Child Poverty Bill

My Lords, I had intended to make an exhaustive examination of the textual content of Clause 15, but I suspect that we are all past that by now. However, the amendment seeks to make it clear in my head, if in no one else’s, what the clause actually means because I think that it is very badly drafted. The Minister has said, and I believe him, that the clause is designed to make the work of the commission more cost-effective in developing policy. I want to take a few moments to guide the Committee through the wording. It suggests clearly to me that this is about the Government being able to plead Clause 15 and the fact that the money has run out in order to walk away from the targets. The clause heading is ““Economic and fiscal circumstances””, which is a broad strategic backdrop into which the clauses following this one fall, but there are no qualifications for it. The clause tackles big-picture stuff. Subsection (1) states: "““The matters mentioned in subsection (2) must be taken into account … by the Secretary of State in preparing a UK strategy””." If you turn immediately to page 10, subsection (2)(a) refers to ““economic circumstances”” while paragraph (b) refers to ““fiscal circumstances””. I concede that I have less of a problem with subsection (1)(b) than subsection (3)(a) and (b) because there is no context to show that it is actually a provision of a much lower order. However, the clause as it stands can be read as if the Government are able to plead lack of money to elide the targets. That is the way I read it. If I am reading it that way—and reading it any other way does violence to the English language—then while I do not object to the import of the clause, which the Minister has tried to explain to me once before, the way it is written does not achieve that. Potentially, it could give rise to doubt. In any case, it would be useful yet again for the Minister to put on the record the reassurance I think he gave earlier that there is no intention of any kind to plead poverty in the future as a way of eliding the child poverty targets. I beg to move.