Clause 2 - Eligible children
Child Trust Funds Bill
10:00 am
Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)
There are other savings vehicles on the market. That issue has been raised in discussion of child trust funds, but the truth is that many parents do not use those savings vehicles, for whatever reason. I think it quite likely that parents in my situation—with one child or more who qualify and one child or more who do not—will want to open accounts for the older children. My proposal would be time-limited. After 12 or 13 years or so, it would be redundant anyway, because everyone will have child trust funds. People will not need to be able to open child trust funds for older children, because they will already have them.
The Government's stated objective, as the Minister repeated on Second Reading, is to encourage
''children and their parents to save for the future.''—[Official Report, 15 December 2003; Vol. 415, c. 1337.]
I am merely asking why we should restrict the benefits of child trust funds to newborn babies.