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Living Standards

Like my hon. Friend, many of us will have spoken to constituents in jobs whose hours vary—for instance, those working in retail or call centres, or those working as cleaners. However, at the moment, their hours are varying in one direction: downwards, because employers are cutting hours and cutting staff. In addition to the changes to working tax credits, next January more than 1.5 million families will lose every single penny of their child benefit. The Government are saying, ““Well, we're only cutting child benefit for rich families.”” However, if they talked to working families, they would realise that many families are heavily reliant on a single earner, because there is only one parent or because one parent is staying at home to bring up the kids. Those families are being hard hit by the changes.