TORY Iain Duncan Smith’s stalling universal credit scheme will take over a millennium to roll out at its current rate, Labour revealed yesterday.

The embarrassing calculation dealt another blow to the Work and Pensions Secretary as his flagship welfare policy is rolled out across Britain today.

Jobseeker’s allowance, tax credits, housing benefit and other means-tested welfare payments will be combined into one payment.

Mr Duncan Smith claimed yesterday that trials of the scheme, designed to prevent people being worse off in work than on benefits, showed people are 5 per cent more likely to find work.

And he defended delays in implementation, saying he was not willing to risk problems in roll out.

“I would rather have this work, I would rather have it that everyone’s experience as we have seen already is positive, people are going into work quicker, they are staying in work longer, and they are earning more,” he said.

But shadow work and pensions secretary Rachel Reeves said: “Iain Duncan Smith promised one million people would be claiming universal credit by April 2014.

“But the latest figures show only 26,940 people on the new benefit. At this rate it will take 1,571 years to roll out universal credit.”

Labour also called the architect of the bedroom tax, which hit 500,000 people, to account over the cost of Tory welfare failures.

More than £25 million extra has been splurged on housing benefit alone as a result of low pay and soaring housing costs, the party said.