Clause 8 - Initial contribution by Inland Revenue
Child Trust Funds Bill
2:30 pm

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

I beg to move amendment No. 122, in

page 4, line 30, leave out 'such amount' and insert

'an amount no less than £250'.

Mr David Amess (Southend West, Conservative)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:

No. 165, in

page 4, line 34, at end insert—

'(1A) The amount of the initial contribution prescribed by regulations under subsection (1) shall be—

(a) no lower than £250 for babies born on or after 1st April 2005,

(b) no less than 107 per cent. of the amount determined for the purposes of paragraph (a) for babies born between 1st April 2004 and 31st March 2005,

(c) no less than 114 per cent. of the amount determined for the purposes of paragraph (a) for babies born between 1st April 2003 and 31st March 2004, and

(d) no less than 121 per cent. of the amount determined for the purposes of paragraph (a) for babies born between 1st September 2002 and 31st March 2003.'.

No. 123, in

clause 9, page 5, line 2, leave out 'such amount' and insert

'an amount no less than £250'.

No. 152, in

clause 9, page 6, line 7, at end add—

'(11) The supplementary contribution shall be fixed at an amount of not less than 100 per cent. of the initial contribution amount.'.

No. 127, in

clause 10, page 6, line 14, leave out from 'of' to end of line and insert

'£50, or £100 for a child to whom section 9 applies'.

No. 128, in

clause 10, page 6, line 16, leave out from 'attaining' to end of line and insert 'the age of seven'.

No. 129, in

clause 10, page 6, line 16, leave out from 'attaining' to end of line and insert

'the ages of 5, 11 and 16'.

No. 153, in

clause 10, page 6, line 16, leave out from 'attaining' to end of line 18 and insert

'the ages of 7, 11 and 15, or

(b) one-off payments are to be made to disburse the proceeds from Government asset sales.'.

No. 167, in

clause 10, page 6, line 23, at end add—

'(4) The amounts prescribed by, or determined in accordance with, regulations under subsection (1) shall be fixed at—

(a) no less than £250 for each contribution in respect of a child to whom section 9 does not apply, and

(b) in respect of children to whom section 9 applies, no less than 200 per cent. of the amount of any contribution in respect of a child to whom section 9 does not apply.'.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

Welcome to the Chair, Mr. Amess. I am sure you have been waiting with eager anticipation for the return of this Committee over the past seven days—I see you nodding vigorously. I also welcome half of my army, who are joining me in battle for part of the afternoon.

The amendments tabled in my name—my Liberal Democrat colleague will speak to his amendments—are intended to do two things. I freely admit that some are contradictory, but they are probing and designed to write into the Bill what the Government say they will achieve by regulation. They will therefore allow us to debate about the amounts that the Government propose for initial supplementary contributions.

Amendment No. 127 is designed to write into the Bill what I suspect the Government will want to achieve by regulation. It would set the further contribution, which is payable at age seven at £50 or, for poorer families, £100. The Government have not said what the amounts will be, but they have said that the initial contribution will be £250 and the supplementary contribution £250. I want to press the Minister on how and why she came up with those figures. What was the rationale behind them?

The figure payable at age seven is more interesting. The Government have not said what it will be. The explanatory notes say:

''The Government has published its proposal that the first of these payments will be when eligible children turn seven. The first payments will be due in 2009 and the amounts will be published nearer the time.''

When the Minister answered a written question of mine on 4 December, she again made the position clear:

''Estimates are not available for the cost of any further Government contributions at age 7 as the value of these has yet to be decided.''—[Official Report, 4 December 2003; Vol. 415, c. 138W.]

One would assume that that was a prudent course of action for the Government to take; obviously seven years is some way off, and it would be wrong to anticipate what the sums will be—perhaps that is what the Government will say.

However, not everyone in the Government is as careful as the Minister. For example, there is someone called Mr. Gavin Kelly. I have never met him, but he is apparently a member of the Prime Minister's strategy unit. I closely followed a summit held by the Institute for Public Policy Research at 10 Downing street. I read its minutes and talked about it on Second Reading because I discovered that child trust funds were known as

''the third way within the third way''

in new Labour circles, which was an exciting discovery for me. On close reading of the minutes, I found that when Mr. Gavin Kelly made his contribution to the exciting seminar—the Financial Secretary will remember this because she was part of the audience—he said:

''The question was whether the figures which had been chosen by the government (of £500 for children from low income families at birth and £250 of those from wealthier families and £100 and £50 respectively as top ups) were appropriate. There was no science behind these figures, they simply felt intuitively correct.''

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

May I check whether the hon. Gentleman is reassured that the person he is talking about, Mr. Gavin Kelly, was a member of the Prime Minister's strategy unit at the time that he was making those comments?

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

I am not as familiar as I used to be with the members of the Prime Minister's strategy unit.

Mr David Cameron (Witney, Conservative)

Some of them are here.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

Some of them are here—or used to be here.

However, the document produced by the IPPR, and we know that that organisation has a hotline to Government, names

''Gavin Kelly (Prime Minister's Strategy Unit)''.

So, if the Financial Secretary is telling me that Mr. Kelly was not a member of the unit at the time that he made the statement, the long and short of it is that he is remarkably well informed. He seems to think that the top-ups at the age of seven will be £50 for everyone, and £100 for less well-off families.

Perhaps the Minister will say whether Mr. Gavin Kelly is right, or perhaps he knows things that the Minister does not. As we know from other developments in this Government, most important decisions are taken at Downing street, so Mr. Gavin Kelly may have his finger on the pulse. I thought that I would try to amend the Bill, using his figures, so that we could have a debate about it, and the Financial Secretary could agree or disagree with the Prime Minister's strategy unit.

Amendment No. 129 deals with the age at which further contributions will be made, which the Bill says will be seven. My amendment suggests that further contributions could be made at a range of ages—five, 11 and 16—rather than there being just a one-off payment at seven. I am not proposing that it would be the same amount; obviously, the amounts would be smaller so that we would not burden the taxpayer with extra expenditure.

Of course, I have chosen the ages five, 11 and 16 because those were the Government's initial choices in their document, ''Delivering savings and assets: The modernisation of Britain's tax and benefit system, Number nine'', which was published in November 2001. It had green writing on the front of it, so I

suppose that it was a Green Paper rather than a White Paper. The authors stated:

''The Government also believes that there is a case for further top-up endowments to keep interest in the accounts active. It proposes that these would be generated centrally on the relevant dates at ages five, eleven and sixteen.''

I wanted to press the Government about why they changed their mind to having a single contribution at seven rather than three contributions made at five, 11 and 16. As far as I am aware, that change was made with no explanation. Surely, it would be a good idea, in the Government's words, to

''keep interest in the accounts active''

with three separate payments?

One of the objectives of child trust funds is to get people engaged and interested in them, and that would be more likely to be achieved if the payments were made on three separate occasions. It is possible to argue that seven is too young an age for a child to take an active interest in a child trust fund. Perhaps seven is the age at which children will first become aware that they have such a trust fund, but at 11 and 16 they are much more likely to take an active interest.

Are the Government saying that between the ages of seven and 18—a period of 11 years—there will be no Government involvement with such children, and no small payment to stimulate their interest? When the Government came forward with the idea and included it in the Green Paper, they proposed three separate payments—at five, 11 and 16. Now, in the Bill, they have changed that to one payment at age seven. I wanted to probe the Minister about that, and, indeed, about Mr. Gavin Kelly's revelation.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

I would like to talk about my party's amendments, Nos. 165, 152, 153 and 167. They have a similar intent to those proposed by the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Osborne), who is essentially trying to flush out what is behind the rather spartan outlines of the policy in the Bill, particularly given that we still await the regulation, which is supposed to detail much of that policy.

