Child Poverty Bill

I would always defer to the hon. Gentleman on matters of statistics, but when the official Government statistics have been reasonably consistent—he may correct me if I am wrong about this—and have shown an increase in the number of people in that category, either we have had an explosion in black market activity among families or we face a genuine problem. It is perfectly reasonable for those of us who have not slaved for many years in national statistics offices to take Government figures at face value, particularly when they show us an ugly picture of an increase in poverty among the poorest. He may patronise me as much as he likes, but until I am given comprehensive evidence to show that there has not been an increase in poverty among the poorest in this society, I shall remain concerned—even if he wants to dismiss my concern for technical reasons. It is worth saying that we could have a clash of ideologies here, although there is so much political fear ahead of a general election that not much clashing is occurring. Historically, the Conservative party has believed—or certainly one could caricature it thus—in trickle-down economics. I remember a friend of mine sneeringly saying to me a little while ago, "I suppose you believe in trickle-down economics." As a good Conservative, I do, to an extent. However, although the previous Conservative Government transformed the country from being the sick man of Europe—we took over from the previous economic wreckage of a Labour Government—to being a much more powerful and dynamic economy, child poverty increased, and nobody who sits on the Conservative Benches is proud of that. We want to combine a proper recognition of the need for incentives, for hard work to be rewarded, for enterprise to be supported and for the state not to smother economic activity with ensuring that, as we grow the economy, we carry all with us and do not rely on trickle-down economics to give us the magic solution. That certainly did not happen under the previous Conservative Government.