Don't expect us to pay benefits for unlimited babies, says minister - big families won't be supported on welfare
By Daily Mail Reporter
7th October 2010
Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt called 'abhorrent' by campaigners
He insists state should not give limitless support to large families
Labour leader Ed Miliband accuses him of 'lecturing' the public
A Cabinet minister was branded 'abhorrent' today after saying that the state should not provide limitless support to benefits claimants with large families.
Campaigners reacted with fury after the Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt savaged the policy of sizeable handouts totalling more than the average household earns.
Mr Hunt claimed that the Government's proposed cap on benefits reflected the need for claimants to 'take responsibility' for their children.
But he denied that the new limit was a 'penalty' on large families.
'The number of children that you have is a choice and what we're saying is that if people are living on benefits, then they make choices but they also have to have responsibility for those choices,' he told Newsnight
'It's not going to be the role of the state to finance those choices.'
He added: 'You can have children but if you are going to ask for support that is more than the average wage that people earn, then we're saying no, the state shouldn't support that.
'That's not fair on working people who have to pay the taxes to pay those benefits.'
Mr Hunt also insisted that the Government was right to withdraw child benefit from families where one parent is a higher-rate taxpayer.
'If ever there was a week when the Conservative Party and the coalition demonstrated its commitment to fairness, it's this week when they removed child benefit from top rate taxpayers,' he said.
Mr Hunt remarks were today criticised by a number of experts and Labour politicians.
Alison Garnham, chief executive of Child Poverty Action Group, said: 'The bankers who are most to blame for this crisis are getting billions in bonuses again, yet it is children in poverty who are paying the price.
'Forcing children into destitution on the arbitrary basis of how many brothers and sisters they have is abhorrent.
'As families brace themselves to discover whether their jobs will survive the cuts, it is awful that those with larger families should face this extra anxiety.
'The numbers of very large families have declined tremendously over recent generations, so why pick on these few children and mark them out as deserving destitution?
UNEASY ED MILIBAND GETS GRILLED ON THIS MORNINGEd Miliband might have been expecting an easy ride when he appeared on This Morning today.
But the new Labour leader looked distinctly uncomfortable as he was grilled by Philip Schofield and Holly Willoughby.
He squirmed as it was pointed out his brother David was more Prime Ministerial and no one really knows who he is.
And he had to defend himself against claims he will now be in hock to the unions because their vote secured his victory.
Mr Miliband admitted his brother's defeat was a 'blow for him, no question about it'. 'It is disappointing for him,' he said.
He also conceded their relationship was now 'different', although he insisted it was as deep and strong as before.
'We're been through quite a difficult few months, no getting away from it, because we've been through a leadership contest against each other,' he said.
Ms Willoughby questioned how he could lead Labour is there were already questions about if the right brother had taken over.
But Mr Miliband said: 'There is a widespread view in the Labour party that we have got to unite behind me as a leader.'
On the issue of union influence, he stressed: 'I am my own person.'
And he issued a warning, declaring: 'I have been underestimated all along. I was 33-1 outsider and I won the election.
'If the Tories want to underestimate me, that's fine. I'm under no illusions about the scale of the task that faces me as a leader.'
He also denied that Gordon Brown was furious after his conference speech last week, in which he criticised claims Labour had abolished boom and bust.
'I have spoken to Gordon and he hasn't said that to me. He said "great speech".'
'All children deserve to be valued and protected by the nation equally and it is a scandal that nearly four million already live in poverty.
'Families with children have already suffered the greatest burden of the cuts so far, but children do not have the broadest shoulders and it is time for the Government to back off and target those who do.'
Labour leader Ed Miliband told This Morning: 'People don't really want politicians coming along lecturing them about how many kids they should have.'
He also called the child benefit announcement this week a 'complete shambles' and said they had caused 'huge anxiety'.
'I don't think they should be messing around with it in the way they are... Changes have to be made, we have got to reduce the deficit but we have to do it in a way that's fair,' he said.
'All families need support. I am against the changes that the Government is making to child benefit.
'The way they have gone about them has caused huge anxiety, particularly for mums who are staying at home while maybe their husbands are going out to work.
'I will look at the changes the Government propose on welfare. We do need to get more people into work and I will look sympathetically at some of the changes that they are making.
'But when it comes to child benefit which has gone to all families for 60 years in this country - it was a legacy of the Second World War - I think it is really important to support families in this country and I think child benefit is a good way of doing it. I don't think, frankly, they should be messing around with it.'
Donald Hirsch, from Loughborough University's Centre for Research in Social Policy told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that the statements marked 'quite a slippery slope'.
'It's a real simplification to divide people effectively into these undeserving poor or lifetime poor who we say "these are the choices you make and if you make them we're not going to support you," and people who are working.
'In the present system we do expect people to go out and look for work if they can and if they lose their jobs we think about their needs, not just some crude comparison with someone who is working on an average wage.'
Labour MP Kate Green, a former head of the Child Poverty Action Group, told the show that children should not be made to suffer because of changes in their parents' circumstances.
Ms Green, MP for Stretford and Urmston, said: 'I think it's unreasonable and very cruel.
'It's utterly wrong that children should suffer because of circumstances their parents experience.'
She added: 'It's absolutely wrong to go down the line of saying only rich people or better-off people should be parents.'
This week Chancellor George Osborne unveiled proposals for a maximum limit on the amount of benefits one family can claim.
He did not put a figure on the new welfare cap but said that - with the exception of the disabled - no family will receive more in benefits than the average family receives from going out to work.
Under explosive plans revealed earlier this week, child benefit allowance will be stripped from all families where at least one parent is a higher rate taxpayer from 2013.
At present, higher rate tax of 40 per cent is paid by anyone earning more than £43,875.
But figures analysed by the Mail yesterday revealed that the starting point will plunge by £1,500 to £42,375 in April.
And in a further blow, one of Britain’s leading tax experts forecast that higher rate tax could begin on a salary as low as £38,600 by 2015, though this claim was denied by the Treasury.
The Government has said that only 15 per cent of families – around 1.2million – who receive child benefit will be affected by the cut.
But in some core Tory areas this is already as high as 35 per cent, and will inevitably rise further.
The fresh revelations will be a crushing disappointment for cash-strapped families who had believed they had escaped the hugely controversial clampdown.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z11grW3VEd
DON'T EXPECT US TO PAY BENEFITS FOR UNLIMITED BABIES
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