Helping teenage mums

Welcome for Plans to Curb Teenage Pregnancies

But the Family Planning Association said the measures must include boys as well as girls if they were to be effective.

The Social Security Minister, Frank Field, has joined forces with the Education Minister, Stephen Byers, to draw up a plan of action to help girls most at risk. They are to meet at the end of the summer holidays to finalise their proposals.

"We know that teenage mothers come from two main groups: those who never succeeded at school and those who started well but never made a successful transfer to secondary school," Mr Field said.

Field: Radical ideas to curb teenage pregnancies

Field explains his concerns on BBC's Today programme Dur: 3'31"

One suggestion is to use school test results to help identify both problem schools and at-risk individuals.

"There would be added urgency to helping those who score badly in their tests. I'm sure schools will want to do this as it will give those children happier lives," Mr Field said.

He has been impressed by a scheme in Bristol under which teenager mothers are invited into schools to talk about their lives as parents.

"The girls will listen to them in a way in which they will not listen to advice from teachers," Mr Field said.

Mr Field is the man with the task of controlling Britain's spiralling welfare budget by getting more people off benefit and into work. Deterring teenage girls becoming pregnant and condemning themselves to a life on benefit, paid for by the taxpayer, is all part of that project.

"We welcome the Government's openness to see teenage pregnancies in a broader sense," said a spokeswoman for the Family Planning Association. "The issue is not just about sex education on its own. Social economic factors play a big part in teenage pregnancies as do aspirations - both of which up to now have been ignored," said the FPA.

"However, any plans that are drawn up should include boys as well as girls. Similar efforts should be made to talk to young men about fatherhood and the responsibility that comes with it," it added.

Britain has a poor record on teenage pregnancies compared with other European countries.

Figures published last week showed there were 36,329 unmarried mothers aged under 20 in 1995, some 12,803 were 16 or under. Under-age pregnancy had risen by 4% in 1994-95 to about 8,000, with about half ending in abortion.