Child Trust Fund

Lord Low of Dalston Excerpts

Monday 28th February 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sassoon]

I am grateful to my noble friend, because we are working on that. We have been talking, for example, to potential junior ISA providers. They have been showing some interest, I am pleased to say, in contributing to a scheme in that way. We need to continue to work on that, but if any financial institutions, charities or other groups are interested in being part of that, we would be very pleased to discuss it with them.

[Lord Low of Dalston]

My Lords—

[Baroness Sherlock]

My Lords—

[Noble Lords]

Cross-Bench.

[Lord Low of Dalston]

The Minister will be aware of local authorities’ inconsistent fulfilment of their duties under the Children (Leaving Care) Act and the inconsistent provision, particularly as regards accommodation, made for children and young people leaving care. What will the Government now do to make good the deficiency in provision for that particularly vulnerable group, whose vulnerability is at its greatest at the point of leaving local authority care?

[Lord Sassoon]

My Lords, we are straying a bit from the Question and from my area of responsibility, but I appreciate that difficult issues are involved with those who are leaving care, which is why additional funding in the “children in care” line of the new local government formula is there to encourage local authorities to use the staying-put models of practice. From April 2011, we will be implementing provision in the Children and Young Persons Act 2008 that allows young people to resume entitlements to leaving care support up to the age of 25, where they take up education or training.