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Child Poverty Bill

My Lords, I was particularly asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, to give her apologies for being unable to be here; she had a previous commitment to a public lecture which existed before she knew the date of Report. She hopes the House will accept her apologies. I have just a couple of points. First, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, that my understanding is that if he moves a vote on the first amendment, Amendment 11, that also brigades with it the other two amendments; and were he to be successful and the other two amendments were to be passed as well, that would be very interesting because together they would be very high-cost. Normally where amendments are grouped, the first one is regarded as trailing to the other two, and therefore carrying the other two. I merely put that to him. He would have to make that very clear; otherwise there may be some difficulties. The second point is to the noble Lord, Lord Freud, who quoted, very interestingly, the German supreme court or high court about a "dignified" existence.