On Thursday 1 July, Sir David Amess called for a debate on allowing the guardians of disabled children access to their savings to avoid long and expensive court procedures.

Sir David Amess said:

I join you, Mr Speaker, and others in wishing Mr Ian Davis MBE a long, happy retirement. He has been a magnificent servant of this House and has great musical talents. My goodness, if he ever wrote a book, it would be well worth buying and would be a top seller.

Will my right hon. Friend find time for a debate on proposals to allow the parents and guardians of disabled children access to their savings? Some 200,000 disabled children are locked out of the savings from children’s trust funds, and it is quite wrong that those parents have to go to court and spend a great deal of money to get those savings.

Jacob Rees-Mogg replied:

I absolutely agree about Ian Davis. He has been a fabulous servant of this House and a kindly and helpful figure to Members—particularly new Members when trying to find out how to approach the Speaker to ask to be noticed in a debate and so on—with a phenomenal knowledge of who the Members are, recognising all of us from a remarkably early stage in our parliamentary careers. He has been a model public servant, as you, Mr Speaker, set out yesterday, in both his military career and his service to this House, and he will be greatly missed across the House.

As regards the very important issue that my hon. Friend raises, I understand that the Ministry of Justice and HM Treasury are currently working together, as a matter of priority, to ensure that parents and guardians can secure the legal authority that they need to act on their child’s behalf as straightforwardly as possible. The Government have announced that those who need to apply to the Court of Protection to access funds in a mature child trust fund can access fee remission, allowing for the court fees to be waived, but I will pass on his concerns to both the Chancellors: the Lord High Chancellor and the Chancellor of the Exchequer.