Treasury and Work and Pensions

I am pleased to be able to speak in this part of the debate on the Queen’s Speech. I was interested in the comments made by the hon. Member for Angus (Mr. Weir). Let me offer a word of caution to him and to other hon. Members who have spoken about the Child Support Agency. As we all know from our advice surgeries, it is true that for many people the CSA has become a bureaucratic nightmare, but there was not a golden age before the CSA when justice was provided to women who had been abandoned by their partners—it is usually women who are left holding the baby. They had to go to court, and for most that was not affordable or feasible. Moreover, there was virtually no way in which the then Department of Health and Social Security could recoup any of the funds that went out to support lone parents and their children, who should have been properly supported by somebody in work. I hope that the forthcoming Bill will take matters forward. People should not think that there was a golden age; it never existed and women and their children had a nightmare time.