Learning Disabilities: Child Trust Funds

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2021 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Young of Cookham]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they have made towards enabling access to Child Trust Funds by those with a learning disability.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Wolfson of Tredegar) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government have committed to making the process of obtaining legal authority to access a child trust fund more straightforward. A working group comprising the Ministry of Justice, the Treasury, HMRC and the Department for Work and Pensions has met several times to consider what more can be done, and it has also met the Investing and Saving Alliance, the Financial Conduct Authority and the Money and Pensions Service. The Court of Protection Rules Committee is reviewing its application forms and considering issues raised by campaigners.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

I am grateful to my noble friend, who has only recently inherited this pressing problem. I hope that he can help the thousands of families who cannot access child trust funds without a lengthy and at times intimidating procedure. On 3 December, when I last raised this, my noble friend Lady Scott said that the new working group would

“report back to the Minister in early January.”—[Official Report, 3/12/20; col. 828.]

What progress has been made? Might he promote a simplified and streamlined court procedure to access what are normally fairly small sums of money?

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right that, because these funds are generally of relatively small amounts of money, it is all the more important that court procedures, which are designed to comply with the Mental Capacity Act 2005, are both accessible and proportionate. Rules and procedures are a matter for the courts, not Ministers, but I will do all I properly can to ensure that children and young adults with a learning disability can access what are, after all, their own funds.