Child Trust Funds: Children with Learning Disabilities

Lord Touhig Excerpts

Thursday 3rd December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

We absolutely will and are looking at my noble friend Lord Young’s ideas and, as I say, the DWP has just joined the working party, which is starting straight away and will report back to the Minister in early January. We are not stopping on that but looking at the best way of dealing with these issues.

[Lord Touhig (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, being disabled in Britain should not mean being a second-class citizen, but that is how it must seem for children with learning disabilities whose families face an expensive battle to gain access to the child trust fund. Imagine the outcry if big city investors, or perhaps pensioners, were denied access to their own money. The Government would then be rushing to their aid. The Prime Minister has pledged to level up. Will the Minister tell him that these children can have access to their money now? The message is simple: get this done.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I am afraid, as I have said before, that we are doing everything we possibly can. It is not costly any longer because the fee remission will ensure that families can go to the Court of Protection and not suffer financially. We will get it done but we have to take into account the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and the fact that these young people are at times vulnerable and need protection through that Act.