Public Expenditure Reductions (Women)

Toby Perkins Excerpts

Monday 6th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Ms Abbott]

I was very struck to hear the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, who has paid a lot of attention to poverty issues, saying that he thought it was important that people were prepared to move around the country from estate to estate in search of work. What family model is he thinking of? The family model he is thinking of is one where only the husband works. It did not seem to occur to him that many of these families also have women who work and who are not willing to pack up and follow their husband around the country. There are some very old-fashioned views of society here.

The Budget, together with the likely changes to the welfare system, seems to me to be more supportive of an outdated male breadwinner and dependent female carer model than the dual earner, dual carer model, which is more representative of society whether in Hackney, inner-city Newcastle or middle England. In short, it suggests that the Government are, for all the window dressing, out of touch and unwilling to move with the times.

The House will not need to be reminded that women rely more on benefits and tax credits than men. A larger share of women’s income is made up of benefits and tax credits. More women than men earn too little—because women are largely among the lower paid—to benefit from the change in income tax thresholds. Women are also more likely to work part time or unpaid, meaning they rely on benefits, particularly tax credits, to boost their income. These changes and the cuts to benefits have been dubbed the worst for women since the creation of the welfare state. I have therefore called this debate in order to put on the record the fact that I think this Budget is not just bad for Britain, but bad for women in Britain.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer insists that his Budget is a progressive Budget but, sadly, that only proves to me that this distinguished product of St Paul’s school does not understand the technical meanings of “progressive” and “regressive” in respect of economic matters. Under any analysis this is a regressive Budget because, in relative terms, it takes more from the poor than from the rich.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

On the comments that have been made about the Budget proving that we are all in this together, the analysis that my hon. Friend is setting out demonstrates not only that women are getting it with both barrels, but that at the same time as women are being asked to pay such a high price for the mistakes of the bankers who got the country into this financial mess, the situation of major industries will, through the cut in corporation tax, improve. Women will be expected to pay more, but big business, and particularly the banking sector, will be better off as a result of the Budget. Does that not demonstrate that we are not in fact all in this together?

[Ms Abbott]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that comment. It is extraordinary that this so-called progressive Budget will disadvantage women with families—and particularly poorer women with families—and advantage big business and bankers. The welfare state, which Government Members love to decry, is essential for stay-at-home mums—a strong state is essential for them—but it is also important for working mums.

Government support is essential for mothers who want to stay at home with their children. I went back to work when my son was eight days old—he voted in the Lobby when he was eight days old—but that was my choice. I have always argued—as have my own Government when Labour was in office—that women should have a choice. We should not financially disadvantage women who choose to stay at home. This Budget, in the cuts that it will make to the welfare state, will make it harder for stay-at-home mums and for working women, because of the predominant number of working women in the public sector. Even the initial decision to freeze public sector pay will hit women, because 4 million of the 6 million people who work in the public sector are women and so women are twice as likely to suffer from the pay freeze. When discussing the public sector cuts further, we must consider the number of women who are head of their household and who will be affected by the 600,000 new job cuts likely by 2016.

Widespread discrimination still takes place in the workplace. A report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission calculated that at the current rate of progress it will take 60 years for women to gain equal status on the boards of the FTSE 100 top companies. So we must ask ourselves why the Government have gone ahead with a Budget that hits women so disproportionately. We have to ask ourselves why they have used a ratio of public sector cuts to tax of 80:20, given that even the previous major Tory cuts Budget, which was under Norman Lamont, used a ratio of 50:50. The 80:20 ratio is at the heart of why this Budget hits women so hard.

The Fawcett Society, which campaigns for pay and pensions equality between men and women, has taken the Treasury to court over the Budget; it has filed papers with the High Court to seek a judicial review of the Government’s emergency Budget, and it is right to do so. Its chief executive, Ceri Goddard, has said:

“Successive governments have failed to give enough consideration to how their policies will impact on equality between men and women, but this budget shows a whole new level of disregard for the importance of equality law and everyday women’s lives.”

The public are giving this new Government an element of a honeymoon period, but Government Members must mark my words. They will see what happens as the financial impact of this Budget comes to bear on ordinary people and they realise what the plans for child benefit are, what the consequences of abolishing the child trust fund and the health in pregnancy grant are, and what effects the proposed housing benefit cuts have on children living in housing need in London—the Minister knows this better than I. London is a high-rent area, so many women and children will find themselves homeless or having to live in more overcrowded conditions, which will make it even harder for them to access work.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lynne Featherstone]

I thank my hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. Obviously, the Government case is that the Budget is progressive. We are increasing child tax credits for the poorest families, protecting them against poverty.

[Toby Perkins]

If the hon. Lady believes that the Library was biased, does she think that the IFS was also biased when it said that the Budget was clearly regressive?

[Lynne Featherstone]

I think that the Institute for Fiscal Studies was inaccurate in what it said. The Government have made it clear that the burden of deficit will have to be shared. At the Budget, the Government took unprecedented steps in publishing details. The Treasury welcomes the innovative approach of the IFS in its revised analysis of the Budget and is open to exploring new ways of assessing the potential impact of Budget measures. However, the IFS states that in order to include previously unmodelled reforms the report makes some strong assumptions that add uncertainty to the analysis.