Amendment No. 165 is designed to help the Government clarify what payments will be made when the first contributions go into the child trust funds, just before the likely date of the general election in April 2005. The Government are delaying the scheme's implementation, in the sense that payments will not be made for individuals born from 1 September 2002 onwards until that April date. How much compensation will the Government give those people? They will not have been able to invest the £250 or £500 that they are supposed to receive for the years from 1 September 2002 onwards.

The Government are confident about the returns available to investors in the child trust fund; the Minister has told us that equity market returns are good over a long period and that annual nominal returns of about 7 per cent. can be expected. The Government left off the footnote to the table published in their consultative document; the 7 per cent. figure takes into account a 1 per cent. charge. In other words, the Government have in mind an 8 per cent. annual nominal return. That is extremely

attractive if it can be delivered. I can only assume that the Government intend to compensate those who will not receive their money until April 2005 for the waiting period, possibly starting as far back as 1 September 2002. Presumably the Government intend to use the 7 per cent. rate, or 8 per cent. rate including the charge, referred to in their consultative document.

Amendment No. 165 seeks to clarify how much will be paid into the funds of children born between particular dates. I have done that crudely, but I would be happy to rework it on a basis that would reflect the different returns that would be available for children born at different stages of the year.

Will the Minister give full and proper compensation to those who do not receive their money until April 2005, or will she short-change them, either by paying only the flat rate, or by paying the flat rate uprated by some other as yet unknown rate, which I fear is what the Government have in mind? Although the Government say that people ought to have returns of 7 per cent. or 8 per cent., the fear is that they will pay only the inflation rate in uprating the amount from September 2002 onwards. I hope that the Minister will throw some light on that and persuade us that she will not be stingy, particularly on the verge of what is likely to be a general election date.

If I understand matters correctly, Mr. Amess, we shall deal with amendment No. 151 in a separate group, which brings me to amendment No. 152. That amendment seeks to clarify what is likely to appear in the regulations at some stage, we hope, before Third Reading. It indicates that the supplementary contribution should be fixed at not less than 100 per cent. of the initial contribution. In other words, rather than relying on regulations to determine the extent of the supplementary contribution for people on lower incomes, I merely suggest that the Government's commitment to ensuring that such people get a significantly higher initial endowment should be on the face of the Bill.

Amendment No. 153 has two purposes, one of which, referred to by the hon. Member for Tatton a moment ago, invites the Government to consider whether and when further contributions could be made to the child trust fund. The Government have it in mind to make such contributions, potentially at the age of seven and at ages beyond that. However, during the Treasury Committee hearings the Minister seemed to want to keep her options. We would have hoped that by now there would be a clear sense from the Government about whether they intend to make a series of payments into the child trust fund for a number of years or whether people can expect only one-off payments.

Mr Andrew Love (Edmonton, Labour/Co-operative)

In the context of his party's opposition to the child trust fund, does the hon. Gentleman support extending it?

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

The hon. Gentleman knows that my party is opposed to the Bill, but we are trying not only to improve its quality, but to flush out a little information from the Government about what they have in mind by keeping from both Opposition Members and Labour Back Benchers all the

fundamental details contained in the regulations. No doubt the hon. Gentleman shares my worry that, even by this stage of our deliberations, we do not have the regulations.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

The hon. Member for Edmonton (Mr. Love) has hit on to a good theme. Would a Liberal Democrat Government pay the further contributions if, God forbid, there were such a body after the next election?

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

In the very likely event of my party coming to power in 2005 or 2006, we will honour all of the contributions that have been made up to the date of the general election, but we will not make payments into a child trust fund beyond that time.

Amendment No. 153 has a double purpose. Not only would it invite the Minister to give us more detail about when the future contributions will be made to the child trust account, but it would prompt her to tell us whether the Government want the scheme—referred to in the third way or new Labour circles as representing asset-based welfare—to be extended by including, for example, in child trust fund payments one-off payments that may be received into the Exchequer from asset sales, for example.

Is it the Government's view that a series of payments will be made into the accounts in future in a relatively arbitrary way or will they meet specific timelines decided by the Minister? Is it in their mind that the scheme could develop, as some advocates of asset-based welfare have suggested, in a more flexible and ambitious way so that the proceeds of the Government's asset sales might be dispersed to a younger generation? Will they at some stage take up some of the arguments that have been made by some people on the centre left, or however the IPPR is defined, which are that we should reform the inheritance tax system and seek through that route to put other payments into child trust fund accounts? How ambitious will the scheme be?

Amendment No. 167 relates to clause 10, which deals with further contributions by the Inland Revenue. It seeks clarification of what they will be and details of the relationship between the contribution that will be made to people on higher incomes compared with people who will be receiving contributions and who are considered to be on lower incomes. In other words, will the uprating by a factor of 100 per cent. of the payments that are made to low-income families be a principle that the Government will continue when they consider further contributions by the Inland Revenue in respect of children who have reached later ages?

Mr Andrew Robathan (Blaby, Conservative)

As this is my first proper contribution to our proceedings, may I say how pleased I am to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Amess. I apologise to you and to the Committee for not being in Committee throughout all our sittings. However, I suspect that what I have said in the past 10 seconds has made more of a contribution than that of some members of the Committee who do not seem to be taking an active part in our proceedings.

On Second Reading, I referred to the Bill as a stunt—a gimmick—and something that would be delivered to the doorsteps of many hundreds of thousands of people just before the general election. It would be difficult to refuse a cheque and difficult for people to say, ''Gosh, how ghastly of the Government to give me this.''

The amendments reach the core of the Bill. The amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton as well as those tabled by the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) put the Government on the spot. We are asking them the exact intention of the Bill. What is the point of the trust fund? I believe that it is a misguided use of taxpayers' money. The amendments will tease out from the Government what will make it meaningful.

It will not have escaped the notice of all members of the Committee that the Government have an arbitrary target that 50 per cent. of young people should go to university. That is fair enough, but at the same time—it will not have escaped the notice of Members of the Committee—today we hear that tuition fees will be forced through in a couple of weeks' time. Not only will 75 per cent of universities charge the full top up rate of £3,000 a year, but after a few years, with inflation and whatever, it is not fanciful to imagine that the fees per year will be something like £10,000 for each student.

The question that the amendments seek to tease out an answer to is: what is the point of the fund? By the Government's admission, it is unlikely that a child who receives the initial contribution will get more than £1,000. The figure quoted is £700 to £800. It does not take the brains of an archbishop, nor even the maths of a Labour Government, to work out that if it is less than £1,000 and fees per year are as much as £10,000, any young person aged 18 who starts receiving the trust fund next year will not have much to contribute towards their university fees.

The crux of the matter is: what is the fund's purpose? If 50 per cent of young people are going to university, how much will the fund contribute towards the fees about to be pushed through? And what is the point of the whole thing if it will be just a small amount of money that will sit in the fund and not develop? For all her excellent speeches, the Minister has yet to answer that question.

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

I enjoyed those contributions immensely. The hon. Member for Tatton has been very honest about his amendments. I welcome the degree of candour that he has shown. I also welcome the opportunity to comment on the value of the initial endowments; perhaps this will deal with the point raised by the hon. Member for Blaby (Mr. Robathan) who, against the view of his Front Bench, thinks that this is a misguided use of taxpayers' money.

Mr Andrew Robathan (Blaby, Conservative)

I am a Back Bencher.

