UK Parliament / Open data

Finance (No. 2) Bill

That is the biggest frustration. We need the Government to audit all their policies and start to recognise the trends when certain groups are disproportionately impacted. We all pay our taxes and we all want the same services, but surely the best thing for the economic growth of this country is for everyone to be able to reach their economic potential. That is surely the best way to get this country back on its feet economically.

According to research by the Child Poverty Action Group, 61% of parents working part time who wanted to work more hours said that the cost of childcare was a barrier, and no wonder, when Government cuts mean that there are now 1,240 fewer Sure Starts than there were in 2010. Yet there was no mention of childcare in the recent Budget. When 41% of women in work have part-time jobs, compared with just 13% of men, it is clear how these policies have a disproportionate impact on women. An equality impact assessment would put a spotlight on those inequalities and on the need for action—but of course we can only assume that that is why the Government refuse to carry out such assessments.

3.30 pm

It is not just younger women who are being failed by Tory economics. Martha’s aunt, Rita, was born in 1956. She has worked all her adult life in an old people’s home. The Tories moved the goalposts for Rita by accelerating the rise in the women’s state pension age. Rita has done the right thing. She has been planning her retirement for years, and she is exhausted. Now, she has to work years longer than planned and years longer than she is physically able to. Rita is hoping for a healthy retirement, but, like many people of her age, she is deeply concerned that the £6 billion that has been

taken out of social care since 2010 will make it impossible for her to have a healthy, secure retirement. More than 1 million of our elderly people are not receiving the care that they need. Where is the reassurance for Rita when we have a Chancellor who does not even mention social care in the Budget? In a leaked 2010 letter to the then Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) said:

“There are real risks that women, ethnic minorities, disabled people and older people will be disproportionately affected by proposed cuts to public spending”.

Well, the right hon. Lady, now the Prime Minister, was not wrong. From tax credit cuts to the crisis in social care budgets, it is women who have consistently been hit the hardest by Tory austerity.

I am immensely proud of Labour’s manifesto commitment to gender audit all our policies and legislate for their impact on women before their implementation. It is shameful that we have to keep challenging the Government to do their legal duty and ensure that their policies are not disproportionately impacting on one particular group. There is virtually no one on the Tory Benches at the moment—and not one woman—so I have to question whether the Government are serious about equality. But if they are serious about equality, and economic equality in particular, they must take action. The simplest way for them to do that would be to support new clauses 6 and 7.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
633 cc965-6 
Session
2017-19
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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