Liam Byrne is calling for cross-party talks to 'fix' Universal Credit
Iain Duncan Smith's flagship welfare programmes have gone so badly wrong they are set to cost taxpayers £1.4bn, his Labour shadow is to claim.
Liam Byrne will say the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is in "chaos" with schemes such as Universal Credit and Youth Contract going over budget.
Mr Duncan Smith firmly rejected his claims of overspend and waste.
"This is just a last ditch attempt by Liam Byrne to keep his job in the shadow cabinet," a spokesman said.
In a speech to Chance UK, an "early intervention" charity that provides mentors to troubled youngsters, Mr Byrne will accuse the Work and Pensions Secretary of breaking his promise to deliver a "welfare revolution" and of presiding over a department which has lost control of its finances.
'Basic delivery'"Nobody wants to see a department that can't get the basics right - but that doesn't mean we can run away from the problem," he will say.
"And there is no escaping the fact the government's failure will end up costing the taxpayer a staggering £1.4bn by the end of this Parliament."
He said Labour would bring "social security spending" under control and "tackle these delivery problems head on, before they eat up even more public money".
"Because three years into this government, their promised welfare revolution has collapsed because of a failure in basic delivery," he will add.
Mr Byrne will set out a string of DWP projects he claims are out of control.
These include the Youth Contract, which provides apprenticeships and work experience for unemployed 18- to 25-year-olds. which he will claim is set to cost taxpayers an extra £457m in 2014-15.
The DWP said the way Mr Byrne had calculated the figure, by counting unused wage incentive payments as Jobseeker's allowance, was "ludicrous", as not all young people on the scheme needed such payments.
'Aggressive agenda'The DWP also rejected Mr Byrne's claim that "waste" will cost taxpayers an extra £140m between 2010-11 and 2011-12, saying it was also a problem under Labour.
Mr Byrne will call for Atos, the private company charged with delivering the government's Work Programme, to be given "weeks" to get back on track or lose its contract.
He will say Labour backs Universal Credit, which is due to replace the majority of out-of-work benefits by 2017, "in principle" but claim that the "implementation is a disaster," with extra costs likely to add up to £300m to implement by 2016-17 - another figure flatly denied by the DWP,
The shadow work and pension secretary says he has written to the DWP to call for cross-party talks "to see exactly how bad things are" with Universal Credit and "what's needed to fix them".
The DWP says Universal Credit - and all other elements of its "aggressive welfare reform agenda" - are on track and rejects out of hand Labour's claims of financial mismanagement.
In a reference to Westminster rumours Mr Byrne is set to be sacked by Labour leader Ed Miliband in a forthcoming reshuffle, a spokesman for Mr Duncan Smith said Mr Byrne was only interested in trying to save his job.
"His talk of wasted money is frankly laughable when you consider Labour have voted against £83bn worth of savings to the welfare budget.
"Labour is panicking - after a summer of discontent, here is yet another disastrous speech, void of any ideas. Same old Labour is in the wrong place on welfare."
Source: BBC News - Business http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23768436#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