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

I just make the point that his Front Bench is expressing a different view. We have evidence from the national child development survey that holding assets has an independent positive outcome

on health, labour market and educational attainment. The value of the asset at the age of 18 needs to be of the order of only £300 to £600. Anyone is welcome to scrutinise that research; they may question it or believe that more research needs to be carried out. That is fair enough and I am sure that a lot of examination will go into such issues in the future. The fact is that one piece of research suggests clearly that an asset at the age of 18 of around the value of between £300 and £600 has a significant impact.

Mr Hilton Dawson (Lancaster and Wyre, Labour)

I am trying to understand the hon. Gentleman's logic. Surely someone in this position who is considering university and who has only a small amount in the trust fund might also be facing the welcome prospect of a substantial grant from the Government and a bursary from the higher education institution. Those figures added together would provide a substantial incentive, particularly for someone from the lowest socio-economic groups that the Government are particularly trying to target towards higher education.

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Of course many views will be put forward, but the debate on top-up fees is one for another place and not for this Committee.

Mr Andrew Robathan (Blaby, Conservative)

This is not a debate on top-up fees. This is a debate on the value and the purpose of the fund. The hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre (Mr. Dawson) says that he does not understand the logic. The logic is simple. If in 18 years' time a young person born today goes to Oxford, which I believe the Minister attended, as did I—and other members of the Committee went to Oxford or Cambridge—facing fees for three years of £30,000, what value does the Minister think that that young person will place on a fund that might be worth £700? All she has come up with so far is one piece of research that says that it is going to be marvellous. I think that most people will do the addition themselves.

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

I intended to develop my argument about the value of these funds at the age of 18. When the hon. Member for Tatton was making his point about why we chose £250 and £500, I consulted the proposals document on child trust funds, which we have just issued, and reconsidered the illustrative projections for future fund growth. I am sure that he will have noted, as other Members will, that even without additional savings, the more limited endowment of £250 will achieve a figure of £456 on that projection, which puts it firmly within the £300 to £600 bracket. The larger contribution of £500 from the Exchequer, which should benefit 40 per cent. of children, would grow to over £900, and perhaps higher if the charges are not included.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

What assumptions is the Minister using in that calculation for the first three years of people's returns from child trust funds—for example, for somebody born on 1 September 2002?

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

I intend to address the hon. Gentleman's point in the course of the development of my argument. If he would be a little bit more patient, I will come to his point in due course.

The figures are not arbitrary and they are not insignificant, but, of course, we could use various nominal interest rates and assume different charging regimes that would produce different figures. The sums are not trivial, however. We have pledged further contributions at the age of seven that will enhance those funds still further. In addition, people will have the additional benefit of contributions from family and friends. They will see the value of those extra contributions grow as well.

I gave evidence earlier to the Treasury Committee and I said that £5 a month added to the fund could produce £2,500, and £10 a month could produce £4,397 on those projections, even without taking into account the additional endowment at the age of seven.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

I am encouraged by the Minister's reference to people saving as little as £5 a month. Previously, we sought clarification of whether the Government would allow minimum contributions of £5 a month. Is she saying that the Government has now approved that?

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

I am merely referring to the table that is in the proposals document. We will have an opportunity to debate the minimum contribution later in the proceedings, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will make his point.

The hon. Member for Tatton asked the Government to commit themselves to a level of payment at the age of seven. The payments will not be made until 2009. It is premature to ask us what those payments will be so far in advance; it is more appropriate for Ministers to make a decision nearer the time. They can take into account the ideal value of any endowment and, of course, the financial context. It would not be wise to commit ourselves to a level now.

The hon. Gentleman referred to the statement made by Mr. Gavin Kelly. I cannot confirm whether he was working for the strategy unit; it is an empirical matter and we should check it. He moved to the strategy unit from the IPPR where he worked to develop the policy, and he was closely involved in feeding ideas to the Government. However, the figures to which he referred were those expressed in the 2001 document on savings and assets, to which he also referred for the purpose of illustration so that people could consider the policy, comment on it and determine whether it was a good thing.

We changed from those illustrative projections that used the ages of five, 11 and 16 to the age of seven partly because, after many rounds of review and consultation, of which the Opposition are aware, we decided that the age of five was too young to make a substantial difference to the financial education of a child, and that it would be more helpful to the raising of a child's overall level of financial awareness if they were at least seven. By that age, one might expect a child to be receiving pocket money, taking some sort of interest in the financial world, and—although perhaps at a slightly later age than that—to look at a statement and make sense of it. However, certainly five seemed too young to us.

Mr Andrew Robathan (Blaby, Conservative)

The Minister has been very eloquent, but I think that her children are younger than seven. My son is just seven, as it happens, and I assure her that he has absolutely no interest in money except in having enough to buy a Beyblade, which is the latest craze. I fear that that goes for all seven-year-olds.

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

My son is six and a half, and he has at least five Beyblades, but he is also very interested in pocket money. Of course, every child is different. We have to be aware that there are children of around seven who are beginning to take an interest in such things, and this is an opportunity for us to trigger that latent interest.

The fact that we have not committed ourselves to future endowments at later ages does not preclude Ministers from, in time, deciding that that would be desirable. It strikes me as sensible to get the policy off the ground, monitor its development, and see how it is working without tying the hands of future Governments.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

On a point of principle, can the Minister tell us whether the timing of the additional payments is designed to incentivise children with respect to the management of and interest in the accounts, or has it been determined simply to keep the parents heated up, as it were?

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

One of the joys of the policy is that it serves a dual purpose. It stimulates children's interest in their financial situations, broadening their horizons and opening opportunities for them, but is also a tool for delivering financial education and raising the level of such education among parents. Indeed, the Financial Services Authority was recently considering financial education from first principles, as it were, and created the new financial capabilities steering group, which has just had its inaugural meeting. That identified the child trust fund account as a powerful tool for developing the financial literacy of the parents, too. The policy has a dual purpose, and I am sure that it will serve both ends, but I would not like to be over restrictive and say now what decisions future Governments will make on the level and timing of any future endowment.

The hon. Member for Yeovil queried the assumption of a 7 per cent. nominal rate of growth. I assure him that that is the rate recommended by the FSA in its ''conduct of business'' handbook as a fairly cautious estimate of future growth. We are aware that children born after the qualifying date of 1 September 2002 but before April 2005, when the first payments are to be made, will lose out on the potential growth of the fund over that time. I intend to make up the difference in the regulations, and I can announce that the value of the endowments will reflect a 7 per cent. growth of the fund in nominal terms for each cohort or financial year in that period, but the exact figures will be laid down in regulations.

The hon. Gentleman also asked about one-off payments from future assets sales. I am aware that there are people in the field who argue that because the policy involves capital redistribution, it should be

funded to some extent from capital proceeds. There is a respectable argument behind such a policy. Again, I would not like to tie the hands of future Chancellors and Governments. It is perfectly reasonable not to commit ourselves at this stage as to how that money might be found. Not only might one argue that the financial climate is uncertain, but any proceeds from assets would be highly uncertain in future.

This is an evolving policy. I am sure that we will learn lessons in the next 15 or 18 years, and I do not think that it would be wise for the Government to commit themselves over that period.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

We have had a good debate. I enjoyed the contribution from my hon. Friend the Member for Blaby. I was disappointed that he had not been here for some of our earlier proceedings, because he could have made similarly illuminating contributions. I think that he is unduly pessimistic about top-up fees. As he would know if he had read the front page of The Times, some members of the Committee feature in the rebel memos. If they get their act together, people may be able to spend their child trust funds on things other than tuition fees. However, we shall leave that to Government Members.

