Alison McGovern

I take the hon. Gentleman’s point. Our challenge is to understand how we can best use our resources to support all our children. We could try to increase funding again and again, without any changes to the system, but we would not necessarily get better outcomes, and costs would keep going up, not least because councils have issues with how they are able to provide some of the support that children need. We need to get to a more stable financial position and take responsibility in this place to change the policy failures that caused the cost spikes that the hon. Gentleman mentioned. Compared with 2024-25, by 2028-29 London will see an increase in core spending power of more than £3 billion. The vast majority of councils in London will see a real-terms increase between 2024-25 and 2028-29 and a fairer system that addresses issues that matter in London—and across England—including recognising the additional strain that commuters and tourists can place on service provision, taking into account need in specific high-demand service areas such as temporary accommodation and crucially, using the most up-to-date data, including the 2025 indices of multiple deprivation. That has been the subject of some feedback to the Department. It is a statement of the obvious that we would use the most up-to-date data, and it so happens that that data can better account for the impact of housing costs on poverty. That was always the intention, and we would always have done that, whatever noise I have picked up on this topic.