HC Deb 02 June 1997 vol 295 cc9-11
8. Mrs. Helen Jackson

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what plans she has to enhance the provision for lone parents on income support. [882]

Ms Harman

We are concerned that there are 1 million lone mothers bringing up 2 million children on income support. I know that my hon. Friend has been concerned about lone mothers in her constituency who depend on benefit and that, like us, she believes that the best way in which to help them and their children have a better standard of living is to allow them the opportunity, which they want, to secure that better standard of living by going out to work.

Mrs. Jackson

I congratulate my right hon. Friend not only on her position, but on the way in which and speed with which she has put opportunities for women, particularly lone mothers, at the top of our political agenda. I am sure that she will agree that the vast number of mothers, both lone and otherwise, want to work, so long as they are not going to be out of pocket. What steps will she take to ensure that the extra child care that is required to enable those women to take up work and training opportunities is both flexible and affordable?

Ms Harman

My hon. Friend raises the important issue of the relationship between balancing responsibilities for children at home with responsibilities at work. Our determination to formulate and implement a national child care strategy is at the heart of that. The week before last, I met the National Council for One Parent Families, which told me that the lack of affordable child care is one of the most important reasons preventing lone mothers from going to work. That is why the Prime Minister, in his speech today on welfare reform, has said that he is determined to do two things: first, to ensure that, when their youngest child turns five, lone mothers are invited into jobcentres to be given advice and information about voluntary work, training and work; and secondly to have a network of after-school clubs throughout the country to ensure that, when lone mothers are perhaps working beyond school hours, they know that their children are learning and playing safely in proper, supervised facilities, rather than feeling that they are having to wander the streets.

Mr. Lilley

I do not know, Madam Speaker, whether you can advise the House, but is there any precedent for the Prime Minister making a speech on social security during Social Security Questions, the content of which is apparently unknown to Social Security Ministers? I have just received a copy, but, obviously, the House has not had time to consider it.

Will the right hon. Lady now clarify the answer given by the Minister of State earlier? Are we to understand that she is now considering reneging on the pledge that she repeatedly gave the House and the electorate that she would pay higher benefits to lone parents than those available to married couples in equivalent circumstances, rather than equalising them, as we had promised beforehand?

Ms Harman

The pledge that we made repeatedly and that we repeated in our manifesto, and the way in which we asserted that our approach was different from that of the previous Government—whose approach was to criticise lone mothers and to say that they were all young girls who had got pregnant to jump the housing queues—was to say that the best form of welfare for people of working age is work. We know that lone mothers want to work. The right hon. Gentleman's Government simply said, "Here is your order book. We will check up once every three years to see whether you are still living at the same address and come back when your youngest child is 16." That was not good enough for lone mothers, for their children or for the taxpayer. We are going to ensure a better standard of living for lone mothers and their children and a better deal for the taxpayer.

Mrs. Anne Campbell

Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Cambridgeshire child care information service, which was launched some months ago, has been a huge success in helping parents and lone parents back into work, giving integrated advice not only on jobs, training and benefits, but on child care? Will she try to ensure that that is a national system and not for the benefit just of people in Cambridgeshire?

Ms Harman

Yes. I have asked my officials to examine closely the pioneering work that my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Mrs. Campbell) has done in the Cambridgeshire Childcare Links project, which brings all the information together in one place so that the lone mother seeking work can, possibly with a child pulling at her skirt trying to distract her attention, nevertheless have at her fingertips all the information that she might want about benefits, local training courses, local after-school clubs and part-time courses at local colleges. Using modern technology to improve and modernise the social security system to enable it to provide the services that people want is one of the most important parts of our welfare to work programme.

Mr. Lansley

Perhaps the right hon. Lady will now tell us whether she proposes to pay additional benefits to lone parents over and above the benefits that would be payable to married couples in the same circumstances. Will she pay those extra benefits? Will she give us a clear answer?

Ms Harman

I have set out, at some length, our approach to lone mothers. The hon. Gentleman will have to wait until we make an announcement—indeed, he would have had to wait for the previous Government to do so—because of the issue of uprating in advance of the Budget.

It is clear that we have a different approach. The issue of income for lone mothers is not just about benefits but about their ability to work. We are working closely with the organisations representing lone mothers to establish a programme that will ensure that, like other European countries, Britain has more lone mothers in work. In the remainder of Europe, they are twice as likely to work and half as likely to be benefit dependent as they are in this country. In Britain, married and cohabiting women are twice as likely to be working as their counterparts who are lone mothers. We have to sort that out.