Mr Harry Barnes (North East Derbyshire, Labour)

The proposal can have nothing to do with the top-up fee provision, as up-front top-up fees are to be removed. It could have something to do with student loans generally, but a number of different arguments would have to be produced in relation to that.

Mr David Amess (Southend West, Conservative)

Order. Interesting as this is, I think that we have heard quite enough about top-up fees. I ask the hon. Member for Tatton to return to responding to the Minister's speech.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

Thank you, Mr. Amess. I am tempted to say that I cannot believe that the hon. Gentleman has been bought off by the up-front argument, but I shall not.

I shall return to the Kelly affair, if we may call it that, and whether Mr. Gavin Kelly was a member of the strategy unit when he revealed to the assembled luminaries at No. 10 Downing street the likely figure for the further payments. The Minister questions whether Mr. Gavin Kelly was a member of the strategy unit. Perhaps she could write to me, or I will table a Question to the Prime Minister and find out. All I know is that the minutes prepared by the IPPR, and presumably it knows who works for it and who does not, describe him as somebody who works for the Prime Minister's strategy unit.

Having questioned the poor man's credentials, the Minister then said that Mr. Kelly was merely referring to a figure that had already been put in the Green Paper. In my quick reading of the Green Paper—I should say ''re-reading'', as of course I took it with me on holiday in preparation for the Committee I cannot find any reference to figures. All I can find is a sentence that says:

''The value of endowments, including the progressive element for lower-income families and the value of top-ups, will not be addressed further at this stage of the consultation.''

Therefore, it is not in the document. The Minister gives me a quizzical look. She presumably wrote that, or got someone to write it on her behalf. If she can point to the £50 or £100 figure in any Government document, other than in Mr. Kelly's remarks at the summit, I should be grateful.

The Minister also talked generally about the impressive research that showed that if a person had a few hundred pounds worth of assets, that makes a big difference to their life. I do not question that. However, Mr. Kelly, when commenting on why the Government came up with the figures, said:

''There was no science behind these figures, they simply felt intuitively correct.''

That was his explanation. Indeed, at the IPPR summit other people suggested other figures. For example, the shadow Australian Foreign Secretary—I am not sure what he was doing there—said:

''It would look better if the original endowment for those on low incomes was more than £1,000.''

Therefore, there was a debate about the figures. The Minister has not given me a proper answer as to why she settled on £250 and £500, nor has she said whether there is any real science behind those figures or whether they simply feel ''intuitively correct''. I am happy to accept that as an answer. If they feel intuitively correct, that is as good a reason as any, but that is not what she said.

The Minister gave us a good explanation for the Government's decision to make the top-up payments at the age of seven rather than five, which I accept. She also did not rule out further payments, saying that those were matters that a future Government might address. However, the size of the top-up at seven will depend on whether the Government think that they are likely also to be making additional contributions at 11 and 16, so the decision cannot be put off indefinitely. I suspect that, once this shiny new policy has been implemented and is working, future Chancellors, be they Conservative, Labour or indeed Liberal Democrat, will have their own shiny new initiatives to dream up and subject Committees to, instead of revisiting old policies and adding bolt-ons. I suspect that the clear indications in all the explanatory notes and the White Paper that the payment will be made only at age seven, and the fact that seven is the only year that has been identified as a time when a further contribution would be made, mean that that is probably how things will stay with the child trust bond proposal.

As I say, I am not entirely convinced by all the research that the Minister deployed. If the figures have been dreamt up because they feel intuitively correct, I am happy to live with that explanation, but it would be good to hear her say that. I remain puzzled about where the £50 and £100 figures for the further top-up came from, but since I suspect that she is not minded to get to her feet again, I will have to wait for another occasion to hear her answer. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

I beg to move amendment No. 151, in

page 4, line 36, at end add—

'(3) The initial contribution payable for children in care shall be set at four times the prevailing standard initial contribution amount.'.

Mr David Amess (Southend West, Conservative)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment No. 43, in

clause 11, page 6, line 31, after '10', insert

'or [additional contributions by Inland Revenue for children in care]'.

Amendment No. 80, in

clause 19, page 10, line 27, leave out 'and'.

Amendment No. 82, in

clause 19, page 10, line 31, at end insert

'and

(d) that the Inland Revenue was required under regulations under section [additional contributions by Inland Revenue for children in care] to make a payment in respect of the child but either the payment had not been made or, if it had, the amount of the payment had not been credited to the child trust fund held by the child.'.

Amendment No. 86, in

clause 20, page 11, line 3, after '10', insert

', [additional contributions by Inland Revenue for children in care]'.

Amendment No. 87, in

clause 20, page 11, line 9, after '10', insert

', or [additional contributions by Inland Revenue for children in care]'.

Amendment No. 88, in

clause 20, page 11, line 32, at end insert

'[additional contributions by Inland Revenue for children in care](2)'.

Amendment No. 92, in

clause 22, page 13, line 3, after '10', insert

', or [additional contributions by Inland Revenue for children in care]'.

New clause 2—Additional contributions by Inland Revenue for children in care—

'(1) If this section applies to a child the Inland Revenue must inform the account provider with whom a child trust fund is held by the child that this section applies to the child.

(2) If the account provider makes a claim to the Inland Revenue in accordance with regulations, the Inland Revenue must pay to the account provider such amount as is prescribed by regulations.

(3) The amount prescribed by regulations under subsection (2) shall be expressed as a percentage of the current rate of child benefit.

(4) On receipt of the payment the account provider must credit the child trust fund with the amount of the payment.

(5) This section applies to a child if—

(a) a child trust fund is held by the child, and

(b) the child was first an eligible child by virtue of section 2(1)(b).'.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

Buoyed by the acceptance of the principle of amendment No. 165, I hope that we can get the Government to give us some information about what underlies amendment No. 151, and to consider whether, in regulations or elsewhere, they should move towards the principle behind that amendment.

The Minister will recall giving evidence to the Treasury Committee on child trust funds. In exchanges with the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, Central (Mr. Cousins), she said:

''It is my view, and one with which you may disagree, that children in care are a particularly vulnerable group who need more than any other group . . . arguably, to have a substantial asset behind them at the age of 18.''

She touched on the issue of children in care in this morning's debate and made some comments suggesting that the Treasury has done some work on assessing the economic position of children in care and whether the majority would have family members of one type or another who might be expected to make some contribution towards the child trust fund.

The amendment proposes:

''The initial contribution payable for children in care . . . be set at four times the prevailing standard initial contribution amount.''

In other words, it proposes that there should be one basic initial contribution amount for all children, and a second top-up element that should apply to children in families below the income threshold of around £13,500, set in relation to the child tax credit amount. It suggests that the Government ought to consider whether there is reason to make an additional contribution into the accounts of children in care, whether up front, or over time—I would be quite willing if the Minister suggested the latter.

The issue is whether that cohort of children is much less likely than other children, including those from low-income families, to have a significant contribution made not only by the state, but by family and friends. My assumption—perhaps the Minister can shed some light on the matter from the research that she appeared to allude to earlier—is that that category of children would be particularly prone to beginning their lives without any significant financial assets, and that they might be much more at risk than any other group that we could easily categorise of not having additional contributions made by parents or other relatives. It is the Government's intention, and the principle of the Bill, to use the level of contributions and the incentives to lean on the basic inequalities in society that would otherwise mean that low-income families saving for their children—families that could not afford to contribute—would end up with much lower final amounts than wealthier families. I hope that the Minister will consider that principle.

