HC Deb 09 April 1957 vol 568 cc997-8

Next, I turn to tax relief for the parents of children. Bachelors are clearly better able to bear our present levels of taxation than married people. At least in a period when the amount of tax relief is necessarily limited, I believe that public opinion—including, perhaps, bachelors themselves, if they look towards the future —would favour a policy which concentrated somewhat upon the problems of the family. The Committee may remember that the Royal Commission gave special consideration to the tax position of married men with children.

At present, relief is given as a flat rate allowance of £100 for each child that qualifies. I have been examining the problem in the knowledge that children, particularly if they continue in full-time education, cost more as they grow older. This is true both for the parent who pays fees and for the many parents who, while not paying fees, make considerable sacrifices to keep a boy or girl at school or university who could otherwise have been contributing to the joint family income.

I propose, therefore, that the child allowance shall remain at £100 for children under 12; but that it shall be increased to £125 as from the year in which the child becomes 12 and that there shall be a further increase to £150 as from the year in which the child becomes 17. A child above the age of 16, as hon. Members may remember, ranks for allowance only if he or she is receiving full-time education or full-time training as an apprentice.

These increases, which are rather different from the proposals of the Royal Commission, will apply irrespective of the amount of the parent's income. The father of the boy or girl who has won a scholarship to a grammar school or university will qualify as well as the father who chooses to educate his child at his own expense. I propose no change in the limit of child's income of £85 that disqualifies a parent from receiving a child allowance. The cost of these proposals is £14½ million this year and £ l7½ million in a full year.