Pro-marriage think tank, the Marriage Foundation, has put forward its “alternative budget”, in which it claims that by taking measures to address the ‘epidemic’ of family fragmentation, the Chancellor could save up to half of the annual £46 billion cost of relationship breakdown.
The total cost of family breakdown figure, calculated in a study by the Relationships Foundation, takes into account the £9 billion in paid out in lone parent benefits, but also the costs of educational failure, juvenile delinquency and mental health problems linked to family breakdown.
The new Marriage Foundation report advocates a re-focus on the family in policy-making to curb the soaring rate of family breakdown.
Specifically it recommends introducing a minister responsible for families into the Cabinet to put family breakdown firmly back on the agenda as an issue in need of redress.
It also proposes distinguishing marriage as opposed to cohabitation on government forms, adapting the transferable tax allowance to go to married mothers with children under three, and moving all NHS ante-natal services into Surestart Centres to improve awareness of relationship support services.
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