Mr David Cameron (Witney, Conservative)

Has the hon. Gentleman given any thought to the concept of paying into the trust fund accounts of children in care a sum in lieu of the child benefit, rather than making a four times commitment up front? Would not that be a neater way of doing it, particularly for those children who might start in care and go back home, or be fostered or adopted?

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. There are two issues. First, is it reasonable to consider this category of children as being particularly prone to ending up with a smaller financial asset compared with other children, including those from low-income backgrounds, where we might expect others to contribute to their fund? Secondly, if that is a problem, how should the Government address it? Should they make a larger up-front contribution or contemplate paying a stream of revenue into the account from another source? One would have to

consider the benefits of that in light of the Government's apparent intention that the owner of the CTF account should effectively play no direct role in managing the account until the child reaches 18. As a consequence of having a stream of money coming in—rather than paying one amount of money up front—there would not necessarily be any benefit from the hon. Gentleman's proposal to incentivise those young people to be more active in managing the account. However, I welcome his suggestion, and the Government could consider this mechanism among a number of alternatives.

I hope that the Minister is able to shed some light on whether it is reasonable to assume that children in care would be more vulnerable in terms of the final asset that they secure and, if that is so, whether the Government are considering introducing any measures to deal with the potential inequality that would arise.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

A number of my amendments are grouped with the one tabled by my Liberal Democrat colleague. They address the same issue of children in care. I should like to argue and persuade the hon. Gentleman that my amendments go further than his proposal because they implement a constructive idea put forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) on Second Reading and raised by him again a few moments ago. Whereas the Liberal Democrats propose that children in care would get an initial voucher of, say, £1,000, my hon. Friend's idea is not just to restrict the additional payment to those children to a supplement, but to make an ongoing commitment to them while they are in care by paying a proportion of the money that would have been paid in child benefit, had they not been in care, into their child trust fund.

No one would deny that, sadly, children in care have among the poorest life chances of any people in our community. On researching this subject for today's sitting, I was astonished by those life chances; for example, only 53 per cent. of children leaving care have at least one GCSE or GNVQ, compared with 95 per cent. of all children. The Office for National Statistics says that educational attainment is an important indicator of a child's life chances, so it is particularly depressing that only 8 per cent. of children in care achieve five GCSE grades between A and C, for example, compared with 50 per cent. of all children.

Some 24 per cent. of children leaving care are unemployed in the September after they leave school, compared with just 6 per cent. of all school leavers; 10 per cent. of looked after children aged 10 or over in care were cautioned or convicted last year, which is three times the rate for children their age; and 49 per cent. of children in care end up in prison at some point. The life chances of those children are poor, and the latest Government figures show that we are talking about a sizeable number of people. On 31 March 2003, the last date for which the Government were able to give me figures, 60,800 children were looked after by local authorities in England alone. I was not given the figures for the rest of the United Kingdom.

The Bill goes to considerable lengths—and I give the Minister credit for this—to ensure that child trust funds will be set up for those children. A great effort has been made to ensure that the Inland Revenue, working with local authorities, will set up child trust funds and that they will receive the initial supplemented contribution of £500, or £250 on top of the general initial contribution.

The hon. Member for Yeovil made the point that, apart from the Government's own further contribution, it is likely that no one will make any additional savings into the child trust fund of a child in care. I am not saying that that is always the case; there might be children for whom parents will make contributions, but if a child has been put in care it is likely that the family will not make regular additional contributions. I do not have any evidence to suggest that that is the case, but it seems intuitively correct.

When such children reach the age of 18, they will have a fund worth about £1,000 according to the Government's own figures, assuming, to make the point made repeatedly by the Liberal Democrats, that their healthy estimates of how those funds will grow are correct. I am not denying that £1,000 is useful—it is very useful—and I am not denying that it will make a difference to a child at 18, but it is not as useful as it could be. Children who spend a long time in care will have none of the parental help that many children enjoy in finding accommodation, getting driving lessons, buying a car or even buying the correct clothes for a job interview.

My amendment would use this Bill to help those desperately disadvantaged children. New clause 2, which is at the heart of this group of amendments, would give the Treasury the power to put some of the money that it forgoes in child benefit into the child trust funds of children in care. I asked the Government for help in trying to work out how much that might cost, and sadly the Paymaster General was extremely unhelpful, despite repeated attempts to find out how much it cost by simply asking what amount of child benefit was saved as a result of children being in local authority care during the past 12 months. When I asked the Chancellor what the annual cost would be of providing child benefit to children in local authority care, the Paymaster General, replying on his behalf, said:

''The amount of Child Benefit that would be paid in respect of children in local authority care would depend on the rate or rates payable. The total cost to public funds of making these payments would depend on what other changes were made to the financing of the care.''—[Official Report, 8 December 2003; Vol. 415, c. 330W.]

There was no attempt by the Treasury to engage with me and tell me what the provision of child benefit might cost if certain assumptions were made.

Thankfully, the House of Commons Library has been a lot more helpful than the Treasury, and I asked it to examine the cost. The cost of providing all child benefit payments that are currently forgone for every one of the 60,000 children in care is quite a sum: £33 million. That figure assumes that the full amount of child benefit is paid into the child trust funds. My amendments merely state that it should be a proportion of the child benefit; we could discuss

what that proportion should be. The figure also assumes that every one of those children is in care permanently throughout the period of a year. We know that children go in and out of care, so the actual figure would not be quite as high.

The Bill gives us a chance to do something for people with the lowest life chances in society, and give them something of the nest egg that other children will get as a result of the Bill. A few thousand pounds at the age of 18 may make a real difference to their ability to find accommodation and the confidence to get a job. Many of them do not have that ability or confidence at the moment.

I am glad to say that when the idea was raised on Second Reading it was looked on favourably not just by my hon. Friend the Member for Witney, but by the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre. The hon. Gentleman said, when intervening on the hon. Member for Witney:

''I commend the hon. Gentleman for that first-class suggestion.''—[Official Report, 15 December 2003; Vol. 415, c. 1374.]

When the Minister was pressed on the point on Second Reading by my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink), she said

''The hon. Gentleman makes an important point.''

We always know that disappointment is about to follow when a Minister says that. She continued:

''We are working closely with children's charities and local authorities to think about the way in which the role of local authorities might develop in future. Certain local authorities are enthusiastic about the potential the policy offers them, for example, to make contributions on behalf of the children in their care. That will evolve after the policy has been put in place.''—[Official Report, 15 December 2003; Vol. 415, c. 1341.]

I do not deny that it is a good idea to allow local authorities to make contributions, and the Bill allows for that. However, I am suggesting that the Treasury itself might want to make contributions. After all, it does not have to pay child benefit on behalf of those people, so there is money that could be put into the child trust fund. It would be good if a child in care, with proper education about how to manage their fund and so forth, were able to leave care with a bit of a nest egg. Many other children take that for granted: they get some financial support from what their parents end up having to fork out for them.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

I am following the hon. Gentleman's argument with interest. Can he clarify two aspects of his proposal? First, is the idea that there should be an annual payment of the amount of child benefit that is selected, or should it be paid in on a more regular basis? Secondly, is he assuming not that there will be a general entitlement to child benefit of which a proportion will go into the child trust fund but that a proportion of the existing child benefit amount will be chosen, arbitrarily or not, and that and only that will go into the child trust fund, and there will be no further child benefit entitlement?

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

I have only sketched the skeleton of my scheme. I am not even beginning to pretend that I have all the details worked out. However, I had ideas about how this would work. Children go in and out of care—it is rare for a child to be permanently in care—and when a child is in care the child benefit payments

to the parents are stopped. I suggest that they should go into the child trust fund weekly or monthly—however the payments work administratively—and that the sum should be a proportion of the current child benefit. The benefit for a subsequent child, not the first child, is £10.75 a week. I suggest that 50, 70 or 80 per cent. of that sum, or whatever proportion is determined to be right and affordable, be paid in. That would be a regular ongoing contribution.

