Mr Peter Bottomley (Greenwich Woolwich West)

I am happy to follow in the debate the speech of the hon. Member for St. Helens (Mr. Spriggs).

We all accept that we should do something quickly about the problems set out in the Finer Report. It is worth reminding ourselves that the pay increase of £28 a week which we received this summer was the same as the amount of social security received by a widower bringing up four children by himself. Perhaps that puts the matter in context.

We should also remember that the children and parents in one-parent families amount to about 1,700,000 people. I am not an honorary member of Gingerbread, as is the hon. Member for St. Helens, but I am a member of the Transport and General Workers' Union—the largest union in the country—which has the same number of members. It is about time that as much prominence was given to Margaret Bramall and the Finer Joint Action Committee as is often given, quite rightly in many cases, to my union's general secretary. One-parent families would not then be ignored as much as they have been by successive Governments over many years.

We have dealt with five of the classic risks facing people—the death of the breadwinner, old age, unemployment, illness, and, in the last few years, we have done a great deal more about invalidity and disability. Perhaps one of the most modern classic risks is being a member of a family with only one parent.

Leaving aside party politics, I should like to congratulate the Secretary of State on being one of the first to recognise that modern category of risk when she announced that family allowances for the first child would be increased first for one-parent families. Plainly someone like myself, who is chairman of an organisation which is part of the Finer Joint Action Committee, would have liked that first child allowance to be made a disregard for social security purposes, which would have helped half the one-parent families who will not receive that help. It is an indictment of all of us—and I include myself in this, even though I have been a Member for only three months—that half the one-parent families are on social security. Supplementary benefits are not doing the job which they were designed to do for a group as large as that. Such an enormous group should receive a special benefit of their own.

I am sorry that my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir B. Rhys Williams) is not present because he would be able to put these points much more eloquently than I can. His expertise in these matters is as much valued by the House as is that of the hon. Members for Erith and Crayford (Mr. Wellbeloved) and Welwyn and Hatfield (Mrs. Hayman). I cannot contribute much except to say, perhaps following up the Archbishops, from where some of the money might come. Unless proposals to combat the problems outlined in the Finer Report cost money, we shall not give much help to the families in need.

I do not see why I should continue to receive a tax allowance for my children—an allowance which is not available for people whose income is not as great as mine—while one-parent families remain on the poverty level. I do not have to explain this matter to the Undersecretary of State because he and I have only to look at what the Child Poverty Action Group says about the work done by his wife and mine when they were low-paid employees of that organisation. [An HON. MEMBER: "He is a Socialist."] There is not much difference between Socialists, Christians and other people in this Chamber and in the country on an issue like this. I am not a Socialist.

If we were to say to people, "Do you want high subsidies for people who travel by British Rail rather than for those who travel by long distance coach?", or "Should we continue indiscriminate subsidies on food and give mortgage interest relief to people like me who have not the housing problems of many one-parent families?", the answer we should get from most people would be, "Let us give the help to those who need it. We are willing to pay our share". It is curious that society expects the liable relative to make a contribution to the maintenance of the family—and most liable relatives have not much money to spare for a second family—while people like myself are not expected to make a full contribution to the cost of school meals and we are not even allowed to make a contribution to our children's education.

See this speech in context