Welfare Reform Bill

My Lords, I add my support to the two amendments in this group to which I have added my name. I shall speak to Amendment 99AAA, which stands in my name, on the issue of kinship carers. Amendment 99ZB, already moved very cogently by the right reverend Prelate, would remove child benefit from the calculation of the cap. There is much that I should like to say on this but in her recent contribution the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, made a very powerful case about the unfairness of including child benefit in the calculation of the cap. Frankly, there is little that I can add other than to say that if the Government were to accede to this amendment, there would be not just huge applause but real consensus around this Table that children should be protected, whatever happens to adults. Whatever is thought—and probably not shared—about the perceived shortcomings of adults, children should always be protected. Amendment 99C deals with the exemptions of particular groups from the benefit cap. This is the subject of Amendment 99AAA in my name regarding kinship carers. I will be very brief but I want to say a few words about why kinship carers are so important. A kinship carer might, for example, be an uncle, aunt or grandparent who takes in children from other members of the family to avoid that child going into council care, with all the trauma and expense to the state that that creates. The purpose of this amendment, which is essentially a probing amendment, is to see whether the Government indeed intend to exempt family and friend carers from the cap. The architecture is already there; Clause 93(4) provides for the introduction of regulations to make exemptions to the cap, and the amendment would include family and friends carers among those exemptions. Perhaps I might briefly explain a little background here. As it is constructed, and unless an exemption is granted, some family and friends carers will be penalised for taking on the care of a child by the introduction of the cap. I believe that this would be very unfair on people who often have stepped in because of extremely difficult family circumstances to keep vulnerable children out of care. Family and friends carers often live in large households as a result of taking children in and, with an estimated one in 10 living in households of five or more people, will therefore already be disproportionately affected by the benefit cap. As has already been alluded to this afternoon, around six in 10 give up work or reduce their working hours when children move in to look after them. That is often because the needs of the children they are looking after, who have often suffered real neglect or abuse, are considerable and often because they are actively told to do so by social workers. Particularly for large households where family and friends carers already have their own children still living at home or have taken in several children, my concern is that the cap will act as a disincentive for people to provide care and is likely to have the unintended consequence of more children being taken into care. Finally, given all that we know about the outcomes for children in care, in education and in the impact on the rest of their lives, I hope that this very small amendment, which could have a profound impact on the lives of some of the most disadvantaged children in our society—and, frankly, would not cost much money—is one to which the Government could see their way to acceding.