Single benefit payment among 'radical' welfare plans
All out-of-work benefits and tax credits could be scrapped and replaced with a single payment as part of a "radical" shake-up of the welfare system.
The idea is one of three options being considered by Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith to make work pay.
He says the current system is "on the verge of breakdown".
Labour have said the start-up costs of a new system could be as much as £7bn.
Mr Duncan Smith has refused to be drawn on the cost, but argues that billions could be saved each year in bureaucracy and fraud with a much simpler system.
30 Jul 2010