Cabinet rebels on truancy 'gimmick'

Tony Blair was today pitched into battle with his own Cabinet over his radical plan to withdraw child benefit from the parents of persistent truants.

Labour MPs joined with the Tories in condemning the idea as a half-baked gimmick, designed to capture headlines rather than solve the problem.

As the dispute erupted, an opinion poll showed a slump in the number of people who see the Prime Minister as honest and trustworthy, while more believe that he relies too heavily on spin doctors.

Critics claimed the Prime Minister's bid to take a tough line on truancy was a populist move ahead of this week's town hall elections, with Labour expected to fare badly as its voters stay at home.

Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott publicly distanced himself from the truancy penalties move. Chancellor Gordon Brown and Work and Pensions Secretary-Alistair Darling were said to be leading a Cabinet revolt against it.

Asked on BBC TV's On The Record about the plan, unveiled by Downing Street at the weekend, Mr Prescott said: "We don't know that that is a proposal. I assume this must come from a range of areas of possible policies."

Mr Blair was said to have been "astonished" when he learned that 80 per cent of truants caught at shopping centres were accompanied by their parents. His plan would involve withdrawing child benefit, worth £15.75 a week for the first child or £17.55 for lone parents, if a child continued to skip school despite repeated warnings.

The Prime Minister was said to have raised his idea at four separate meetings of a No 10 taskforce looking at ways to combat youth crime. Education Secretary Estelle Morris backed the move as a way to make parents take responsibility for their children's actions. She said: "We are not talking about your child being off school for a day with a cold and you lose child benefit.

"We are talking about when parents have been warned again and again."

However, there was fury among Leftwing Labour MPs. Diane Abbott called the idea "nothing more than a gimmick" and said: "Many of these women - and they are mostly women - even if they wanted to control their children, couldn't. All we would do is make some very poor women and their other children even poorer."

There was also anger from the Child Poverty Action Group, whose director Martin Barnes said the benefits withdrawal "is not going to make the job of parenting any easier". Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith said: "It is not part of a real concerted plan or a network of things to do. It is just an announcement to get the press off their backs for five or six days while they run to the local elections. It is so cynical."

Today's opinion poll, conducted on the internet by YouGov, found that just 31 per cent of the public believe the Prime Minister is "honest and trustworthy", compared with 77 per cent when Gallup conducted a similar poll in 1998. Those saying that Mr Blair "relies too heavily on PR men and spin doctors" rose from 52 per cent to 71 per cent, while those saying Mr Blair "is proving to be a strong Prime Minister" fell from 81 per cent to 48 per cent.

Mr Blair retained his lead over Mr Brown as the man most voters want to see as Prime Minster. In the poll, 48 per cent said they would prefer Mr Blair in the job, against 36 per cent for Mr Brown.