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Childcare Bill

I thank my hon. Friend for sharing that policy development with Conservative Front Benchers, who are clearly unaware of it. A concentrated effort would be required from all public agencies on levelling down, because all the evidence suggests that better educated and better informed people are, for example, changing their diets, taking more exercise and attending preventive health checks, with the result that their life chances and those of their children are improving at a better rate than those of less well informed people. I imagine that the only way to lower outcomes for the more advantaged would be to stop them getting information in the hope that they will stop doing the things that are improving their health. All the evidence suggests that more effort is required to find ways to improve outcomes for the most disadvantaged. The hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs. Miller) has argued that outcomes will improve for the most disadvantaged if effort is concentrated on them, so it does not matter that outcomes for the advantaged are rising. However, if the gap widens and less advantaged people perceive that their life opportunities are much less than those of more privileged people, then they will think that the situation is unjust, and it will become more difficult to sustain a multicultural, diverse community.