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Mr. William Cash (Stone): Would the Chancellor read the front page headline of the Staffordshire Newsletter, which states, "Our schools betrayed"? There is a photograph of the Prime Minister below the headline. Why are all the public services--including the health, local government, social and education services--in Staffordshire in crisis? Will he explain that to my constituents, the House, and perhaps also to Rodney Bickerstaffe, Bill Morris and John Edmonds? Will he also explain the connection between the 3 per cent. deficit--
to which he referred earlier--and the Maastricht treaty, and why the people of this country do not get the services that they believe they should receive?
Mr. Brown: The hon. Gentleman is now posing as a champion of public expenditure--which will sit strangely with the views that he expressed during the last Parliament. This Labour Government have put £20 billion extra into education. Without this Government, that £20 billion would not have gone to education and the £19 billion extra would not have gone to health. We have just heard this afternoon from the shadow Chancellor that he opposed putting that £40 billion in--
Mr. Maude: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The Chancellor has deliberately and absolutely misrepresented what I said.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin): Order. Perhaps the right hon. Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude) will raise his point of order after the statements.
Mr. Brown: I am grateful, Mr. Deputy Speaker.I repeat: the shadow Chancellor opposed putting £40 billion into health and education. He and his colleagues will not be allowed to forget that. They called that expenditure reckless and wasteful. They said that we would have to cut back and that we could not afford it. That was the position of the Conservative party, and that is what the Conservatives are all about.
Mrs. Maria Fyfe (Glasgow, Maryhill): Does myright hon. Friend agree that it is not surprising that Conservative Members have not uttered a single word this afternoon about child poverty? They threw children into poverty and we are correcting that situation as quickly as possible. Does my right hon. Friend agree that we must deal with the problem facing unemployed single mothers who cannot find child care during the hours ofwork offered by prospective employers? What are the
Government doing for responsible mothers who cannot work at present for perfectly sensible reasons involving child care?
Mr. Brown: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who has been a champion of action against child poverty for many years. As I have said, our proposed measures will take nearly 1 million children out of poverty. I recognise that we must do more and that child care is important for lone parents who are looking for work or who wish to attend college courses. Through the 37,000 child care places that will be available in colleges, we are determined to increase the ability of lone parents to gain the college qualifications they need.
We want to increase the number of child carers, and there is money available for that. We want to increase the accessibility of child care, and there is money available to expand the number of child care places. Under the child care element of the working families tax credit, there will be more money to help families pay for child care.
Mr. John Townend (East Yorkshire):
I ask this question as the chairman of a small and medium-sized enterprise. For companies such as mine, the savings on corporation tax are peanuts compared with the burdens that have been imposed on us in the past few years. I refer to the cost of derv for delivery vans, the cost of petrol for representatives' cars, the working time directive, the 48-hour week, paternity rights, the part-time directive, the social chapter, and the administrative costs associated with the working families tax credit, the child tax credit, the disabled tax credit and student loans. Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that such measures increase competitiveness and job creation or reduce them?
Mr. Brown:
The hon. Gentleman seems to oppose any improvement in maternity rights and in other measures designed to help working people in this country. He should congratulate the Government on creating the stability that is necessary for small and other businesses to move forward. That certainly did not happen under the Government whom the hon. Gentleman supported.
Mr. Maude:
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. Points of order are not taken until after statements. I shall take the right hon. Gentleman's point of order after the statements.
Benefits Uprating
5 pm
The Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Alistair Darling): I should like to make a short statement on the annual uprating of benefits. I also want to set out how we are delivering a better deal for pensioners.
First, on uprating, I can confirm that most national insurance benefits will rise by the retail prices index, which is 1.1 per cent. That means that, to protect the basic state pension from inflation, we shall increase it in line with prices to £67.50. For couples, that rises to £107.90. Most income-related benefits will rise by the Rossi index--1.6 per cent.--in the normal way. I shall place details of the uprating in the Vote Office, and I shall arrange for the figures to be published in the Official Report shortly, in the usual way.
Today, we have already announced significant help for children. I now want to set out the additional help that we are giving to pensioners. The help will mean that our oldest, poorest pensioners will be more than £500 a year better off since we came to power. That is real help from this Government for those in real need. We are determined to tackle pensioner poverty, because retirement should be a time in life to look forward to. For many it is, but for too many it is not. We are determined to help every pensioner to have a secure and fulfilling retirement.
