19.Section 1 provides for amendments to section 2 of the Child Trust Funds Act 2004 (“CTFA”) with the effect that children born on or after 3 January 2011 will not be eligible for a CTF. Section 2 of the CTFA makes provision for who is an ‘eligible child’ for the purposes of that Act and provides that for a child to be eligible for a CTF the following conditions must be satisfied:
the child must be born after 31 August 2002; and
either a person is entitled to Child Benefit in respect of that child (“a Child Benefit child”) or the child is a child in local authority care (“a looked-after child”); and
the child must not be subject to immigration control.
20.Subsection (2) of section 1 of the Act amends section 2(1) of the CTFA so as to require all eligible children to be born before 3 January 2011. Subsection (3) of the section inserts into section 2 of the CTFA new subsections (5A), (5B) and (5C). New section 2(5A) CTFA will provide that a child born before 3 January 2011 who would otherwise become eligible to a CTF on or after that date may not be an eligible child unless either new subsection (5B) or (5C) applies.
21.New subsection (5B) provides that a child born before 3 January 2011 will still be an eligible Child Benefit child, even when eligibility under the provisions in section 2 CTFA does not arise until after that date, provided:
entitlement to Child Benefit in relation to that child commences on or before 3 January 2011; and
the child is not subject to immigration control at the beginning of 3 January 2011 or is so subject at that time but immigration control is subsequently lifted before 3 April 2011.
22.The first bullet point in paragraph 21 above reflects the processes involved in the claiming of Child Benefit and the fact that Child Benefit entitlement can only commence on a Monday and can only be backdated for up to three months. Thus, for example, a child born on 31 December 2010 (or indeed any date in the week up to and including 2 January 2011) can only become entitled to Child Benefit from the week commencing Monday 3 January 2011, being the first Monday after birth. (This can only happen if a claim is made within 3 months of the Monday following birth.) Similarly, if a child is born outside the UK and comes to the UK before 3 January 2011 (say on 2 January 2011) and Child Benefit is claimed for that child within 3 months, Child Benefit entitlement will commence on or before 3 January 2011.
23.The second bullet point in paragraph 21 above reflects the fact that a child who is subject to immigration control is not an eligible child for CTF purposes, even though Child Benefit may be being received in respect of that child. To provide parity with the Child Benefit regime, which allows a claim for Child Benefit to be backdated three months, the same window of three months will apply to such children born before 3 January 2011. This means that where immigration control is lifted within three months of 3 January 2011, i.e. before 3 April 2011 (and thus a child becomes an eligible Child Benefit child by that date) they will still be entitled to a CTF so long as they are born before 3 January 2011.
24.Subsection (5C) provides that a looked-after child born before 3 January 2011 will still be an eligible looked-after child if:
the child is in the UK at the beginning of 3 January 2011;
the child becomes a looked-after child before 3 April 2011; and
the child is not subject to immigration control at the beginning of 3 January 2011 or is so subject but immigration control is lifted (and so would otherwise be eligible) by 3 April 2011.
25.The requirement that the child becomes a looked-after child before 3 April 2011 provides parity with the Child Benefit child (who will not become entitled to a CTF until an award of Child Benefit is made which, as explained above and because of the way the Child Benefit regime operates, may not be until 2 April 2011) and also with children who become Child Benefit children if immigration control is lifted before 3 April 2011 (as discussed in paragraph 23 above). A child who first becomes entitled to a CTF by virtue of being a looked-after child becomes an eligible looked-after child at the date that he or she is taken into care.
