Child Trust Funds: Children with Learning Disabilities

Lord Addington Excerpts

Thursday 25th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for referring to Mr Justice Hayden, with whom I have met and who I know is personally committed to resolving this. It is fair to say that our understanding of all sorts of mental capacity is considerably greater now than it was in 2005, when the Act was passed, and in 1995, when the Law Commission reported on this issue. We are therefore looking to address this.

[Lord Addington (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Young, for bringing this to our attention and for his wonderful summary of that letter. If we agree that the money is for the children, and that they are capable of spending money in other situations, why have the Government not used the capacity of this Chamber and the other place to make sure that this happens?

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, the position is this: in 1995, when the Law Commission reported on this, it recommended a small claims exception to the Mental Capacity Act. Parliament did not do that; it put in a Mental Capacity Act with no exceptions at all. That is the legislative background against which I now have to operate.