Lord Lucas (Con)

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for that reply, in particular her words on the relationship with local authorities. I will study that in Hansard and come back to her if I have any problem with it, but my first impression was that it was hugely positive and very helpful. I thank her very much. She said that the Department for Education has intervened with local authorities. I will ask for a better understanding of how that process works, because it is such an important part of making sure that local authorities that are not in the best place progress to a better one. I understand the objection to my noble friend’s “do not register” amendments. I was wondering how he would have argued for Mozart—I think Mozart might have appreciated the intervention of a local authority in his education. I should like to pick the Government up again on how nomadic families are to work with this legislation. Which local authority do they register with? How does that work? This is just so that it is clear. I know it is an item of detail and I will obviously not pursue an amendment on it, but knowing how that works for nomadic families and families not consistently in one place would be very helpful. The Minister said some very helpful things about requiring high-level information, not every day or even every three months, which comes back to the proposition of the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, about focusing on an annual report. I would love to see that. The Bill does not say that. The Government are relying on their ability in guidance to take what is in the Bill, which is a very detailed, “record every minute” requirement, and say, “Actually, if you give us a report once a year, that will be fine”. Very early on, I sent a message through the department to the Government’s legal draftsman to ask what the limits on this are. How far can guidance go against what is there in the Bill? Do the Government have the power to say in guidance that an annual report would be enough? I would really appreciate an answer on that. I should like to understand where that lies. Similarly, that applies to things such as, where parents are together, the requirement to say who is providing how much of the education. Again, obviously, that can be dealt with in regulations, but is it within the Government’s power to put that in guidance? When it comes to the consequences of failure, I am delighted—I thought it was the case that there were no fines involved—that the process is moving towards a school attendance order. In this sort of area, the process is the punishment; it has been tipped into this process. It is about the stress, worry and effort required to fight through that process. Therefore, again, it comes down to the importance of a strong, positive relationship and a well set-up local authority, and to how important all that is to the Bill working. For now, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.