My Lords, this is a small amendment but it concerns an important point. Clause 4 takes us to adoption support services and the proposal for personal budgets. It requires a local authority to prepare a personal budget if asked to do so by the recipient of adoption support. My amendment would simply say: if asked to do so “at any time”. That is because I wanted to put before the Committee the possibility that problems may arise at any time and may manifest themselves at any time—for instance, when a young person who has been adopted as a child reaches adolescence. There are Members of this Committee who are far better qualified than I am to describe this sort of circumstance. My drafting is not very good and I acknowledge that the clause as drafted does not limit the timeframe, but I wanted to raise the issue and to ask the Minister what reassurances he can give with regard to support being available for as long as it is needed.
While I am speaking, perhaps I could comment on Amendment 19, which either the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, or the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, is about to speak to, on the use of prescribed agencies. This amendment proposes regulations regarding agencies from which adoption support services can be purchased. I wondered whether that might be—while showing an understandable concern about quality, which I assume is what this is about—a bit too prescriptive. Personal budgets are about choice and personal responsibility and I was not very clear whether this actually fitted with the philosophy of personal budgets. I also wondered whether paragraph (i), which deals with the conditions that have to be complied with on direct payment, might not cover their concerns. Personal budgets are increasingly used in various areas of social care, but they are still developing as a way of working. It is also right to put on record that the Local Government Association is concerned that the clause is not commenced until findings from pilots are available. I beg to move.