Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Environment – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 12 June 1991.
Miss Joan Lestor
, Eccles
12:00,
12 June 1991
If the Minister is saying that the Government do not collect the statistics nationally, it is about time that they did. Research undertaken by Kim Greener at Brunel university has shown that 140,000 school-age children are now in bed-and-breakfast accommodation. Is the Minister aware that those children suffer nutritionally because there are no proper cooking facilities in the accommodation and that that affects their educational attainment, because a hungry or malnourished child cannot learn properly? It is about time that the Government reversed their housing policy, because the selling of council houses has meant that all the council houses that could house large families have gone. Many of the families concerned have been in bed-and-breakfast accommodation for 18 months and their children are suffering to a degree that should not be permitted.
Ministers make up the Government and almost all are members of the House of Lords or the House of Commons. There are three main types of Minister. Departmental Ministers are in charge of Government Departments. The Government is divided into different Departments which have responsibilities for different areas. For example the Treasury is in charge of Government spending. Departmental Ministers in the Cabinet are generally called 'Secretary of State' but some have special titles such as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Ministers of State and Junior Ministers assist the ministers in charge of the department. They normally have responsibility for a particular area within the department and are sometimes given a title that reflects this - for example Minister of Transport.
