The Treasury have admitted that they are holding over £7.6 million in interest earned by uncashed child trust vouchers, and there are no immediate plans for these unexpected funds, although they may consider 'adding it to the pot' so that the interest gained by the Treasury did not come at the expense of children.
A total of 2.1 million vouchers have been issued up to the 20th November this year, and only 1.16 million have been cashed. This accounts for a take up rate of just 55%.
The 971,000 uncashed vouchers have a value of over £240 million and have accrued £7.6 million in interest alone. This figure is estimated to be increasing by £30,000 per day!
To date, the Government have spent around £7.5 million on advertising the child trust fund, of which, £3.5 million has been on television commercials.
Our view
They should not add interest - if people are too 'bone idle' to walk into a local bank of building society to invest FREE money for their children they do not deserve it!
The Child Trust Fund, in our opinion, is the biggest waste of money this Government has embarked upon. It will fail.