Family Incomes

Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Treasury – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 1 March 2001.

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Photo of Dawn Primarolo Dawn Primarolo Paymaster General (HM Treasury) 12:00, 1 March 2001

I would recommend that the hon. Gentleman reads the whole of the CAB report. If he does, he will see that it welcomes the working families tax credit and acknowledges that 1.1 million families are being helped to the tune of £30 a week or more, compared with what they received under family credit. That is a contribution to the reduction in child poverty. The CAB report identified that, of the 90,000 calls that the bureaux received, there were only a handful of exceptional cases, and it gave one example involving a bad employer.

I repeat to the hon. Gentleman what I said to the CAB. The working families tax credit has built-in protection against bad employers, but the overwhelming Majority of employers welcome it and recognise the contribution that it makes to enabling their work force to stay in work, particularly by helping with child care costs, and to reducing child poverty, which the previous Government forced to increase.

majority

The term "majority" is used in two ways in Parliament. Firstly a Government cannot operate effectively unless it can command a majority in the House of Commons - a majority means winning more than 50% of the votes in a division. Should a Government fail to hold the confidence of the House, it has to hold a General Election. Secondly the term can also be used in an election, where it refers to the margin which the candidate with the most votes has over the candidate coming second. To win a seat a candidate need only have a majority of 1.