Child Poverty Bill

I mentioned one or two routes in response to my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Devon (Mr. Streeter), including worklessness, educational underachievement and addiction. Nearly 1.5 million children in this country live in households where their parents are subject to serious addiction. Just over 1 million are subject to serious alcohol abuse and 350,000 children have parents who are subject to serious drug abuse. I say to the Government in all earnestness that, unless they ally their anti-addiction policy with their anti-poverty strategy, we will not succeed in meeting the 2020 targets. I thought that the right hon. Member for Birkenhead phrased his contribution extremely well. I am at one with him on ensuring that the debate is not about stigma or castigating a particular group, but about giving help to every type of family and trying to encourage the right sort of behaviour, which he ably described in relation to his constituents.