Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the statement of the Chief Secretary to the Treasury to the Treasury Committee of 31 January 2018, what (a) amount and (b) proportion of the 6 per cent increase in maternal employment she cited is paid at the National Living Wage.

The Office for National Statistics has published statistics that show the employment rate of women with dependent children in England increased by 6.3 percentage points from 67.4 per cent in April-June 2010 to 73.7 per cent in April-June 2017, with 64 per cent of the increase amongst women working full time. We do not have an estimate of the hourly earnings of those women. https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/articles/familiesandthelabourmarketengland/2017

Economic evidence from both the UK and internationally shows a positive effect of reduced childcare costs on female labour market participation. In the UK, the Institute for Fiscal Studies found that the fraction of mothers working or looking for work increases by 5.7 percentage points when their youngest child becomes eligible for free full-time care at school.

The overall economic costs and benefit of parents moving into work will depend on a wide range of factors in both the short and long-term, and will vary significantly depending on the situation and characteristics of the family.