Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Miller Excerpts

Tuesday 26th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Kemi Badenoch]

I would dispute the hon. Gentleman’s claims. We have taken unprecedented steps to support people and businesses around the country. We have supported 19,100 jobs in his constituency through the coronavirus job retention scheme. Greater Manchester Combined Authority has been allocated £54.2 million from the Getting Building fund for a wide-ranging package of projects. We have also provided over £170 million for the Greater Manchester-Preston city region and Liverpool city region to improve public transport. We have also supported the regeneration of 33 towns in the north-west through the towns fund. There is a lot that is happening on levelling up. If he would like me to write to him to explain everything that we have done in his region, I am happy to do so.

[Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

What comparative assessment his Department has made of the effect of Government financial support during the covid-19 outbreak on (a) women and (b) men on low to moderate incomes.

[The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Kemi Badenoch)]

The impact of tax and welfare policy is best analysed at the whole-household level. As the Institute for Fiscal Studies has said, because most people live in households with others and we do not know how incomes are shared, it is very hard to look at effects separately for many men and women. That is why the Government support has been targeted at the most vulnerable. Our distributional analysis published last year shows that the Government’s covid-19 financial support protected the poorest households’ incomes the most as a proportion of their income.

[Mrs Miller [V]]

The pandemic has been a difficult time for pregnant women in work, and one in four have faced discrimination, including being unlawfully singled out for redundancy—a problem not confined to the pandemic. Will my hon. Friend look again at how other countries tackle this problem and consider adopting Germany’s approach of protecting pregnant women from redundancy, which would also give families much-needed financial stability at what can be a very challenging time?