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Child Poverty Bill

The hon. Gentleman anticipates me. I embrace that concept, except to say that I am not sure how practical it is. I support probing the issue and I believe that the Government need to think about it more, but I reject the fact that we are measuring only financial poverty. This is a slightly different point, but we know that there are lots of children who are from modest or poor backgrounds but who have a stable, loving family and lots of encouragement and nurturing, and who would not consider themselves to be poor. There are other families with a great deal more financial support and income, but who live in chaotic households and would certainly consider themselves to be deprived of the most important things in life. We are talking about very difficult issues. More thinking needs to be done. The Bill suffers from the fact that it does not seek to get behind the issue of poverty and try at least to trigger a debate about its causes. My hon. Friend the Member for South-West Bedfordshire is on to a good thing in setting out new clause 2, which would require someone to do some more thinking on the issue. I think that the idea is for regulations to come forward to grapple with the problem—I am sure that my hon. Friend will nod at this point.