Capital Gains Tax (Rates)

My hon. Friend is right to raise concerns, particularly as many people who receive housing benefit are in work. They work hard, are in low-paid jobs and cannot afford to pay their rent without the extra help that housing benefit brings. So, the Government's measures will hit people who work hard to support their families and make ends meet. They will find the rug withdrawn from under them. I am particularly concerned about the combined proposals for lone-parent families, and I ask the Secretary of State to look at them, because he says that lone parents with five and six-year-olds will move on to jobseeker's allowance and have to look for work. However, his own documents, which were provided at the same time as the Budget, assume that only 10% of those lone parents will leave benefits because of the risk they might be less work ready or need more time to find a suitable job that fits with their caring responsibilities. Many lone parents need additional support to find work that fits school hours, but as a consequence of these proposals about 90% of them will still be on jobseeker's allowance one year later, at which point they will suddenly be hit by the right hon. Gentleman's 10% cut in housing benefit. Lone parents with young children might work really hard to find a job that fits school hours, but suddenly an average of £500 a year will be taken from their incomes because they cannot find work and because, as a result, he wants to cut their housing benefit. That is deeply unfair on families who might work really hard to try to make ends meet. What does he expect people to do? Hundreds of thousands of people will struggle to pay their rent, and parents will have to move house, shift their kids out of school, move long distances and break up communities in order to try to find an affordable home.