Welfare Reform Bill

I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in support of the amendment, and to my noble friend Lord Ramsbotham, who, I am glad to say, escaped from the Iraq war long enough to add his support verbally. I am also extremely grateful to the Minister for a long and detailed response which, frankly, I will have to take away and read most carefully—probably with a magnifying glass because there are so many words in it. There was some comfort for me there. The noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, and the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas, plugged Thrive. Mencap has for many years had Lufton College in Somerset, which trains people in animal welfare, horticulture, agriculture and so on. It hopes that, at the end of the training, which can be anything from two to four or five years, they will be able to take up work in that activity when they finally return home. The training of the advisers in learning disability, and all the other problems, is a case of "How long is a piece of string?". Truthfully, how good are the trainers going to be? How good are the trainees going to be at receiving what they are trained in? It is a difficult problem, and I hope that, in four or five years—if the Bill is eventually enacted and applies—we will not hear those dread words "lessons have been learnt" once again because things have gone horribly wrong. During the passage of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, all those years ago, the Kent police, who had a good film studio, made a DVD in co-operation with Mencap to show to all police officers who were likely to be involved with learning-disabled people. It was a great success and circulated to all police forces. I am not sure that one might not care to consider that device. I would be more than happy to step in front of a camera with some learning-disabled people and try to explain the problems and difficulties. It might be a practical help to the training of these people. Nobody has yet mentioned the easy-read pamphlets that should be available for people with learning disabilities. Again, they should automatically be available. Easy-read versions of the actions of Bills, the Acts when they eventually come out, the regulations and so on are vital. It is not that they will exactly be the most popular reading, but they should be available.