Mr.
Gauke: I must admit that I have never really fully
understood the role of the Children’s Commissioner. Can the
Minister elaborate on the powers of the Children’s
Commissioner?
Helen
Goodman: The Children’s Commissioner has
responsibility to oversee the condition of children in England. The
powers of the Children’s Commissioner for England are slightly
different to those of the Children’s Commissioners for Scotland,
for Wales and for Northern Ireland. In Scotland, Wales and Northern
Ireland, the Children’s Commissioner can take up individual
cases. In England, the Children’s Commissioner simply takes a
view on overall policy. The role is slightly different in England, but
it is emphatically not a purely advisory role—that is the
position of the child poverty commission.
Therefore, we
do not believe that, even on a pilot basis, it would be appropriate to
subject the appointment of the chair of the child poverty commission to
a pre-appointment hearing. Of course, I entirely accept that Parliament
is extremely interested in the work of the child poverty commission. Of
course, the Government have no control, or power, over the Select
Committees, who are free at all times to invite whoever they choose to
give evidence. One can well imagine, after the appointments have been
made, and after the commission has been set up and embarked on its
work, that it would be very sensible for the Select Committee on Work
and Pensions, the Treasury Committee, or even the Children, Schools and
Families Committee, to call members of the child poverty commission to
give evidence. They will be free to do that. The amendment tabled by
the hon. Member for South-West Hertfordshire is not practical or
necessary, nor would it significantly enhance the role of Parliament in
the policy area of child
poverty.
Mr.
Stuart: May I tease out how independent this appointment
will be? The rules about appointments are there to ensure that a person
does not appoint their best mate, or somebody with whom they have an
overly close relationship. They ensure that the person who is appointed
is remotely competent in the area. To what extent will the chair of the
child poverty commission be independent? It does not appear from the
Minister’s explanation that they will be. They will be appointed
by the Secretary of State. In the case of the Children’s
Commissioner, the appointment was made by a person from the
appointments quango that checks up on the rules, one director from the
Ministry of Justice and another from the Department for Children,
Schools and Families. That appointment was not independent, but was
controlled by Ministers. To what extent can the new position be
described as
independent?
Helen
Goodman: I am sorry if the hon. Gentleman is not convinced
by what I have said. Early in my remarks, I explained that the
appointment will be overseen by an independent person approved by the
Office of the
Commissioner for Public Appointments. I hope that that reassures the
hon. Gentleman not only that we are establishing a structure for
appointing people who are independent, but that the process will be
independent.
Mr.
Gauke: This has proved to be a helpful debate, but I am
not convinced by the Minister’s arguments. She seems to suggest
that being chair of the child poverty commission is not that big a job.
She says that there is a case for parliamentary scrutiny if there is
strong public interest, or if the role involves holding the Executive
to account. I assume, therefore, that there will not be strong public
interest in the chair of the child poverty commission, and that it will
not be part of his or her responsibilities to hold the Executive to
account.
Helen
Goodman: I thought it was quite clear that Parliament
holds the Secretary of State to account, and that the child poverty
commission will advise the Secretary of State. The child poverty
commission will not hold the Secretary of State to
account.
Mr.
Gauke: I had previously thought that the holder of the
role was supposed to be a big pain in the backside, to use the words of
the hon. Member for Northavon. I thought that the point of the role was
to put pressure on the Government. As our Committee sittings go on, I
cannot help thinking that the hon. Gentleman would perform the role
splendidly. I mean that in a nice way and hope that he takes it as a
compliment. [Interruption.] Well, things can
change, can’t they?
It seems to
me that the role, as the Government envisage it, is quite small. I am
not convinced by the Minister’s distinction between the chair of
the child poverty commission and the Children’s Commissioner,
whose role is to take a view on policy. That seems to be a largely
advisory role. I cannot help noting that I tabled a similar amendment
in the Statistics and Registration Service Bill Committee, in relation
to the chairman of the Statistics Commission. I raised the matter again
in the House on 2 July 2007, when the hon. Member for Wallasey (Angela
Eagle), then a Treasury Minister, said that we would not go down that
route. Then, the very next day, the Prime Minister announced that the
chair of the Statistics Commission would in fact be subject to
parliamentary scrutiny. I do not know whether the same thing will
happen with the child poverty
commission. There
is confusion, and perhaps tension, as to what the child poverty
commission’s role is supposed to be. I understand the argument
that the role should be limited, but if it is to be purely advisory, I
am not sure why it cannot be carried out by the relevant Departments,
unless the holder of the post is supposed to be a bit of a pain in the
backside. For those reasons, I would like to press the amendment to a
Division. Question
put, That the amendment be made.
The
Committee divided: Ayes 7, Noes
9.
Division
No.
4]
Question
accordingly negatived.
