Oral Answers to Questions

Andrea Leadsom Excerpts

Monday 16th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very good point, and he has a strong record in campaigning on these issues. We want to make sure that everyone who teaches in schools built when building standards were lower has the support that they need. The changes that we have made to building regulations are intended to ensure that schools built in future are fit-for-purpose and refurbished appropriately. I am happy to ensure that officials and Ministers in my Department liaise with him to make sure that teachers and children are protected from unfit buildings.

[Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

If the permanent secretary is considering moving the Department to Northamptonshire, may I recommend Towcester or Brackley? We had a fabulous team win at the Chinese grand prix this weekend.

To come to my point, on adoption, does the Minister agree that, given what we now know about the development of a baby’s brain, it is absolutely essential that, wherever possible, a baby gets the best chance of attaching to new adoptive parents by being adopted before the age of two?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Tim Loughton)]

My hon. Friend, who within and outside the House is an expert on attachment, is absolutely right. That is why, for young children in the care system for whom there is clearly no safe way home to their birth parents, getting a good-quality, strong, attachment in adoption as speedily as possible is absolutely essential, so that they have a good chance of a safe, stable, healthy upbringing with a loving family—something denied to them by their birth parents.