Savings Accounts and Health in Pregnancy Grant Bill

Debate between Diana Johnson and Ben Gummer

Tuesday 26th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Diana R. Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

Let me start by addressing a point that the hon. Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman) made. He implied that there was no glee on the Government Benches last Wednesday at the comprehensive spending review announcement, but I was in the Chamber and I clearly remember the cheering and waving of Order Papers when those vicious cuts were announced.

[Ben Gummer (Ipswich) (Con)]

rose—

[Diana R. Johnson]

I am not going to give way.

I also take issue with the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg), who reminded me very clearly why I am on the Opposition side of the Chamber and of my commitment to a modern, enabling welfare state that not only meets needs but opens opportunities to the poorest and extends people’s life chances and opportunities. Those were key objectives of the progressive politics behind the child trust funds, the saving gateway and the health in pregnancy grant. I want to tell hon. Members why, for my constituents, the decision of the Liberal Democrats and the Tories to scrap these three policies is short-sighted and fundamentally wrong.

I have heard Ministers and Government Members talk at length about the economic environment and about cuts being inevitable, but the cuts disproportionately affect children and families, and that is not fair. All the decisions that the Government side is making are choices of the coalition Government. The cuts are not inevitable: the Government are taking those decisions. They decide where to allocate funding and what their priorities are—and their priorities clearly are not women and children.

We have also heard a lot from Government Members about wanting to target benefits more, but that is not what the Bill is about. It is about the wholesale scrapping of three important policies. As an MP in Hull, I know only too well that people often struggle to provide for their families on a day-to-day basis. They often live week to week, juggling as best they can paying bills and meeting their commitments. In Hull, the average household income is just £21,623 compared with the English average of £35,544 and the Yorkshire and Humber average of £29,902. Since 1997, there has been a 5% increase in average household income, but it is still a low-income area. The opportunity provided by child trust funds of a savings vehicle for Hull children and a nest egg for young adults is something that many families have never been able to provide no matter how much they wished to do so.

A few years ago I held a child trust fund surgery at a children’s centre in my constituency—it is worth reminding Government Members that there is no ring-fenced funding for Sure Start, so we will wait to see whether those centres continue—and there was clearly a lack of financial literacy among many of the parents to whom I spoke. The child trust fund provided a real opportunity for families to think about finances and about having some capital set aside for their children when they reached the age of 18. Many families are able to save regularly for their children so that there is a capital asset that their children can use when they reach 18 to pay for driving lessons, buy a car or pay for higher education. Having assets and savings is something that more privileged people, such as the 20 millionaires in the Cabinet, take for granted, but in my constituency that is not the case. That is why the child trust fund was such a good idea: it was universally progressive—I am glad that we have been able to teach Government Members what that means—as poorer children received more.

Cutting the child trust fund and cutting the saving gateway are just two examples of how the coalition’s spending review attacks families, and attacks women and children from poorer backgrounds with special venom. They have already seen child benefit frozen and cuts to the child tax credit, and in the comprehensive spending review the education maintenance allowance is going, there are higher tuition fees for universities and now there will be tuition fees in further education colleges. The pupil premium, the Deputy Prime Minister’s fairness fig leaf, turns out not to be new money within the schools budget, and will do little to mitigate cuts in schools, including the switch of funds to free schools. There will also be cuts to local authority budgets, particularly in children’s services. We have heard lots of warm words on the coalition Benches about looked-after children, but looked-after children are paid for out of local authority budgets for children’s services, so let us see what the outcomes are for those looked-after children after the 30% cuts to local government finance.

To be fair, before the general election, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Simon Danczuk) pointed out, the Lib Dems made it clear that they wanted to abandon and abolish the child trust fund. Even though the Conservatives had indicated that they wished to make the fund more targeted, the Bill would scrap the whole lot.

The coalition of those who now say that a child trust fund, or something very similar, should be reinstated includes the Daycare Trust, the Family and Parenting Institute, the National Childbirth Trust and think-tanks such as ResPublica, whose director Phillip Blond is often in the media as the red Tory mentor of the Conservatism of the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr Cameron). Abolishing the child trust fund will be a regressive measure, and will not promote social mobility and equality of opportunity—something that Conservative Members go on and on about. This measure will not deliver that for them. It will also be a backward move.

Many of those groups argue that we should promote a savings culture. It is ironic that when the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, the right hon. Member for Twickenham (Vince Cable), was on the Opposition Benches he used to speak at length about the need to promote a savings culture in this country, and yet he is part of a Government doing exactly the opposite. That links in with the saving gateway policy—a scheme that was successfully piloted in Hull. It was designed to promote a savings habit among people on lower incomes, with the Government incentive that every pound saved by an individual would be matched, and to encourage people to engage with mainstream financial services. That latter point was very important, as loan sharks and doorstep lenders are a real problem in parts of Hull, and it is vital to promote the excellent work of credit unions, such as the Hull and East Yorkshire credit union, managed by John Smith in Hull. Individuals would be passported in to the saving gateway if they were in receipt of certain benefits and tax credits. All that has fallen by the wayside, and it is such a shame for constituents who could have benefited from that excellent scheme.

The health in pregnancy grant was a clear example of an enlightened potential spend-to-save policy, paid to expectant mothers from the 25th week of pregnancy on condition that they had received maternal health advice from a health professional, and paid for the first time from April 2009. I have always been concerned about health inequalities in Hull compared with other areas of this country, and we need to focus generally on maternal health and the early years of life. It has been very important to focus on good nutrition, for example. In July 2010, 86% of pregnant women and mothers of young children in my constituency were eligible for the healthy start programme, which is a targeted programme, compared with a Yorkshire and Humber average of 82%. In the light of that statistic, if the Government are willing to listen and think about targeting the health in pregnancy grant, it seems to me that a vast number of my constituents would be eligible.

I asked Ministers how many people in my constituency were receiving the health in pregnancy grant, but I was told that information was not available. It is ironic that a Government who are requiring councils to list all spending over £500 are not keeping that kind of information, which would help us in our decision making. The grant is also important in helping with the additional costs incurred by families when a new baby is on the way, and it is the link with the health advice that is so important. We heard the quote from the Royal College of Midwives, which was quite clear about the importance of that health advice.

The Government are making the wrong choices. There are alternatives. There are different ways to deal with the deficit. It is unfortunate that the Government will not listen and are taking an ideological view of where the cuts fall, and it is unfair that women, children and babies are being penalised.