My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 15, 18 and 20, which are in my name and that of my noble friend Lord McKenzie of Luton. I shall also speak to the other amendments in this group.
Amendment 15 seeks explicitly to exempt from this measure children entering a household as a result of a multiple birth. In the light of the Minister’s commitment on the record that such children will be exempted, I will not dwell on this for very long but ask him to clarify a couple of things. First, he mentioned that this will be done by regulation. Will the regulations be of the affirmative or negative kind, given the question raised by the Delegated Powers Committee on that point? Secondly, can he confirm that the Government intend that the exemption will apply to any means-tested benefits, not just tax credits, and irrespective of the number of children who may come along at the same time in that multiple birth?
Amendment 18 is a simple amendment which provides for exemptions to apply in exceptional circumstances, as defined by the Social Security Advisory Committee. The thinking behind this amendment is that, as we have heard already today, there are a number of special circumstances which Ministers may not have thought about when devising the Bill. I know that Ministers never like to admit that things can crop up which they have not already thought of but, just every now and again, things that none of us have been clever enough to work out may suddenly turn up and make a difference. To protect the Minister from the exigencies of such a disastrous situation befalling him, I offer the Committee this amendment today. It would enable the Social Security Advisory Committee—a statutory body with huge expertise—to spot these things that, unaccountably, none of us have managed to spot and to bring forward to the Minister recommendations for exemptions which could then be put into legislation. I commend this idea to the Minister; he may have it free of charge. If he does not like it for any reason, and I cannot think that he would not, he might instead like SSAC to undertake a formal review of the impact of this policy 12 months, say, after its enactment and to advise him and his colleagues of any additional exemptions that might be needed. I would settle for that.
Amendment 20 proposes to exempt from this provision couples with dependent children who, if living in separate households, would not be affected by the two-child limit. This is a broader exemption than that proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Manzoor, in Amendment 4, although I also support her amendment should mine not go forward. Her amendment would seek to exempt someone who is a single parent and previously claiming tax credits; my amendment seeks to address all such reformed families. This is one of the issues which exposes why this whole measure is such a bad idea. The Government have spent a lot of time advocating the importance of family life and making much of their support for marriage. I approve of them doing that, yet they are again proposing a policy which will run in direct contravention to that other policy objective. If two people meet and fall in love and they each have two kids, if they get married or partner and set up home together then overnight this measure alone will make them worse off to the tune of £5,560 a year. The irony is that they may find by coming together as a household—for example, if they are both working—their entitlement to benefits would go down naturally as a result of the means test. It seems particularly unfair to deprive them of support for the children when they would have been supported by the state had those two people decided to stay separate.
I have been struggling to get a handle on data on stepfamilies. Maybe the Minister can write to me. I have had to work my way through official statistics trying to make sense of them. It seems to me that more than 20% of adoptions registered in 2014 were in stepfamilies, and ONS data based on the 2011 census seem to suggest there are 326,425 children living in stepfamilies with three or more children where the parents are either married or in civil partnerships. There are another 196,173 children living in stepfamilies with three or more children where the parents are
co-habiting. I make that more than half a million children. They will not all be eligible for tax credits or universal credit, but up to half a million children could be affected by a measure not because they themselves were third children but because their parents made the unconscionable error of falling in love with somebody else who already had children, and by coming together the household suddenly becomes ineligible for those benefits for the third and subsequent children.
I used to run a charity that worked with single parents. Unless the trends have changed significantly, there was a tendency that lone parenthood was a state someone would stay in for an average of five years. It tended not to be a lifetime choice. People tended to repartner or remarry. We are increasingly putting barriers in the way of people ever doing that. I wonder if that is wise. I also wonder whether it is an intention of the Government’s policy. If not, has the Minister given any thought and has the department done any assessment on the likely impact on second marriages or repartnering?