I am not suggesting that the proposal for an initial larger voucher contribution is not a good one. However, a relatively small number of children are in care at birth. The figures that I got from the Government show that only 390 children aged nought to three months are in local authority care. The average age at which children come in and out of care is much older than that. The voucher proposal would help those 390 children, but it would not help the 60,000 or so children who go into care later in childhood.

All I ask is that the Government keep an open mind about my plan. It is not enough for the Treasury to say, ''This is something that some local authorities might do.'' I suggest that the Government should do it, and that it should be driven centrally from the Treasury. It struck me as a neat idea that as the Government are not paying child benefit on behalf of these children, they might consider making payments into the child trust fund instead.

Mr Hilton Dawson (Lancaster and Wyre, Labour)

It is a pleasure to take part in this debate. I commend the Opposition Members who have spoken so eloquently and with such purpose on this issue.

I should have mentioned on Second Reading when I responded to what the hon. Member for Witney said that it was not the first time that I had heard this suggestion. I have not heard it from the Government or any other Labour Members. I first heard it from a young woman called Kubarat Tijani, and at the time she mentioned it she was a young person in care. She came up with what the hon. Member for Tatton called quite stunning logic, when she asked, ''If we're not getting the child benefit when we're in care, who's it going to? Shouldn't it come to young people in care?''

That young woman has gone on to take a degree and now has a professional occupation. It is important when we are talking about young people in care not to get hung up on the more desperate statistics about their circumstances, but to recognise that they have been through experiences of abuse, neglect, dislocation and disruption in their lives that would have floored any of us and probably would have placed any of us in the worst of predicaments. It is a tremendous tribute to the resilience and abilities of young people in care that so many of them come through.

Next Wednesday, 21 January, my hon. Friend the Minister is talking to the all-party group on children and young people in care on the issue of child trust funds. I guarantee that she will be questioned incisively about the Government's proposals in that respect for children in care. That meeting is open to all Members and is a monthly occasion in the House. If Members

came to the meeting they would come across some young people who are highly intelligent; some who have been through devastating experiences; some who are achieving; some who are in good jobs and higher education; some who are just getting on with their lives. Occasionally they will meet the odd young person who has written a book and who is raising himself or herself to considerable prominence.

The strength of the suggestion about child benefit and substantial assets going to children and young people in care is not that it will compensate them for the awful circumstances of their lives, and only to some extent will it to support young people who are coming out to face the world with low levels of educational qualifications and with emotional disturbances that may make life difficult for them; it is that it will emphasise to young people in care that they have their whole lives ahead of them, that they are young people of ability and that they have a real chance to make good in their lives, and that an asset such as this can help them. Certainly it can help every young person, but it can help such young people in particular.

It is an excellent idea to put child benefit in the hands of young people in care. Frankly I would pay the whole lot; I would pay whatever child benefit was due to them on a weekly basis into their account. One proviso would be that the local authority—whoever was looking after them, whether it were a residential care worker or a foster carer—would be required to work with them, in the same way that the Government are expecting parents to support their own children, in providing financial education. It is vital that the local authority ensures that people directly caring for young people work effectively with them to understand and manage the trust fund, to think about what it might be used for in the future and to make contributions from their own assets to that trust fund.

I would not leave the decision making for the amounts to go into that trust fund in the hands of local authorities at all. Frankly, I have good reason not to trust local authorities in general with the care of young people. Some local authorities treat children in care properly and well, but some, despite legislation and resources, treat them extremely badly. Evidence for that is the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000, which the Government wisely introduced. It puts a statutory duty on local authorities to support young people up to the age of 21 or, if they are in higher education, up to the age of 24. Some local authorities give grants to young people of £5,000 when they leave care to go into higher education, but some provide them with a bin bag in which to put their things. I shall not dwell on those discrepancies too much.

Essentially, young people in care definitely need a substantial asset. There is good evidence to suppose that they could use it extremely well. No less and no more than any other child or young person, young people in care need the support of the people who are caring for them to understand and make the most of the asset, but we should ensure that it goes directly to them and is not mediated by a local authority. Also,

that substantial asset should not be allowed to undermine the other duties that local authorities owe to young people in care. Hon. Members may have children who have a trust fund. As parents, they will not abrogate all their other responsibilities towards that child simply because it reaches the age of 18, and local authorities should be required not to do so either.

We have heard some good suggestions. I believe that they can be built on, and I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will be able to respond positively to the debate today and to others as the Bill unfolds.

Mr David Cameron (Witney, Conservative)

My hon. Friend the Member for Tatton and the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre have put the case very clearly, so I have only a little to add. I hope that the Minister will carefully consider whether it is right to do something special for children in care, and, if so, how we do it.

It is highly unlikely that children in care will get any top-ups to their child trust fund. As my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton said, their need is likely to be great, if one considers the outcomes for children in care. If the Bill is about a savings culture for all, which I believe it is, we must ensure that some children are not left behind. Children in care are the ones who are likely to be left behind if we do not do something.

As I said on Second Reading, the state is, in effect, in loco parentis for children in care. As such, it makes sense for it to act as a parent by adding to the child trust fund through child benefit or by another means. It is right to do something special for children in care. Clearly, that hurdle has been crossed.

If it is right to do something, how do we do it? There is a problem with the Liberal Democrats' suggestion of a four times initial sum. If we take the simple example of two children, one born into care who stays in care until the age of 18 and one who goes into care at the age of two and stays in care until 18, one will end up with a much larger sum than the other. That would not necessarily be right. It seems to make more sense, bearing in mind the in loco parentis point, to do it via child benefit. Therefore, I favour my hon. Friend's amendments rather than those of the Liberal Democrats. I hope that the Minister will respond positively and constructively to that concept, which is good.

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

I, too, commend hon. Members on both sides for their contributions. This is a serious matter, and it reflects well on the Committee that there has been a serious debate on it. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Wyre, who speaks passionately on the subject and who cares deeply about it. I have already spoken to him about his proposal. I do not for one minute dispute the fact that as a society we need to deal adequately with children in care and ensure that we maximise their opportunities as adults as far as possible. To date, we do not have a proud record in that regard. As a Government, we will consider and we are considering that agenda, and we have already taken steps in the right direction.

As for the child trust fund policy, the first point is that special arrangements have been included in the Bill to ensure that children in care receive a child trust fund. I was also mindful of maximising potential

benefits under the policy as it stands for children in care during their lives. We have had a debate on the subject already so I will not rehearse the arguments, but we must make sure that the Inland Revenue account is most likely to maximise the value of an endowment at the age of 18 by ensuring that it is a stakeholder account, which is largely equity-based in the early years. That is likely to give children in care a higher value of asset at the age of 18.

Secondly, we must ensure that children in care, who do not have a parent responsible for them who is claiming child benefit, receive the maximum entitlement to the endowment immediately. After birth and again at the age of seven, and at the time of any future top-ups, there would be no delay in them receiving a further state top-up; they would automatically be eligible for the higher rate without that being linked to any claim for child tax credit. On both counts, children in care without a parent exercising parental responsible will be helped by this policy.

