I beg to move,

That for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Autism Bill, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of money provided by Parliament of—

(1) any expenditure incurred under or by virtue of the Act by the Secretary of State, and

(2) any increase attributable to the Act in the sums payable under any other Act out of money so provided.

On Second Reading, it was the will of the House that the Autism Bill should be discussed in Committee. The Bill, introduced by the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan), will have expenditure implications for the public purse. At the first sitting of the Committee last week, the Chairman confirmed that those implications are significant for certain clauses of the Bill. Therefore, approval for a money resolution is needed before the Committee can engage fully in those discussions.

I want to stress that the Government, and I personally, share the hon. Lady’s wish to improve services for people with autism, whether children or adults. Indeed, with the Under-Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth, North (Sarah McCarthy-Fry), I have made clear commitments to take forward a range of work that will achieve all the objectives claimed to be behind the Bill. We will take it forward in a way that is cost-effective and focused on improved outcomes for people with autism. Our determination to deliver real and lasting change for people with the condition is rock solid.

Although there was a common aim on Second Reading, I was duty bound to make clear to the House the Government’s view that the Bill, as currently drafted, is not the most effective way to achieve the improvements that we all want, and my view on that has not changed. Nevertheless, the establishment of the Committee to consider the Bill gives us a timely opportunity to discuss all the important issues that it raises. I am looking forward to doing so, confident that the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham and I will be able to move forward together in a true spirit of mutual interest and collaboration.

To do that, however, we need to deal with the money resolution, without which the Committee will not be able to have a detailed discussion of the key clauses of the Bill. On that basis and no other, I commend the resolution to the House.

I am pleased to speak to the Government’s money resolution on the Autism Bill. I thank them and the Minister for tabling the resolution at this stage. As the Minister acknowledged in his brief contribution, it is necessary to progress discussions of the Bill against the background of the House’s having passed the money resolution.

The resolution is also a good sign, in my book, because, as the Minister said, we are continuing negotiations on the content of the Bill. I am optimistic that, with a little give and take on both sides, we may reach agreement on legislation which will give the help that the Minister and I wish to bring to people with autism and their families. Some cost to the public purse is associated with the legislation, and I have been looking at the costs with the National Autistic Society.

However, it is becoming more apparent that, in this case, a stitch in time will save nine. That is what the Bill is all about. Expenditure at an early stage, enabling better interventions and better assistance to be given to people with autism, can often help prevent such people from deteriorating into a crisis phase. It is the costs of people in crisis that are often so high, to say nothing of the savings that we may be able to find in terms of the pain and misery that a crisis usually causes the individual and their family.

The Minister will be familiar with the Knapp report, which clearly laid out the economic consequences of autism; it certainly makes sobering reading. The aggregate national costs of supporting children with autistic spectrum disorder were estimated to be about £2.7 billion per year, most of which was accounted for by the services used. For adults, the aggregate costs amount to £25 billion each year. Of that, services account for 60 per cent. and lost employment and family expenses account for the remainder.

With an annual cost to the economy of about £28 billion, we must be looking for ways to ensure that the best outcomes are achieved for people with ASD and that the money is well spent. Early interventions can help with behaviour patterns, and increased investment at the right time could reduce the high support costs in adulthood. The report points to the reality that greater availability of early interventions will reduce the impact of ASD on the UK economy—but most importantly, it could improve the quality of life for people with ASD and their families. In addition, we will shortly have the National Audit Office report, which will give us a more detailed analysis of the effectiveness of expenditure. I am sure that that will add to the knowledge of what Government need in order to ensure that we improve the quality of outcomes. We need to know how best to spend these resources, and I hope that the Bill will act as a pointer and a general framework for that background.

On the clauses relating to children, registration of children with autism on the local authority registers should not present significant cost implications. The cost of an administration assistant to receive the register and manage it totals £210,600 on the last Government-prepared estimate, but as the registers already exist in some form, the additional costs should be marginal. The effective implementation of clause 2 would result in an increase in service provision, but it is also clear that there are significant medium-term and long-term savings to be made by providing the appropriate services at the right time to children with autism.

On clause 3, there is existing funding to deliver support for transition through the Aiming High for Disabled Children transition support programme, but there is a low baseline in many authorities, and the £17 million that is already in the budget can only achieve so much. However, as the funding exists, it does not necessarily form any great amount in extra costs under the Bill.

On the remainder of the clauses, much of the cost has already been committed by the Department through the announcements that the Minister has made. We are in the process of negotiating amendments to the Bill so that it can reflect the generous offer made by the Government to fulfil some of those promises. I look forward to the Minister supporting the Bill as we progress through the Committee stage, and I am delighted that the money resolution has been tabled to enable that progress to be made.

Question put and agreed to.