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Dormant Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill [HL]

As the noble Lord, Lord Newby, has pointed out, we have reached the point of deciding how to spend the money. One of the problems that I perceive as we go through the Bill is that there is a lack of clarity on this spending and I would be grateful if the Minister could clear up how the money is to be spent and, most importantly, whether some of this money will be used as a substitute for government programmes in order to save the Government having to spend money where they have made commitments. My noble friend Lord Hamilton asked about youth. An announcement was made only recently by Mr Balls on how much money will be spent on youth. Was he counting on cash from some of the unclaimed assets, or was he saying that it was government spending? It certainly appeared to be spending by the Government as opposed to spending unclaimed assets, which after all are not government money. The whole point of the Bill is that money should be made available to projects to which the Government are not committed, and where government funds would not be appropriate. We will seek to clarify that matter. I hope that the Minister will make a start when he speaks.