Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

Where there is no target as such. A scientifically calculated phenomenon should be a current either moving from local government to central government or from central government to local government. In so far as local government says to central government, ““We appreciate the principle that you have enunciated and agree with it. This is the situation in our area and this is the amalgam of the cases that we are dealing with which we consider to be appropriate to be the subject of adoption, not as a target, but as a calculated fact””, I am sure the Minister can see the distinction. They are not targets. They are not matters moving from central government to local government, but rather in the other direction—the moving as a category of collected facts which represent the current situation in the estimation of the local authority. I hope I am not splitting hairs, but to my mind that is something very different from a target that has been calculated in relation to some set phenomenon.