1m families to miss out on Child Tax Credit
The deadline for claiming the Government’s Child Tax Credit is expected to cut off over one million families who are entitled to the benefit.
Both the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives are warning that not all of the 5.2 million families believed to be eligible for the new Child Tax Credit have claimed. The deadline for claims is Monday 7th July.
Conservative Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, David Willets warned that only the latest figures show that only 4.2 million families have claimed for the tax credit. He claims that ten per cent of all families with children have not made a claim because of the complexity of the system.
Mr Willets is to call for a suspension of the deadline in a Commons debate later today.
Mr Willets commented, ‘Gordon Brown should abolish this year’s deadline for tax credit claims. Instead, ministers should allow people who claim at any point within the current tax year to have their claim backdated to April. That might help increase the level of take-up from catastrophically low to just about respectable. Unless we do this, too many of Britain’s families will carry on losing out.’
The CTC entitles all families with children with an income of up to £58,000 of £66,000 with a child under one-year-old to a payment.
Claims will still be taken after the 7th July deadline but people will not receive the full year’s benefit.
Mr Willets added, ‘Today I am shining the spotlight on the families who haven’t even applied for the tax credit in the first place. It is deeply worrying that if they haven’t applied by today, they won’t be able to get the money for the full tax year.’
Liberal Democrat Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, Professor Steve Webb warned that the deadline would mean that the Government was ‘sitting on’ over half a billion of money that one million families were entitled to.
Professor Webb stated, ‘The government estimated that six million families were eligible. To have one sixth of this number left out in the cold is unacceptable.’