Steve
Webb: I beg to move amendment 49, in schedule 1,
page 17, line 20, at end insert
“The sums under 9(c) shall include resources
to commission independent research as
required.”. I
am reflecting on my alternative career, and in that context it is
important that the child poverty commission has a research project. I
do not have one
yet. The
amendment deals with the child poverty commission’s facilities
and role. We propose that the sums that the Secretary of State will
provide to the commission under schedule 1(9)(c) should include sums
for research. Indeed, the impact assessment on the Bill inserts a
notional figure, but we have not so far had any assurance from the
Ministers that that funding will actually be made available. The reason
we are trying to beef up the commission is slightly informed by our
previous discussion, because it is currently—it would be
pejorative to describe it as an academic scavenger—relying on
what is lying around. If there is some useful, relevant research, a
commission of 14 good men and women and true will presumably know about
it, will have read it, or will even have done it themselves. However,
they will be performing an advisory role in a new area, because while
some of the definitions used to measure poverty have been in use for a
long time, other areas are quite fresh, such as some of the stuff on
material deprivation, the index, the weighting and so on; they are
fairly new. We certainly did not do it like that when I was a
lad. I
do not think that all the research that one may require is lying
around. If the child poverty commission is to have some power of
initiative to ensure that it can provide the proper advice to the
Secretary of State, it ought to be able to commission a limited amount
of research and not simply hope that it exists. If the commission
identifies a gap in knowledge, it would be appropriate for it to have a
limited budget to do something about
it. There
is a contrast between the child poverty commission and the Committee on
Climate Change, which has a budget this year of £3.4 million. I
think that the child poverty commission’s budget is about 5 per
cent. of that figure. Within the CCC’s budget, research and
consultancy is £750,000. Climate change is an awfully big and
important issue, but one would think that child poverty was, too. We
simply seek an assurance that research would be part of the
commission’s budget. Schedule 1(4)(b) suggests that the members
of the commission should have experience in, or a knowledge of,
research in connection with child poverty. That is obviously partly
about knowing what other people have done and what the members
themselves have done, but one also assumes that if people who know
about research are appointed to a commission, they will be well placed
to make good use of limited public funds to commission relevant
research.
6.45
pm The
£200,000 figure in the impact assessment is not outrageous for a
research budget, and would enable the commission to pay for some
tightly focused work that would enable it to do its job
properly—to provide high quality advice to the Secretary of
State in a new and developing area. I am sure, therefore, that the
Minister will welcome our attempt to enhance the commission’s
ability to assist Ministers in their work, and will agree to the
amendment.
Mr.
Gauke: The proposal comes back, I think, to the similar
point about what the child poverty commission is for. If it is a big
important organisation that will drive the debate, of course it should
have a research budget. However, if it is there solely to provide
advice, making use of research undertaken by others, that prompts the
question of whether a separate organisation is necessary or whether its
remit should be addressed within the Department, making use of outside
expertise. We will therefore listen to the Minister’s answer
with great
interest.
Mr.
Stuart: This debate is familiar. I had the pleasure of
serving on the Joint Committee on the draft Climate Change Bill and, in
that pre-legislative scrutiny, extracting and making the point that the
Committee on Climate Change needed a decent research budget was like
pulling teeth, but a reasonable budget came out in the end. The fact
that research budget provision is not already in the Bill fits entirely
with the Minister’s vision of the child poverty
commission’s role. As she just said, she does not see the chair
of that commission engaging with the public interest to any great
extent. [Interruption.] The Minister looks
disgusted. She said that there should not be parliamentary overview of
the appointment because the post did neither of the two things
required—engage in a major way with the pubic interest, or hold
the Executive to account. She has told us that the commission cannot
hold the Executive to account, so by implication she is saying that it
does not fulfil the other criteria of engaging with the public
interest. To
give the commission no reasonable research budget further enfeebles it,
and if it is unable even to conduct its own research into the critical
areas that currently do not receive the attention that such an expert
commission would give them, it will certainly continue to fail to
engage with the public. If it fails to do that, it will be purposeless,
and will not help to create the political momentum that all who support
the Bill want to see, to ensure that child poverty stays at the top of
the political
agenda.
Helen
Goodman: I want to make it clear from the outset that I,
like Members here today, regard the commission and the advice it will
offer as crucial in equipping us to meet the goal of eradicating child
poverty by 2020. It therefore follows that the Government will do
everything they can to ensure that the commission has the necessary
resources, and that they will ensure that the resources allocated are
adequate for the commission to fulfil its statutory
functions. When
considering whether the commission should undertake research, balance
is important. The parallel that has been drawn with the Committee on
Climate
Change is not strong because, notwithstanding the fact that there are
areas of child poverty where techniques are developing, the truth is
that climate change policy is a much less well ploughed field with many
greater uncertainties and far more new issues to explore. We have made
it clear that the child poverty commission’s responsibility will
be to draw on, analyse and distil the huge amount of existing knowledge
and research. When I say that balance is required, I mean that there is
no need to establish a new London School of Economics, notwithstanding
its excellent Fabian antecedents and the fact that it is 100 years
since Beatrice Webb wrote her minority report for the royal
commission.
I have heard
hon. Members’ strong views, and I am sympathetic to the points
that the hon. Member for Northavon made. It would be helpful to draw a
distinction between the commission undertaking research and its having
the power to enter into contracts to commission work in areas that have
not yet been fully explored. Notwithstanding the fact that I do not
foresee the child poverty commission undertaking research in the way
that the Committee on Climate Change does, I am prepared to examine the
proposal in detail and to see how we might make it work. With that
assurance, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw his
amendment.
Steve
Webb: That sounds like half a loaf, which is much better
than no bread at all. The amendment suggests that the commission should
not carry out research, but should commission independent research. I
will take what I have been offered, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw
the
amendment. Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn.
Mr.
Gauke: I beg to move amendment 10, in schedule 1,
page 17, line 24, at end
insert— ‘(2) All such
remuneration, allowances and expenses must be published monthly
online.’. The
amendment should not detain us for long. It simply states that all
payments to commission members—their allowances and
expenses—must be published monthly
online. Members
will be well aware of the increased public interest in such matters and
of the need for greater transparency as far as public funds are
concerned, applying to Members of the House and to those in public life
as a whole. There is a general move towards much greater transparency.
I do not expect the amendment to be terribly controversial and am
hopeful that the Minister might accept it. As public money is being
spent, the remuneration in all its forms should be available for the
public to scrutinise. In the cause of greater transparency, I hope that
the amendment would add to the
Bill.
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