Tim Loughton (Shadow Minister (Children), Health; East Worthing & Shoreham, Conservative)

We have had a useful discussion. I take on board the Under-Secretary’s point in response to amendment No. 108, but I think affordability need not be a purely relative term. It should include information about price and relative costs in parts of an authority, or in an area or region. I take on board her comments about it including information on tax credits and the availability of help.

I do not agree with the Under-Secretary’s points on sustainability. She accused the hon. Member for Stockport of accusing me of future-gazing, which is an interesting phrase. I am more concerned, as I made clear to the hon. Member for Stockport, that one clarification under sustainability would be how the provision is funded. Is it purely a private commercial enterprise? Has it been made possible through public funding from neighbourhood nurseries or various Sure Start-type programmes? Is it funded on a voluntary basis? Information about the nature of its funding streams and financial structures would be perfectly sensible and practical and would constitute, as far as I am concerned, a good degree of information   with which to judge sustainability, which is a subjective phrase by any measure. However, I will not push that point.

I am not convinced by what the Under-Secretary said on amendment No. 191. We often have debates about why we should not single out a group of people. They are singled out; we would all agree that people with disabilities should be singled out for particular reasons. I am not convinced by her argument that because the matter is covered in clause 6, which deals with market deficiencies, it should not be included in clause 12. The Bill does not require local authorities to publish full information about the availability of disability-friendly and disability-specialist child care places. However, I will not detain the Committee by forcing the amendment to a vote. I am grateful that the Minister has pledged to reinforce that matter in the regulations. Of course, it goes back to the problem that we have had all along, which is that without sight of the regulations it is difficult for us to judge whether the Minister will provide the sort of assurances in practice that she says she will. It is useful that we have reinforced the importance of those points in this short debate, but I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.