Hon. Members make interesting suggestions about how we can do even more for children in care. It is tempting to say that child benefit, which is not claimed for children in care, should be paid by the state as a supplementary payment into a child's account. I understand the attractiveness of such a policy, but I point out that the purpose of child benefit is to support a family looking after a child rather than the child itself; it relates to the financial circumstances of a family. Payment is not made in the form of child benefit, but in recognition of the financial call of the child to local authorities through the personal social services' standard spending assessment. To suggest that surplus money that could be used is sitting in the Exchequer's coffers does not go to the heart of the argument.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

The Minister may be delivering her comments back to front in the sense that she is dealing with the mechanics of the proposals before the principle. Can she tell us whether, in all seriousness, she considers children in care to be particularly disadvantaged and in need of additional support, or is she saying that we might be wrong in suggesting that that group would necessarily be more disadvantaged than other people on low incomes? Perhaps the Government have some other concern about advantaging that group in the way that we have described. Will the Minister deal with the point raised by the hon. Member for Witney that there is an issue of principle as well as of practicality? Does this pass the principle test?

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

Again, hon. Members are quick to jump to their feet before my arguments have been developed. I absolutely accept that we have a special responsibility towards children in care. That has been the approach of this Government, and it will continue to be. The social exclusion unit examines all such issues, as do the responsible Departments in conjunction with the Treasury. The issue for this Committee is whether the child trust fund is the best way of supporting those children.

I have been asked whether I can make an announcement today, but I do not think that that

would be right. I would not rule out any development in this area in future. As I have made it clear throughout the Committee stage and on Second Reading, this is an evolving policy, and it will develop into all sorts of areas. The most important issue for us is to get the policy up and running, see how it works in practice and monitor its development. We have at least until 15 or 16 years from now, when the first policies mature, to decide in what areas we want policy to go. I have already made it clear to the House that we have been in discussions with children's charities and local authorities on what they would like for the future of the policy.

Although I have already prioritised certain measures to make sure that children in care benefit to maximum effect from the policy, it would be premature to write that policy at the moment. However, I absolutely accept the principle that they are a disadvantaged group of children and that we should work to maximise their opportunities.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

We have had a good debate on the issue, and have attempted to come to terms with complicated subjects, particularly in order to propose a solution to some of the concerns that hon. Members have expressed. I must say that I am a little disappointed in the Minister's response; I hoped that she might go a bit further in suggesting that the Government might bring forward proposals, even if they do not accept the amendments on the principle of the issues that have been discussed today.

The Minister said that there were three reasons why she was not inclined to proceed with the amendments. The first concerned whether the proposals in the amendment were the right ones. The second was that we had time to make the changes. The third was that she questioned whether the child trust fund was the right vehicle to assist children in care. I accept that the issue of practicalities is a serious one, and I am not sure whether either of the main amendments touching on the issue is the right one to achieve what we want. However, I am concerned about the other two reasons for leaving the matter aside for now.

The Minister said that we had time to revisit the policy. In one sense we do; we have not even seen the regulations yet. We know that the group of children who will be affected by the policy will not receive the money from their accounts until 2020, or something like that. There is a sense that we will have time later to introduce new proposals. However, there is a real risk that if we do not do so now while debating the Bill and making law on the issue, we will not get the opportunity to return to the matter later. The particularly vulnerable group that we are talking about, which represents a small proportion of the population, would then be overlooked.

The second issue is whether the child trust fund is the right vehicle for proposing such changes. Obviously, there is a much wider debate to be had about how the Government deliver assistance to people on lower incomes, and even about whether the child trust fund is the right way to do that. I will not get into that debate now. However, I think that the

fund is the right vehicle for the Government to address their concerns. If they want everyone to have an asset at the age of 18 and are creating the child trust fund as a consequence and if they want people to save using that fund, it must surely cause them concern that one group of young children who are vulnerable and likely to have very small quantities of assets might be disadvantaged in the way that hon. Members have described. I am not sure what other vehicle the Minister can use to achieve larger assets for those young people at 18 if she does not use the route proposed today.

I pressed the Minister on the principle of whether the Government favour taking additional measures to assist children in care. The Minister gave the fairly clear answer that the Government consider that group of children to be particularly vulnerable, even in relation to the group of children in households with incomes lower than the child tax credit amount, which are very low-income households. I had wondered whether she believed that the particular group of young people that we were considering was not as vulnerable as we were suggesting. However, given that she did not advance such an argument, I assume that she accepts that the group is financially vulnerable.

The Minister did not say that there was an unfairness in our proposals in that people who were taken into care for reasons other than that of blame attributed to their families might end up being financially advantaged compared with children who were law abiding and came from similar income backgrounds.

Mr Hilton Dawson (Lancaster and Wyre, Labour)

The hon. Gentleman is making a strong argument. Does he accept that the vast majority of children who go into care do so as a result of the action of others? The distinction between children in care and other groups of young people is that, at the age of 18 or very close to it, they have independence thrust on them in a way that other young adults do not. They do not have the backing of a family that so many other children have. Such young people need an asset, something that is theirs to help them through such a difficult phase.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who obviously has much interest and expertise in these matters. I agree with him. I was merely trying to explore whether such a concern was holding back the Government. We all know that it is possible for individual cases of perceived injustice—even if it were only one case in 60,000—that appear in the media to have a wider effect in discrediting a particular policy. If such concerns are not holding back the Minister, we are left with the practicality of the proposals.

I accept the points made by the hon. Members for Tatton and for Witney that our amendment is deficient in that it deals only with young people who were already in care at an early age. As the hon. Member for Tatton said, many young children will go into care much later and the worry is that they will not receive the contributions that the Government hope that other families will make for their children. That is an important deficiency in our amendment. It would

need to be complemented by a measure that would make contributions for children who are not covered at birth and that made sure that the trust funds had the savings effect that the Government desire.

I anticipate the worries of the Government about the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Tatton because of the principles that determine the payment of child benefit. He is asking whether it is right to be seen to be making a payment that is linked to child benefit, even though the purposes of child benefit are designed to meet the needs of children differently and are not necessarily supposed to cover the costs that might be borne by a different entity for children in care. I also anticipate some of the concerns about administrative costs.

Mr Andrew Love (Edmonton, Labour/Co-operative)

I have listened carefully to the hon. Gentleman's argument. I interpret his comments as being in support of the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Tatton. On Second Reading, the thrust of the Liberal Democrat opposition to the Bill was that the money could be spent better in other ways. Is there not a contradiction in such an argument? If so, how will the hon. Gentleman vote if the hon. Member for Tatton presses his amendment to a Division?

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

I do not want to repeat my speeches, although I will if the hon. Gentleman wants me to. We advanced a genuine and sincerely felt argument that the greatest form of inequality in society appears in the early years. Our priority is to continue the Government's work in relation to Sure Start and children's centres and to ensure that such support is there in the early years. I am not talking about the most apparently deprived constituencies, but places throughout the country. Deprivation is not as neatly and tidily packaged as the indicators that the Government rely on to role out the Sure Start schemes assume.

Such a proposal would deal with the challenges that face many young people in the early years of their life. It is more important to direct the money in a way that makes sure that people have the opportunities at that age, so that they can deploy those skills and talents as adults, rather than giving them a packet of money at the age of 18, after they have already been disadvantaged by having to face other hurdles. I have explained our thinking, and I am merely trying to improve the Bill as far as possible within the principles set out by the Government.

