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Child Poverty Bill

Can I come back to the noble Lord on his point about this being a relative income Bill that should be labelled as such? The noble Lord knows full well that that is not the case. The heart of the Bill is about the strategy; it is about making sure that children do not experience socio-economic disadvantage. Yes, there are targets which help us to measure progress, and those targets are predominantly income-focused. The noble Lord has also looked aside from the material deprivation component of one of the targets. The heart of the Bill is about eradicating and illuminating child poverty in our country. That is what the strategies require. The building blocks are there for the framework to make that happen. The noble Lord also mentioned well-being. If he looked at the draft regulations that we have circulated about local authorities and their needs assessments, he would see that they are a key part of how we will make progress on this. One provision says that the needs assessment must include for the local area and each part an assessment of well-being, as related to matters set out in Section 10 of the Children Act 2004. The noble Lord claims that this is all about relative income, but that is absolutely not the case. I hope that, after these debates, the noble Lord will accept that.