Deprivation/Child Poverty

We have much fewer than we used to have—there are 400,000 fewer. That is a reflection of the terrible starting point that we had in 1997. The hon. Gentleman was frank enough to say that he did not support everything that the previous Conservative Government had done. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, East said, child poverty more than doubled during that period. I was in the House for the latter part of it, and there used to be a claim that there was no such thing as poverty in the UK. I very much welcome the fact that the Conservative party now recognises that there is a real problem that needs to be addressed. I shall come on in a moment to the policies that need to be put in place to address it. My hon. Friend made a point about public views on the subject. I agree that we need to communicate to the public the compelling moral and economic case for eradicating child poverty. There is a job still to be done there. Organisations such as the CPAG, the End Child Poverty coalition and others can help us, and I warmly commend their contributions. ““Ending child poverty: everybody's business””, which was published at the time of the Budget, was a step in the right direction, but we need to do more to get messages across to the public and to persuade people that there are real problems behind the statistics. My hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North raised several important points. Let me respond to some of them. He made a point about the charge for music lessons and the difficulties that that has imposed on some children who find themselves excluded from part of the benefit of schooling as a result. We have committed £332 million over the next three years, so that by 2011 all children of primary school age will have had an opportunity to learn a musical instrument. I hope that that will be a significant step towards tackling the particular problem that he mentioned. There were a couple of contributions about the higher incidence of poverty for disabled children than for children as a whole, and it is true that there is a higher incidence. However let me remind the House of the most recent statistics. The risk of poverty for disabled children in 2006-07 was 24 per cent., compared with a 22 per cent. risk of poverty for non-disabled children, so on the most recent data there is only a 2 per cent. different between the two groups. Since 1998-99, the risk for disabled children has fallen from 30 per cent. to 24 per cent. There is still an issue that needs to be addressed, but, again, that is an example of our having been able to move in the right direction. I agree with my hon. Friend about the need for people to understand that housing benefit is an in-work benefit as well; he is right about that. That is one reason why people are sometimes unwilling to take work and a reason why the better off in work calculations are so important. I listened to what hon. Members said about the ““better off in work”” calculations. The feedback that I have received, including from some of the organisations that have been mentioned, suggests that people mainly think that those calculations should be more readily available. People find those calculations useful: the woman in Paisley, whom I mentioned, did. Quite a lot of people find those figures to be a revelation and discover, once they get into work, that the calculations are correct. There is certainly no deception here. I understand the argument for more information being provided on the cost of school meals, transport costs and so on, but it will be clear to anyone listening to the debate that that is the intention. The other criticism was that the information takes too long to get, is complicated and should be available instantly. However, working out bus fares, for example, cannot be done in a couple of minutes. Our approach is right. There is absolutely no deception. We are saying, ““This is the basis for the figure that we are presenting to you. It does not include x, y and z. Other factors may need to be taken into account.”” If we try to include too much information, it will get impossibly complicated and will be less valuable. I have picked up on a big demand for such information to be more widely available. I have mentioned that we have now rolled out advice to lone parents nationally and, in addition to that, have in place an in-work emergency discretion fund to help lone parents with unforeseen financial problems in their first six months in work. That is a significant change, which recognises that the problems will not all necessarily be over on day one of employment: they may continue beyond that time. My hon. Friends the Members for Leyton and Wanstead (Harry Cohen) and for Bristol, East and the Committee Chair, my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North, were dismayed about the comment in the Government's response on the absence of evidence of a concern about stigmatisation for those who receive free school meals. I accept that criticism. The Secretary of State wrote in March to all schools and local authorities, asking them what they can do to encourage families who are eligible for free school meals to take up that entitlement. We have developed a new system to simplify and streamline the way that local authorities check a family's eligibility. I was interested in the example from her constituency that my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, East gave. I accept that, in that respect, the response should not have said what it did and that, perhaps, the criticism of complacency is justified. I apologise to the House for that comment having been included. The hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire talked about the number of jobs taken by non-UK nationals. More recent data have been produced showing that of the 3.2 million increase in the number of jobs since 1997, UK nationals have taken 55 per cent., or 1.8 million jobs, and foreign nationals have taken 1.4 million. He will acknowledge that the foreign nationals who have come to the UK have made a substantial contribution: they have worked hard and contributed to the UK economy. The fact that those people have come has been consistent with our having the lowest number of people claiming unemployment benefit since 1975. Non-UK nationals' contribution has been positive and has not been in contradiction with the aim of raising the number of people in employment in the UK. I can also give the hon. Gentleman some updated data on the number of children on free school meals getting five or more good GCSEs. He makes a fair point about the gap. Some 35.5 per cent. of children in 2006-07 who were eligible for free school meals achieved five good GCSEs, compared with 62.8 per cent. of other children. The gap between the most disadvantaged schools and the rest narrowed by 19 per cent. between 1999 and 2005. We have a public service agreement target to narrow that gap further. The hon. Gentleman is right to highlight the gap. Again, we have made progress in that area, although there is more that we need to do. Let me pick up on the hon. Gentleman's point, which I noted carefully, about commonly shared targets on child poverty. I think that I am right in saying that a spokesperson for his party has not previously referred to his party's having a target for eradicating child poverty. I am not sure whether what he said reflects a policy change, but if it does I certainly welcome that and look forward to hearing more details about how the Conservative party plans to deliver it. In a moment I shall make a couple of points about the Conservative party's policy in this area.