I want to comment briefly on the other proposed exemptions. The noble Baroness, Lady Manzoor, expressed the concern I think many noble Lords will share about how intrusive a process might have to be to establish that a woman had been raped. I certainly hope the Minister realises that he will find it a challenge to get the Bill through this House in its entirety without explaining how a proposal that somebody should be tested to see if they have been raped would be implemented. At the very least, is the intention that it is only when a woman has made a complaint to the police or someone has been charged or convicted? If not, who will she give evidence to in DWP and how will that be assessed? How will the Minister guarantee that the process will be confidential? If any other official in a benefit or tax office or school could see that a woman was getting benefits or tax credits for a third or subsequent child, there are only two ways at the moment that that could happen—a multiple birth, which would be evident, or the pregnancy being the result of rape. I wonder where that leaves us in terms of confidentiality. Has the Minister given any thought to that? Given that, has the Minister considered the impact on the child if at some point they discover they had been conceived as a product of rape—something the parents may have gone to considerable pains to disguise from them? The Government mentioned in the impact assessment that they would consult stakeholders before deciding how to deal with this. Can the Minister tell us who the Government have consulted and who they intend to consult?
I also asked at Second Reading—but got no answer—what the rationale was for exempting children in multiple births or those conceived as a result of rape. The Minister has indicated that this is about choice. Does he accept therefore that there are other circumstances where a woman may not be able to exercise choice? The noble Baroness, Lady Manzoor, mentioned domestic violence. The proposal, which I support, to exempt people in cases of domestic abuse rests on two arguments: first, that a child may have been conceived under duress, rather than as a result of a clear choice; and secondly, that the two-child limit may make it harder
for a parent of more than two children to leave an abusive relationship as they would struggle to support the children.
We have heard how widespread domestic abuse is. Each year more than 2 million people suffer some form of domestic abuse. Its impacts are severe and hard to escape. About 42% of domestic violence victims have been victimised more than once. On average victims experience 20 incidents a year, which can often increase in severity every time. While 80% of victims report physical abuse, it is not just that—nearly 90% of high-risk victims report experiencing emotional abuse and/or coercive control or behaviours. Those are exactly the kind of things that could lead a woman to become pregnant without exercising choice. Abuse can include a refusal to allow a woman to use contraception. It can include rape and pregnancy as a result of rape which she may have been reluctant to report to the authorities because of fear of the abusive partner. Of course, the use of power and coercion are the very things that make it hard for someone to leave an abusive relationship. Sometimes they do manage to leave, often by getting advice or support and by meeting other victims; sometimes things go too far, such as when a child is caught in the cross-fire of domestic abuse. At the point at which they flee, they need all the help they can get. Too often they leave just with the clothes they stand up in. They are homeless and need to move and often hide from their abuser; they leave behind schools and jobs. It is hard enough to rebuild a life in those circumstances but this policy could act as a further barrier, so I hope very much that the Minister will consider this exemption very carefully.
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Finally, I will comment briefly on the amendment from the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Portsmouth about bereavement. I thank him for sharing his own experience with us, very movingly, and for describing the wider implications that this amendment raises. My mother died when I was a child and I am very conscious of just how hard it was for my father to manage in those circumstances. When a parent dies, as the right reverend Prelate pointed out, the remaining parent has to not only deal with their own grief but do all the practical things, including all the practical tasks that their late spouse had done before they were bereaved.
In the Pensions Act 2014, despite the best efforts of many of us on many Benches of the House, the Government decided to reform bereavement benefits to reduce significantly the time that bereaved parents could get support from the state before they had to return to work. We are now going to compound that by cutting the support they will get even if they are working. Parents with three or more children who have been bereaved will not therefore be able to get adequate support for all their children. This is obviously a particular problem where the deceased was the main earner, but even where the surviving partner was the main earner, they may well end up having to reduce their hours or even give up their job because they cannot manage it now they are the full-time or sole carer for the children, as the right reverend Prelate pointed out.
Bereavements are sometimes sudden, as a result of a medical emergency, an accident or an assault, which can be very difficult for a family to deal with. This whole situation is a perfect example of where a family with existing children who had not needed recourse to benefits or tax credits while there were two earners might well do so now there is a single parent, as the right reverend Prelate pointed out. It is an example of what the welfare state was designed for and I very much hope the Minister will consider these amendments carefully.