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Home | Women's Work and Pay | Pay and Income | Budget 2006

Pre-Budget Report 2006 Outcomes for Women

The following items are among the outcomes of the Pre-Budget Report 2006 which will benefit women:

Increasing Employment Opportunity for All

In-work credit

Government will extend the In-work Credit in the current pilot areas until June 2007. this means that around 250,000 eligible lone parents will continue to benefit from improved financial gains to work.
In-Work Credit is a £40 per week payment for lone parents who have been on income support for more than 12 months, for their first 12 months back in work.

National Minimum

Wage Improved enforcement of the National Minimum Wage by increasing by 50 per cent the resources allocated to tackle non-compliance and raising penalties for the seriously non-compliant.
Nearly two thirds of those who benefit from the NMW are women.

Building a Fairer Society

Support for Families and Children

From April 2007, the value of the child element of Child Tax Credit will rise by £80 to £1,845 per year.

Government recognises the importance of a healthy diet in the final weeks of pregnancy and the additional costs faced by parents when their children are born. Low-income families may already claim the Sure Start Maternity Grant, worth £500 per child, to help with these additional costs. This PBR announces that:

From April 2009, additional support for all families, with every mother-to-be becoming eligible for Child Benefit from week 29 of their pregnancy, so that women will be up to £200 better off by the birth of their first child and up to £130 better off at the birth of their subsequent children.

Since 2003, parents with care on the new child support scheme have been able to keep the first £10 per week of any child maintenance paid without it affecting their benefit entitlement. This is known as the Child Maintenance Premium and currently over 50,000 parents are benefiting from it. By the end of 2008 the Government will extend the Child Maintenance Premium to parents with care on the old child support scheme – it is estimated this will benefit an extra 40,000 parents with care, with an additional 15,000 more children receiving the full amount of maintenance paid by the non-resident parent.

Fairness for Pensioners

An extension of the Warm Front programme targeting 300,000 pensioners and other households most vulnerable to fuel poverty. Warm Front programme includes free insulation and central heating. By the end of 2008, 2.7 million homes will have been insulated.
Mention of the Basic State Pension rising from next April to £87.30, with the longer-term commitment to uprate the BSP by earnings (as outlined in the recent Pensions Bill).
Pension Credit rising from next April to £119.05 for single pensioners and £181.70 for couples, and Savings Credit rising to maximum of £19.05 a week for a single pensioners and £25.26 for couples.

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