However, we inherited two problems. The first is a problem for the future. If we had done nothing, one in three people could have depended on means-tested benefits in retirement. That was the legacy we faced, which no Government could tolerate. So, we are tackling that with our reforms for the long term. We are reforming the state earnings-related pension scheme--SERPS--with the state second pension, and we are introducing the new stakeholder pension schemes. Because of our proposals, people can look forward to a decent income in retirement after a lifetime of hard work.
However, the second problem that we inherited is immediate, and it needs to be confronted now. Since 1979, pensioner incomes as a whole have increased, but the gap between the better-off pensioners and the poor widened dramatically. The incomes of the 2 million better-off pensioners rose by two thirds, but the 2 million poorest pensioners missed out, their incomes rising by only a third.
Too many pensioners have spent the past 20 years living in poverty, afraid to turn on their heating, struggling to make ends meet and sometimes living in fear and isolation. That cannot be right, which is why we are acting now by delivering a fair deal for pensioners with more cash help for the poorest, help with fuel bills and action to tackle isolation.
Our priority is to direct help to those hardest hit over the past 20 years, those who missed out in the rising national prosperity. That is why we have introduced the minimum income guarantee, which will provide extra help for those who need it most, and that is why we are increasing the minimum income guarantee in line with earnings from next April. Therefore, it will be worth £78.45 for single pensioners and £121.95 for couples. For single pensioners aged between 75 and 79 that rises to £80.85, and to £125.35 for couples. For those over 80 that increases to £86.05 and to £131.05.
The universal basic state pension remains the foundation of pension provision in this country. However, Governments over the past 50 years have known that the basic state pension would not do enough on its own. That is why the graduated pension scheme was introduced in 1961 and why SERPS was introduced in 1978. That is why we are introducing radical reforms for the future, and it is also why we have already introduced the minimum income guarantee, which gives direct cash help to the poorest now and helps those who would otherwise have to live on the basic state pension with no income from a funded pension to top it up.
An across-the-board increase in the basic state pension would not begin to tackle the pensioner poverty that we inherited. The poorest would lose their benefit pound for pound, and they would be no better off as a result. That is why our approach--providing extra help for the poorest pensioners--is not only the right thing to do; it is the only fair thing to do, and it is the only way seriously to tackle pensioner poverty today. So, that is why I can announce today that we shall increase the minimum income guarantee in line with earnings each and every year during this Parliament.
We are helping 1.5 million of our poorest pensioner households more than ever before, because we are determined to make sure that retirement is a time to look forward to, and of course for most pensioners it is. However, it can be difficult for pensioners on fixed incomes to meet the cost of one-off annual bills. Older pensioners can find that particularly hard, since they are more likely to be living on low incomes. Nearly half of pensioners over 75 are among the poorest third in relation to incomes.
To solve that problem and to address the particular needs of older pensioners, the Chancellor today announced free television licences for pensioners aged 75 and over. That will provide help for pensioners who need extra help after a lifetime of hard work and caring. It will help 3 million households from next autumn and will be worth up to £101. The measure will help to prevent isolation and it will help older pensioners to keep in touch and to stay informed. We are helping to make sure that older, poorer pensioners have access to something that so many of us take for granted. Details of how we shall do that will be published shortly.
We are helping the poorest through the minimum income guarantee and we are helping the oldest with free TV licences. It is those pensioners who have most to gain through the winter fuel payments. This year, around 10 million pensioners in about 7.5 million households will get £100, paid, for the first time, before Christmas. The first of this year's winter fuel payments were sent out yesterday.
Today we can go further. I can confirm that the £100 winter fuel payment will be paid each and every year from now on. That is on top of cutting VAT on fuel and on top of the home energy efficiency scheme, which will help the poorest with up to £2,000 to fit central heating from next year. All those measures have been taken by this Government. We are delivering lower fuel bills and providing pensioners with direct help to pay for them.
We always knew that the retail prices index would be low in September. We not only predicted it, we pre-empted it with all the additional help announced
today: the increase in the minimum income guarantee in line with earnings for the rest of this Parliament;free television licences for pensioners over 75, and the fivefold increase in winter fuel payments paid every year from now on.
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