Poverty (Children) (Hansard, 19 May 2000)

§ Mr. Field
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to his speech to the Child Poverty Action Group on 15 May, if he will disaggregate the £7 billion additional spending in 2001 relative to 1997 on children's financial support. [122983]

§ Dawn Primarolo
I refer my right hon. Friend to Chart 5.2 in the March 2000 Economic and Fiscal Strategy Report, HC 346.

§ Mr. Field
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer on what basis he made the statement that many poorer families are now £50 per week better off in his recent speech to the Child Poverty Action Group. [122836]

§ Dawn Primarolo
I refer my right hon. Friend to paragraph 1.31 of the EFSR which stated that "By 2001, when personal tax and benefit changes measures from this and previous Budgets have come into effect—a single-earner family with two children earning £12,500 a year will be £2,600 a year or £50 a week better off".

§ Mr. Field
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will set out the measurement he used to determine which children live in poverty when he described Government policies as having taken more than one million children out of poverty in his speech to the Child Poverty Action Group on 15 May. [122981]

§ Dawn Primarolo
The estimate that 1.2 million children will be lifted out of poverty is based upon the number of children in low-income families who will no longer be living in households below 60 per cent. of median income after the combined effect of the personal tax and benefit changes announced in the four Budgets since May 1997. The calculation includes those households classified as self-employed and measures income after allowing for housing costs, as explained in Box 5.1 of the March 2000 Economic and Fiscal Strategy Report, HC 346. Consistent with the indicators chosen in "Opportunity for all", Box 5.1 also presents estimates of the number of children lifted above a number of low-income thresholds.

§ Mr. Field
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will set out the basis of the calculation made in his speech to the Child Poverty Action Group on 15 May that the poorest 20 per cent. of families receive 50 per cent. of the additional £7 billion per year spent on children's financial support. [122982]

§ Dawn Primarolo
This calculation is based on analysis of the distributional impact of the main children's measures announced by the Government. The analysis is consistent with the chart in Box 5.1 of the EFSR. The measures included are the introduction of and increases in the Working Families Tax Credit, increases in Child Benefit and the child premia in income-related benefits, and the new Children's Tax Credit. The estimates are 297W based on data from the Family Expenditure Surveys from 1996–98 uprated to estimated 2000–01 levels of prices and earnings.