Savings Accounts and Health in Pregnancy Grant Bill

Yasmin Qureshi Excerpts

Tuesday 26th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hoban]

Mr Waugh continues:

“It is spent on absolutely anything the mother wants. A lot of middle class mums simply bung it towards a fancy new Bugaboo pram.”

[Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)]

Does the Minister know how much folic acid costs?

[Mr Hoban]

Clearly, if this grant was targeted at enabling women to buy folic acid, the argument would be different, but no strings are attached to this grant; money can be used in any way that people want.

--- Later in debate ---

[Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)]

I know that time is short, so I intend to be quite brief, although I apologise in advance for not allowing any interventions, as a number of colleagues still wish to speak.

I endorse and echo the sentiments expressed by my right hon. and hon. Friends, who have explained in detail why the child trust fund and the health in pregnancy grant are important and why we need to retain them. I want to deal with the three reasons given by the Government for why they have brought forward this piece of legislation. The first reason is that they have to make these cuts and that the Bill is the only way to do so, because of financial difficulties. Paul Krugman, who was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), recently said that the Government’s cuts are ideologically driven, not driven by economic necessity. Therefore, economics has nothing to do with the reason for making the cuts in this Bill.

Secondly, we are told that the schemes are being cut because they are universal benefits, benefitting the rich and poor alike. However, if that is the argument, why should the Bill not be amended to say that such benefits should be means-tested, so that those who need them can keep them? That would make the Government’s case more logical. I suggest that the Government are using the argument about this being a universal benefit, even though they do not do so in regard to the winter fuel allowance—I want to put on record that I am not against the winter fuel allowance being universally available—because it is well known that people of pension age are the most likely to vote, while those who receive income support have the lowest tendency to vote. Perhaps there is an element of self-interest there. That would explain why the Government think it is fine to abolish one universal benefit, the child trust fund, but wrong to abolish the winter fuel allowance.

It has been said that the child trust fund has not led to an increase in the savings culture in our society, and that it was intended for children to use when they reached 18 and were grown up. We know that the savings culture has gone from our society over the past 20 or 30 years and that people are saving less and less. However, many people in their early 20s to mid-30s find that having children is an encouragement to save, and that is bringing saving back into our society. To suggest that the argument about the savings culture does not apply because a child does not benefit from the trust fund until they are 18 is also wrong.

The child trust fund continues to be among the most successful Government savings schemes ever. Two million people are now contributing to 4.5 million accounts, resulting in more than £2 billion of assets under management and attracting more than £22 million a month in regular contributions. As my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) pointed out, the majority of this activity is undertaken by families with an income of less than £50,000. We have seen that the number of people saving has increased, and the Government should be thinking about how to make that very successful programme even better. We should be trying to find ways of extending and improving the system, not abolishing it.

I shall turn now to the health in pregnancy grant. If someone is well-off, so be it: becoming pregnant probably causes no inconvenience or difficulty for them. Having a child results in many extra expenditures, however, and the Government should surely be able to afford giving even a little extra money to those on very low incomes. They have told us that they have introduced a levy on bankers’ bonuses, but if this is all about finance, why can they not increase the levy just a little more? I am part of a group called the Robin Hood tax alliance, which contends that if we were to tax the bankers a bit more, we could easily get £45 billion. That would be more than enough to pay for the child trust fund and the health in pregnancy grant. The money is there in the system; it is just a question of whether there is any will on the part of the Government to use it in the right way.

The argument that we have to make these cuts just does not wash. This is really sad, and I am surprised at Members on the Government Benches. I thought that there were more compassionate Conservatives out there who would think that these benefits could be retained. If they really do not want to provide them on a universal basis, they could at least target them at people on lower incomes.