Education Bill

I thank the Minister for that. I think we have an agreement about the date, although the date is not the point here. I think that we would be happy with the original date and with working towards that plan. I am slightly anxious because he talked a lot about enforcement. While the original legislation had enforcement mechanisms, the whole point of our amendment is that it is not about enforcement. Raising the participation age will work only if the infrastructure and the enforcement go hand in hand. I do not want the Minister to go away with the idea that we would come along with a big bludgeon and demand that young people stay on at all cost. That is not the purpose of the amendment. Its purpose is for teachers, local authorities and employers—all the players in the education of young people—to put in place all the mechanisms to ensure that that encouragement takes place. I am still a little unclear about what the Minister means when he says that they will commence the support duties. We may have to return to that, because if that is the case, we would like to see those duties on the face of the Bill, and it is not clear to us at the moment that they are. This is about a balanced approach, it is about infrastructure and making sure that young people comply with the new legislation in equal measure. I am not sure, as the Minister has set out the position at the moment, that we will achieve necessarily what the original legislation aimed to do, so we may well return to this matter. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment 145A withdrawn. Amendments 145B and 145C not moved. Clause 71 agreed.