One in four families on means-test benefits One in four families on benefit after 25% rise One in four families on benefits in 25% rise

One in four families now receives a major means-tested benefit, a rise of 25 per cent since 1979 when the Conservative government took office, according to new figures released to the Independent by the Department of Social Security.

And 27 per cent of the population - a rise of almost 60 per cent since 1979 - now lives in families which depend on means-tested social security.

The figures yesterday led to renewed charges that a government which says it wants to end the "culture of dependency" on benefit has presided over the most dramatic expansion in the numbers on means-tested benefits since the founding of the Welfare State in the late 1940s.

Frank Field, Labour chairman of the Commons social security select committee, said: "It is now clear that this government has become the main recruiting sergeant for a benefit dependency culture."

Last week, Peter Lilley, Secretary of State for Social Security, released figures showing that 30 per cent of individuals live in households where at least one member receives at least one major income-related benefit; a rise of 50 per cent since 1979.

The latest figures, however, give the number of families or benefit units - the number of couples or single people, with or without children - who receive a major income-related benefit such as income support, housing benefit, family credit or a council tax rebate.

In 1992/93, the last year for which figures are available, they comprised 25 per cent of all families against 20 per cent in 1979, an increase of a quarter. But the proportion of the population involved has risen even more dramatically from 17 to 27 per cent, an increase of almost 60 per cent. That is because more claimants have children - for example, fewer pensioners now claim income support.

The sums people receive vary from a few pounds a week for those only on council tax rebate to virtually the whole of their income for the 3,135,000 families who receive only income support and help with housing costs, having no other income nor any entitlement to non-means-tested benefits.

David Shaw, Tory MP for Dover and a member of the social security select committee, said: "We need to look at American ideas, for example that after two years on benefit you cannot claim again for a period, whether three months or six months, and at other ideas such as an adaptation of Workfare to put people into work."

The Department of Social Security said exact comparisons were complicated by income support having replaced supplementary benefit since 1979, housing benefit replacing rent rebates, Family Credit replacing Family Income Support, and rate rebates now operating as council tax rebates.

A spokeswoman underlined that 1992/93 represented almost the peak of unemployment in the last economic cycle, while 1979 was a year of growth with much lower unemployment.

As the table shows, the increase in benefit reliance has been driven by three main factors: higher unemployment, more non-earning lone parents and more sick and disabled claimants whose increase in part probably reflects higher unemployment.

With unemployment at 2.8 million in 1992/93 against 1.3 million in 1979, there are four times more unemployed on income support than in 1979. The numbers of sick and disabled on the major means-tested benefit have risen fourfold and the number of non-earning lone parents has risen threefold.

State benefits during the Tory years

Numbers on main means-tested benefits 1992/93 and 1979

Income Support 1992/93 1979

Total: 5,791,000 2,850,000

Of which:

Pensioners: 1,562,000 1,727,000

Sick and disabled: 758,000 207,000

Lone parents: 1,034,000 306,000

Unemployed: 2,253,000 566,000

Housing Benefit 4,757,000 3,314,000

Family Credit 591,000 c.200,000

Council tax rebate 5,641,000 5,396.000