MP Mark Reckless hits out at 'toxic' policy
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by political editor Paul Francis
The government has been urged to
re-think its plans to cut child benefit by Kent MP Mark Reckless,
who has warned it has become a ‘toxic’ policy.
The Rochester and Strood MP said the
plan to withdraw benefit from households in which one or more
taxpayers earn more than £45,000 was unfair and one he would find
it difficult to support.
Writing in his blog, Mr Reckless
warned the government was ‘toxic’ and that ‘a very significant
number of Conservative backbenchers’ were sufficiently concerned
that they were likely to vote against the policy.
He said: "Ministers cannot answer
colleagues who question them about the sheer unfairness of one
family with a single earner on £45,000 losing their child benefit,
while a family with two earners, each earning around £40,000, get
to keep their child benefit.
"Certainly, I don’t feel that I am
currently able to give constituents a satisfactory answer as to how
this is fair, particularly when we continue to pay child benefit to
many thousands of children in EU countries such as Poland and
Lithuania, where costs are much lower, even when they have never
set foot in the UK."
The issue was ‘particularly toxic’ for
MPs who were keen to see the Conservatives promote marriage and
traditional family values, he added. "However, the policy is also
objectionable for those who want the tax system to be neutral
between personal choices, since it clobbers single earner
householders, most usually with a stay-at-home Mum, relative to
dual-earner couples."
The benefit is worth £20.30 a week for
the first child and £13.40 each for every sibling. Under the
government’s plans, as many as 1.8m families where a parent earns
more than £42,725 would lose out.
Mr Reckless said he would find it hard
to support the changes as they stood, principally because of their
unfairness and that many backbenchers shared his reservations.
The Prime Minister has indicated the
policy may be re-examined but to date, no official steps have been
made to change the proposals.
Wednesday, February 22 2012
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