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Social Security (Lone Parents and Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2008

No? In that case, I shall have the answer in due course. I know that those credits go on for a full year. Nevertheless, many of those lone parents will have been out of work for some considerable time—I would guess at least seven years, and probably seven years plus maternity pay, possibly even longer. Some will never have worked at all. The subject of jobcentres brings me to the training of officials, who are particularly stretched at the moment by a reduction in numbers at a time when unemployment is on the increase—to 1.82 million—and only 589,000 jobs are available. I noted that the Minister’s figures on that particular item drifted a little between Question Time today and the speech that he has just made. There was a difference of 2,000. That is a tease that I could not resist. One wonders how long this will last, with small and medium enterprises failing at the rate of 50 a day, according to the Federation of Small Businesses. What extra training have officials been given to cope with the extra demands being placed on them by this order? How much will they know, and inform parents, about what childcare is available locally, for example? Presumably, the parents will be expected to pay something towards the childcare that their children receive; if so, to what extent does the Minister expect lone parents to be better off when paid the minimum wage? Lastly, and on a more general point, I said at the beginning of my speech that the Official Opposition believe that the policy of getting more people into work, whether lone parents or others, is the right one. I did not, however, say how pleased we are that the Government have adopted a fair proportion of our welfare to work policies, as shown by their acceptance of the Freud report. However, the way in which the Government are going about it makes me ponder. Do they have any intention at present of doing away with jobseeker’s allowance altogether in favour of the lower rate of ESA? Although I see a certain logic in that, now would not be the time to do it. Nor am I certain that, at a time of deepening recession, now is the time to move lone parents with children aged between 10 and 16 from income support to jobseeker’s allowance. Will the Minister tell us why the Government have introduced this order now, with unemployment rising as fast as it is?