§ Mr. LidingtonTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when the Ministerial Group on the Family last met; and if he will make a statement on its current programme of work. [159009]
§ Mr. Boateng[holding answer 26 April 2001]: The Ministerial Group on the Family, as with other Ministerial Groups, meets as needed.
The Government have a robust framework of family policies in place. We have made excellent headway in tackling child poverty by helping parents back into work and ensuring that hard working families are rewarded through increases to the Working Families Tax Credit, and through the new Children's Tax Credit. All families with children have benefited from increases to Child Benefit. On 26 April, we outlined proposals to break the long-term cycle of disadvantage by setting up the new Child Trust Fund, starting at birth, with further investments at five, 11 and 16, to give young people a savings base with which to start their adult lives.
We have simplified and increased significantly maternity leave and pay, and announced the introduction of paternity pay ensuring that parents can spend time together as a family after the birth of a new baby. Parental leave provisions enable parents to take unpaid leave during the first few years of the children's lives. The National Childcare Strategy and free early education places for all four and many three-year-olds are providing an increasing number of high quality places for children, to enable parents to work. The Worklife Balance Campaign encourages employers to adopt flexible working practices which will enable employees to achieve a better work-life balance.
The Family Support Grant provides funding to over 60 voluntary organisations working with parents to improve their parenting skills. These include Parentline Plus which runs a national freephone helpline providing a listening ear for parents, and the National Family and Parenting Institute which is raising the profile and importance of parenting. We provide core and project funding to a range of marriage and relationship support organisations including Relate—the largest provider of marriage, family and relationship support in the country.
Locally based initiatives such as Early Excellence Centres, Sure Start and the Children's Fund provide a range of support services to children and their families in 616W our most deprived areas. The new adoption framework and "Quality Protects" programme will help some of the most disadvantaged children and their families.