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(Clauses 1, 4, 8, 189 and 209, Schedules 1, 23 and 33, and new Clauses and new Schedules relating to value added tax)

I recognise that not everyone wants to address the matter and that there are those who do not want to change the position whereby people earning £20,000 or £25,000 a year are paying taxes to fund child benefit for substantially wealthier families, and I realise that arguments are made to defend that. But if we are to do something about it, we have a choice. Do we do this through a tax credit system, which means putting everybody through that system, and doing it on a household basis, or do we try to find an alternative way of doing it that reduces the administrative demands? I do not deny that there is complexity in this method, but relatively, we believe that this is the simpler way of doing it.