Teenage Pregnancy (Hansard, 14 July 2003)

§ Mr. Love
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of teenage pregnancy literature produced by the Government; and if he will make a statement. [120771]
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§ Margaret Hodge
The Teenage Pregnancy Strategy national campaign was launched in October 2000 with advertisements, aimed at boys and girls aged 13-17, running in popular teenage magazines and local independent radio. The campaign is supported by a freephone advice line and website. Local materials are also available for use by local teenage pregnancy strategies.
In the tracking survey carried out as part of the independent national evaluation of the Teenage Pregnancy Strategy, over 70 per cent. of 13-17 year olds recognised the advertisements, a level of recall associated with television advertising. The early success of the campaign was also recognised in the first annual report of the Independent Advisory Group on Teenage Pregnancy (2001). Since October 2000 the freephone advice line has advised over 8 million young people, around 50 per cent. of who were boys.

§ Mr. Love
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills if he will make a statement on the impact of the cross-cutting teenage pregnancy strategy since its introduction in 1999. [120772]

§ Margaret Hodge
The most recent data for 2001 shows a 10 per cent. reduction in the under 18 conception rate and an 11 per cent. fall in the under 16 conception rate since 1998, the baseline year for the Teenage Pregnancy Strategy. Participation of teenage parents in education, training or employment has doubled from 16 per cent. to 33 per cent.
These are early encouraging signs of progress towards meeting the Government's target to halve the under 18 conception rate by 2010 and increase to 60 per cent. the participation of teenage parents to reduce their long term risk of social exclusion.
However, evidence suggests that it takes many years to bring out the societal and behavioural changes required. That is why the Government have set out a 10-year Strategy.