Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Julian Brazier

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

On poverty projections, in October 2012 the IFS suggested that the number of children in relative poverty would fall by 100,000 in 2010-11, but in fact it fell by 300,000. If the hon. Lady wishes to talk about educational attainment, I am sure she will join me in welcoming the news yesterday that thanks to strong reforms of the education sector by the Secretary of State for Education, more schools are now offering better education than under the previous Government.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, as the Centre for Social Justice has argued for a long time, we must tackle the underlying drivers of poverty—family breakdown, illiteracy and innumeracy, substance abuse among parents and so on—as well as put a welcome emphasis, as she has done, on getting people back into work?

[Nicky Morgan]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. The Government remain committed to ending child poverty by 2020 and to the Child Poverty Act 2010. We understand that poverty is about more than income alone. As he has said, we need to focus on the root causes, one of which is poor mental health, in which I have taken a particular interest.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Morgan of Cotes and Julian Brazier

Tuesday 10th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

My hon. Friend is, of course, right. The fall in living standards is a consequence of the economic crisis left to us, and the best way to deal with living standards is to deal with that economic crisis so that families can find work in a growing economy.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the reason we have had a big drop in living standards is that we had the largest drop in output since the second world war? As my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom) says, we need to rebuild that output, as we are now doing, if we want to rebuild living standards.

[Nicky Morgan]

My hon. Friend is right. As I said, Paul Johnson of the Institute for Fiscal Studies said:

“We’ve have had the biggest recession we’ve had in 100 years”.

It is hardly surprising that household incomes and wages have fallen. We recognise that times have been very tough for households and for businesses, but as my right hon. Friend the Chancellor’s autumn statement showed last week, we are on the right path to a responsible recovery now.