§ Mr. Tony ClarkeTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the impact of his Department's measures to tackle income inequality in Northampton. [100801]
§ Dawn PrimaroloThe Government have taken a range of measures to tackle income inequality since 1997, including supporting families with increases in Child Benefit and the introduction of the Children's Tax Credit; supporting low income people in and into work through introduction of the National Minimum Wage, the 10 per cent. starting rate of Income Tax, reductions in National Insurance contributions for the low paid, and the Working Families' Tax Credit (WFTC) and Disabled Person's Tax Credit (DPTC); and supporting pensioners with increases in the basic State Pension, provision of the winter fuel payment, and for the poorest pensioners through the Minimum Income Guarantee(MIG).
As an indication of the coverage of some of the measures designed to tackle income inequality, 4,800 families with children in Northampton were receiving the WFTC and DPTC in August 2002, while there were 4,600 pensioner households in Northampton claiming the MIG in November 2002.