§ Mr. Ovendenasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what steps will be taken to safeguard the position of taxpaying war widows when child benefit is increased and the child tax allowances generally withdrawn next April.
§ Mr. Alfred MorrisFrom April next year child benefit goes up by £1 and social security allowances for children are to be reduced by the same amount. It is also proposed that child tax allowances should be withdrawn next April.
The net result of these changes would be that the war widow paying tax would be worse off. To safeguard her income, the dependency allowance will be increased next April by 5p instead of being reduced by £1.
The effect of these adjustments, together with the child benefit payable, will be that no war widow paying the basic rate of tax will suffer a loss of 963W income and some will receive an increase of up to 42p. War widows not paying income tax will, of course, be better off by £1.05 a week for each child.
I am writing today to all the major ex-Service organisations to inform them of this improvement.