, fell from 5.35 per cent to 5.32 per cent after the Chancellor spoke.