Child Poverty

Michael Tomlinson Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Duncan Smith]

No. All those young people will always be supported by this Government. We are talking about getting the balance right between those who need support and can be supported by their families and those who have genuine and serious long-term difficulties. Part of the process I have announced today is to identify those families earlier. Universal credit helps enormously in identifying the families with debt problems, housing problems, and drug and alcohol problems. Getting to them and dealing with those problems is far better than the tokenism that the hon. Lady seems to be involved in.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement, which will continue to build on the Government’s work to address the root causes of poverty in Mid Dorset and North Poole and elsewhere. Does he agree that this Government’s work to support families and prevent family breakdown is critical in tackling child poverty and increasing children’s life chances?

[Mr Duncan Smith]

I do believe that. One of the big failures of Governments is that too often they have been ambivalent about the whole concept of stable family structures and have simply chased the errors. Since we came to power, family life has stabilised, according to the latest reports. More than that, we are putting millions of pounds into help and support for those in danger of family break-up, and that never happened before.