Child Poverty Bill

I thank the Minister for that response, but I must point out that if I were still sitting in an investment bank, which six or seven years ago I was—I am a reformed character now, I assure him—I would get a decent-looking spreadsheet on this overnight, which would give the rough order of magnitude of cost and expenses that we were talking about and would give a framework in which to look at the issue. It is clearly an issue of immense importance. I cannot understand why we cannot have a rough spreadsheet with three or four basic assumptions so that we can just look at it informally. You can tell from the debate that there is a very strong group of Members who feel that the state should support this. I anticipate that this will come back in quite powerful form at later stages. Such a spreadsheet would be an immensely valuable stepping stone to allow us to take a sensible approach to this later.