Any young girl who becomes pregnant receives child tax credit, income support, child benefit and a £500 maternity grant and their rent and rates paid for them. The shocking extent of benefits made available to such gym-slip mums has to stop.


The government is effectively condoning under-age sex. It also puts a gloss on teenage motherhood, with the result being many youngsters consider it an attractive lifestyle.Perhaps most crucially, handouts like these make a mockery of the Government's strategy aimed at cutting teenage pregnancies.

The Government vowed to half the number of pregnant under-16s by 2010. But how can it achieve this goal when it is offering teenagers such 'help' as £500 maternity grants? These policies are simply encouraging pregnancies among young women.A lot of the ones on my estates admire their peers who have given birth and often seek to copy their status and acquire the free flat they think having a baby usually brings.

Such alarming attitudes should provide the government with a stark warning that welfare benefits to single teenage mothers need to be curtailed.Britain has long had among the highest teen pregnancy rates in the EU. The initiatives introduced to tackle the problem are not working. But this is shrugged off by the Government, which claims the situation will improve.



But how can it improve when teenagers are confronted at every turn with the notion that teenage sex is acceptable? Teenage pregnancy plotlines are now are in all of our television soaps.Then there's the government's promotion of abortion and contraception among school-aged children which in effect condones and encourages sexual activity.The Government must change tack and adopt a tougher line.



Advocating abstention is a policy which has worked in America. So, if America can cut teen pregnancies, why can't we? Britain has effectively made under-age sex acceptable by handing out condoms to children and proposing confidential sex counselling to girls under 16.
Why aren't we reinforcing the meaning between sex and love and the importance of committment between sexual partners? Education is vital in combatting teenage pregnancies, not the incentives for young mums-to-be that come with generous financial handouts.


It's not good enough for parents, or the government, to throw their hands up in their air and say the battle can't be won.Our role as responsible parents is to tell our teenagers that sex under 16 is wrong and against their best interests. Terrify them with the consequences, show them examples of the uphill battle children who have children face. These young mums seem to have enough money to booze their weekends away and bring home a string of men, exposing their children to God knows what. Benefits to this section of society must be cut.