"there are no problems with UC and it will roll out as planned"

The delay appears to be an admission by the Government that they do not have the training, computer programmes and experience in place to avoid embarrassing mistakes which could lead to people not receiving the benefits to which they are entitled.     In its announcement of the delay the Department of Work and Pension made no attempt to explain why it was unable to proceed as planned.

Absolutely not so, as a government spokesperson quickly made clear :-

"Now look here, when will you naysayers and disbelievers stop "reading between the lines" like this ...  UC is on track, it will remain on track, we are simply slowing down a bit, giving ourselves time to assimilate important new information, like that the f-ing IT doesn't in a lot of cases exist yet, and where it does exist the f-ing software stuck on it doesn't f-ing work and ....  er sorry about that, ignore the last few comments please, it is a really tiring and stressful job being a spokesperson for the DWP what I meant to say was, and on this you can quote me, this decision has only been taken because ..."

"it was 'sensible' to start with one area* before rolling it out to the other three in July.  It will allow us to make any changes that we feel we need to make and see what works and what doesn’t.”

*that area being "a single job centre in Ashton-under-Lyne".

Not so Universal Credit: Government puts the brakes on new benefits programme trials