I accept that our amendment would need to be complemented by the sort of measure proposed by the hon. Member for Tatton. I am not sure whether linking it to child benefit per se is right, nor am I sure whether the Minister may be shying away from the administrative costs. The principle for an additional payment into the accounts of children in care has been explained today. The purpose of the regular payment that the hon. Member for Tatton suggests has been widely supported, so I am disappointed that the Financial Secretary has not said that she may be able to introduce proposals in the short term. I do not know whether it will be possible for me to withdraw amendment No. 151 and still vote for the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Tatton if he presses it to a Division. That is how I wish to proceed if the

Minister is unable to respond to the widespread desire for such matters to proceed.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

This has been the best debate that we have enjoyed in Committee. That is probably because people other than the principal speakers have taken part, thus making it livelier than other debates and perhaps of a higher quality. I go beyond what my Liberal Democrat colleague said. I am not just a little disappointed—I am very disappointed—that the Minister has not at least held open the possibility of revisiting the proposal.

We heard a powerful speech by the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre and, on behalf of the Committee, I congratulate the young lady to whom he referred. Perhaps he will send her a copy of the Hansard report of our proceedings, so she can see that she provoked such a great debate. I accept his argument about paying the full amount of child benefit, which I calculate for second and other children to be about £559 a year. We are talking about a fairly substantial sum. However, it is still only half what many parents would put into their children's child trust funds each year, because the annual limit is £1,200.

The hon. Gentleman also made an important point about local authorities. If we could enact such a proposal, they could play an important part in helping children spend the money wisely and making sure that it gives them a better start in life than they have at present.

Mr Hilton Dawson (Lancaster and Wyre, Labour)

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. Does not the fact of putting £500 plus each year into a child's account make it highly likely that children will want to contribute even more from their own resources when they have the ability to do so within the £1,200 threshold? Could that not be an acutely important element in children's financial education and their whole outlook on the future?

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

I agree with all what the hon. Gentleman has just said. I went out of my way in my opening remarks to congratulate the Government on the measures that they have taken to help children in care and to make sure that they are not left behind by the proposal. They have gone to lengths to make sure that a child trust fund is set for up for such children. However, the Minister did not deal with either of the points put by my hon. Friend the Member for Witney, which were whether it was right in principle that the children should receive more and whether we should establish for children in care an asset to help them to find accommodation or buy a car when they leave care. Most children are helped to do that by their parents after the age of 18. As we all know, parents do not stop paying for their children when they leave home.

The Minister did not say whether she thought that helping children in care in a special way, beyond what is set out in the Bill, was a good idea in principle. Furthermore, she did not really address the other point in the way that my hon. Friend the Member for Witney put it, which was about the practical elements of the matter. She rested her argument on the point that child benefit is not designed for that purpose.

Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.

On resuming—

Mr David Amess (Southend West, Conservative)

I call Mr. Osborne.

Mr Andrew Robathan (Blaby, Conservative)

Hear, hear. A fine man.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

I thank my hon. Friend for his support.

I was summing up the discussion on children in care. I said that the Minister had not addressed the first point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Witney—whether it is a good thing in principle that we give children in care more. Nor had the Minister addressed his second point, which was whether giving such children at the age of 18 substantial assets, which they are unlikely to have otherwise, is the right way to help them.

The Minister said that child benefit is used for a different purpose—to help parents bring up their children—and that children in care cost lots of money anyway, which I thought was beside the point. Of course parents use child benefit to pay for the costs, incurred on a weekly basis, of raising their children. However, I suspect that a lot of parents might decide to put the child benefit into their child's trust fund; I suspect that the financial providers will try to get people to do so. So a parent may in any case pay child benefit into the trust fund.

The Minister is technically correct in saying that child benefit is not for such contributions. However, it is a simple idea. If those children were not in care, the Government would pay money to their parents. The Government are not paying that money, so why not take it, or a proportion of it, and put it into those children's funds? That could be done regularly, on a weekly basis. That was my idea in relation to child benefit. If the Minister says that that is not correct, that the Treasury would object and that it does not make Whitehall sense, she could do some such thing in another way. The idea is just a device: why not link the trust fund to child benefit, which is something that we can all understand?

I was more than a little disappointed by what the Minister said. She used every phrase in Sir Humphrey's phrasebook: ''I do not rule out any developments; the policy is an evolving one; it may develop in all sorts of areas; we need to get it up and running first''—classic ways of saying, ''No, we are not going to do it.'' The Bill is still in its early stages; it has not yet gone to the House of Lords, and we have not yet got to Report.

All I wanted the Minister to say was that Members on both sides of the Committee had brought up an interesting idea, which she was prepared to consider, whether she later said it could not be done for all sorts of reasons, or that it could work and was a good idea. Unfortunately, she was unable to say such things, which is a shame. If she maintains her position and does not at least open up the possibility that she will consider the idea, give us some costings and do a back-of-an-envelope job that we can all consider, I am

afraid that I will have to press the matter to a Division. I am reliably informed, by people who know more about such things than I do, that we will have to wait until we reach clause 11 for that vote.

Mr Hilton Dawson (Lancaster and Wyre, Labour)

I appreciate all the hon. Gentleman is doing to get further discussion and consideration of the clause. I have said that there will be a meeting of the all-party group for children and young people in care next Wednesday. The Financial Secretary will be there. That would be a perfect opportunity for a further discussion—perhaps led by young people in care and those who work with them—without the necessity of engaging in a divisive vote at this stage on a necessary flawed motion.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

I was a Whip for part of this year, and I understand the hon. Gentleman's problem. Given that he has been supportive, I am sympathetic towards him. Perhaps the Minister could help him and me by getting to her feet and saying that she is prepared to consider the matter and return to it, in which case I would not press the amendment to a vote.

The hon. Gentleman's all-party group would be an excellent place to raise the matter and press the Minister. I have known Ministers who would spend more than £30 million to get themselves out of a difficult meeting, so perhaps the Financial Secretary will reconsider and ensure that she has a nice, easy time on Wednesday.

Ms Ruth Kelly (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Bolton West, Labour)

The hon. Gentleman has asked us to confirm the costs. As he referred to costs, I shall take this opportunity to say that the £30 million refers only to those children in care who have no one to claim child benefit on their behalf. I believe he was talking about a much wider pool of children in care—perhaps he will correct me if I am wrong—and certainly the hon. Member for Yeovil was. The £30 million is the annual cost in year 16 of the policy, which gives us a figure on which to work.

I am not against the matter in principle and there are interesting possibilities. I said that I am not in a position today to say that that is a policy we will pursue.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

Is that something to which the Minister could return on Report? The £30 million is a figure provided by the Library. In fact, it is probably less than that because £30 million is a simple calculation: the number of children in care times the amount of child benefit for a second child. The figure is probably less because those 60,000 children are not in care for the full 52 weeks of the year. If the Treasury has some good costings, as the Minister indicated, she could bring those forward.

Mr Hilton Dawson (Lancaster and Wyre, Labour)

Perhaps I can help the hon. Gentleman. If children are moving in and out of care, there is a period of around four weeks when they come into care and parents are still able to receive child benefit. Presumably it would not be payable in those circumstances.

Mr George Osborne (Tatton, Conservative)

Indeed; the hon. Gentleman makes a good point.

I have not seen any proper costings and if the Minister will indicate, perhaps by nodding—[Laughter.] I am trying to save the blushes of the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre. All the Minister needs to do is nod and have a 10-minute debate on the matter at some future time, and we shall not embarrass the hon. Gentleman. If she is not prepared to do that, perhaps she will reconsider before we come to the vote.

Mr David Laws (Yeovil, Liberal Democrat)

I cannot help feeling that the Financial Secretary probably needs some time alone with the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre who will no doubt persuade her that she should be making a move in the direction that he and other hon. Members suggested. The proposal that we will put to the Committee now is, if not for a meeting with the Financial Secretary, at least for some notes to drift backwards and forwards across the Table between her and the hon. Member for Tatton. On the basis of what the hon. Gentleman has said, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 8 ordered to stand part of the Bill.