Clause 8 - Entitlement
Tax Credits Bill
11:00 am
Professor Steve Webb (Northavon, Liberal Democrat)
I beg to move amendment No. 66, in page 6, line 19, leave out from 'who' to end of line 21 and insert
'either—
(a) has not attained such age (greater than sixteen) as is prescribed and satisfies prescribed conditions; or
(b) is aged less than 20 and is engaged in a course of full-time non-advanced education and began that course before the age of 18.'.
Clause 8 deals with entitlement to child tax credit, and that raises the question: What is a child? The amendment is designed to probe further the grey area of children who are past the end of compulsory schooling, but may be in full-time education. I should like to flag up for the Minister, in anticipation of our later debate on entitlement to working families tax credit, that I shall then deal with children at the other end of the age scale—the position of pregnant mothers, new-borns, maternity leave and that set of issues. The issues may be related as it could be argued that pregnant women should be brought into the scope of child tax credit. We have not tabled a specific amendment to that effect, so I shall deal with it when we debate clause 10. I just wanted to forewarn the Minister.
The current children's tax credit applies only to 16 and below. One cannot receive it in respect of a 17-year-old, whereas the working families tax credit provisions broadly mirror those for child benefit in applying up to the age of 18. In bringing the two systems together, which road should we go down? The Bill states that the money can be obtained in respect of a child—youngsters in school presumably fall into that category—but then refers to ''qualifying young persons''. What does that term mean? Is a 17-year-old at school a clear case of a qualifying young person? What about an 18-year-old or someone who takes two years resitting GCSEs? Those are grey areas. One wonders how far the tax credit system should be doing the job of educational maintenance, or do the Government believe that that should be dealt with through a separate system?
The amendment is designed to probe who precisely is covered by the clause and, in particular, by the term ''qualifying young persons''. Are 17 and 18-year-olds, and perhaps even 19-year-olds coming to the end of A-levels included? Will the Minister clarify the Government's intentions?