A new campaign to encourage people to claim the new child tax and working tax credit has been launched by the Chancellor.

The two new benefit schemes will only be introduced next April but those eligible can begin applying now.

UK Chancellor Gordon Brown said: "The child tax credit and working tax credit mark the biggest revolution to the tax system since Beveridge.

"They will modernise the existing systems, ensuring better support for children whether or not their parents are in work and making work pay for those without children as well."

He said six million people would be eligible for support.

Millions of eligible people do not claim the existing tax credits and even more people will be turned off by the latest gobbledegook

David Willetts, Tory work and pensions spokesman

The advertising campaign will use the line "It's money with your name on it" to encourage take up.

Child poverty campaigners are worried many low-wage families do not realise what benefits are available to them.

Single parent parity

The child tax credit will be paid directly to the child's main carer - in most cases, the mother - and will be calculated on annual family income.

For example, families on incomes under �13,000 per year will receive �54.25 a week for the first child, whereas families earning between �50,000 and �58,000 will get �15.38.

Single parent salaries will be treated in the same way as those of two earners.

The working tax credit will be paid to all low-income earners, regardless of whether they have children.

Deja vu

Tory shadow work and pensions secretary David Willetts said: "Exactly three years ago, in September 1999, Gordon Brown launched an advertising campaign for the working families tax credit and announced a new 'crackdown on work-shy' young people.

"His policies failed last time round and they will fail again."

He said Mr Brown's tax credits were "unbelievably complicated".

"Millions of eligible people do not claim the existing tax credits and even more people will be turned off by the latest gobbledegook.

"And young people will continue to get jobs on their own merits - in spite of, not because of, the Government's failed welfare-to-work schemes."

He called on Mr Brown to devise a system people could understand, rather than "spending tens of millions of pounds on advertising an incomprehensible system."

For more information or to apply for the new benefits you can visit the Inland Revenue website.