My hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil assured me that, given the glacial pace at which the Committee had cantered—or, rather, not cantered—through previous clauses, there was absolutely no chance that we would reach this stage before 10 o’clock, when he is scheduled to join us. For the past few minutes, I have therefore been somewhat panic-stricken and I have been reading through the amendments that my hon. Friend drafted and tabled. I will have to make my best attempt—[ Interruption. ] Well, it demonstrates palpable honesty in front of fellow Committee members. I will try my best to interpret what my hon. Friend would have said had he been here or had we been able to travel forward 20 minutes in time to when he was here.

The amendments suggest that if the local authority is to offer support to the young person to ensure that they can fulfil their obligations under the Bill to attend compulsory education or training, some assessment should be made of whether that support is appropriate. During our evidence sessions a few weeks ago, we heard some interesting evidence from various bodies, particularly the Prince’s Trust and Fairbridge, which suggested that some of the people at whom the Bill is aimed in the broadest sense—those not in education, employment or training—lead quite dysfunctional lives. They might have an addiction to drugs or alcohol or might have been in and out of the criminal justice system. The support offered to them by the local authority might not, therefore, necessarily address the fundamental needs that they have in their daily lives, and that might be one of the underlying reasons why they are unable to fulfil the obligation in the Bill to attend college.

Obviously, if someone has an addiction to heroin, or some other part of their life is dysfunctional, attending college or workplace training will not be at the forefront of their minds, and their attendance might not be welcomed by the institution or employer anyway. The compulsion introduced by the Bill will clearly not have the desired effect of ensuring that that group of people have a measurable level of educational attainments by the time that they are 18.

It will be clear from our earlier discussions and the questions that we asked during our evidence sessions that my hon. Friend and I would prefer these young people with dysfunctional lives to be given more access to the support services that would make a tangible differences to their circumstances, such as more drug rehabilitation and treatment and more investment in mental health, if such problems are the reason why they cannot fulfil their duty to participate. The purpose of the amendments is to put in place a requirement to assess whether young people’s health needs—I see drug addiction as a health problem—or mental health needs have been properly dealt with before further duties are placed on them. Our aim is to ensure that the relevant support is there so that the local authority can take an holistic approach. I have done the best that I can in the circumstances.