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6.25 pm
Charles Hendry (Wealden) (Con): Given the amount of time remaining, I shall curtail my remarks to ensure that colleagues have a chance to speak.
There can be no greater indictment of any Government than failing vulnerable young people who are entrusted to their care, and are taken into care, which is when they most need support. That is a criticism not of the Government but of the care system, and it stretches back many years. I acknowledge the comment of the hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre (Mr. Dawson) that many people come out well from care, but the examples that my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) and the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Mr. Willis) presented so clearly show that far too many people are left behind and suffer badly from being in care.
For some young people, life is even worse and they cannot cope with their problems. I therefore want to speak about children and young people who commit suicide. It is one of the most frightening issues that the Government and the country face. In 2002, some 886 children and young people committed suicide. They were overwhelmingly young men; three quarters were male. Suicide accounts for 16 per cent. of deaths of males aged 15 to 19, and 23 per cent. of deaths of those aged between 20 and 24. It is the biggest single cause of death for young people in this country. We need to establish a system to ensure that we do everything possible to prevent such suicides.
There is an additional problem of self-harm. It is frightening that 20,000 young people engage every year in deliberate, serious self-harm. That should cause us terrible anxiety.
Sixty-nine per cent. of suicidal children have suffered violence from an adult and 60 per cent. perceived the seeking of help from parents, teachers or anyone else as a sign of weakness. Nearly 90 per cent. of suicidal young people experienced bullying at school and three quarters suffered bullying outside. The figures for homophobic bullying are even worse. One third of young gay men have considered taking their lives.
Voluntary organisations such as the BE-Foundation, do marvellous work but receive no funding through the Government suicide prevention strategy. I hope that the Government can ensure that those organisations, which work with some of the most vulnerable children in our society, can be helped and supported.
Voluntary organisations also do fantastic work. The system has not crumbled further partly because of such national and local work. Let me draw attention to one organisation, Kids Company, which is based not far from here. The Minister kindly attended a reception that it held here recently. Day after day, it works with hundreds of young vulnerable people in Lambeth. It gives them a safe place to go where they can do their homework and get a proper meal, which they often do not get at home. It provides care and support for those whose parents cannot do that because either they are not around or there is abuse, drugs or other issues.
National organisations, such as Weston Spirit, the NSPCC, Barnado's and the Children's Society, also do wonderful work. If the Minister has not already done so, I urge her to read the Prince's Trust report "Reaching the Hardest to Reach", which provides remarkable case studies of young people who have been helped in the voluntary sector. However, those organisations face problems. First, they are starved of funds. Too often, they feel that they are not in partnership with Connexions, but in competition with it. We need to find a more structured way of getting money through to those organisations. Secondly, there must be a simplified way for them to apply for funding. At the moment, the forms are far too complicated and put off many organisations. They find that they are up against professional form fillers and application makers, which means that they do not end up getting the grants.
Thirdly, the funding system needs to give greater recognition to the core costs that the organisations incur. They cannot for ever be running projects if they do not have the core services to enable them to operate those projects. Finally, we need to move away from the obsession with new projects. At the moment the system is so crazy and barmy that, if an organisation has a project that has worked successfully for three years and could carry on doing marvellous work, it has to reinvent it because money is available only for new projects. There has to be a better way of funding these organisations.
I do not think that the Minister is the right person to be doing that job, because her track record in Islington precludes her doing it properly. I say that with some sadness, but I feel that it was shown by her speech, which was one of the most offensive, unpleasant and negative that I have ever heard in the House. It contrasted sharply with that of the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Jonathan Shaw), which was extraordinarily mature and dignified. I hope that she will carefully consider what lessons can be learned on this matter. If she can provide a care system that does not let young people down and does not lead to far too many of them ending up homeless, on the streets or in prison, and if she can provide a system that works genuinely in partnership with the voluntary sector rather than making that sector too often feel excluded, then perhaps—just perhaps—she will justify the trust that the Prime Minister has put in her, in giving her responsibility for the hopes of young children across this country.
6.31 pm
Mr. Hilton Dawson (Lancaster and Wyre) (Lab): I shall be very brief, and try to keep my speech to four minutes to allow Opposition Members to contribute.
I do not know what that last comment was about, but it gives me great pleasure to follow the speech of my right hon. Friend the Minister. It reminds me of why I am so pleased to be leaving the House at the next election: I shall take, I hope, a very active part in the transformation of children's services that will develop from this Government's legislation and policy.
I am sorry that the debate opened, and to some extent continued, with glib negativity from the Opposition. These are incredibly important issues, and the Government are addressing them fundamentally and
significantly. Members on both sides have mentioned the future of the national service framework for children, and I fully agree that that is extremely important. I have met Professor Aynsley Green on several occasions, and I have great respect for his work. In the massive changes that are taking place in government and across Departments, I desperately hope that that work, far from being lost, will be brought back into the mainstream of integrated developments.At the moment, we have an Opposition who are, quite honestly, unable to oppose. They tell us that they welcome the prospect of a children's commissioner, but they have done absolutely nothing to bring that about. They have done nothing on serious issues relating to asylum, nothing on the fact that one or two children in this country die at the hands of parents or care givers, and nothing to deal with the fact that children in this country have less protection under the law than adults do from assault. The Conservative home affairs spokesman speaks of the virtues of parenting time, but says nothing about the 25 children in this country murdered during contact visits in recent years. The Conservatives approve of custody, so they have nothing to say about the plight of young people in our prisons.
I have great confidence in the Government, and I am confident that they will address those extremely important issues in the near future, in the way that they have addressed the issue of the children's commissioner. I criticise the Government a lot, but I think that they are doing extremely well. In fact, they are doing far better than I would have believed possible when I came to the House in 1997. They are dealing with poverty, bringing in fine legislation and making good investments. They have introduced proper registration and greatly improved training courses for social workers. They have increased participation and we now have the prospect of a children's commissioner in England, just as we already have in Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland. I salute the efforts that the Government have made, and I urge them on to improve even more.
6.35 pm
Mr. David Amess (Southend, West) (Con): Looking after vulnerable children is certainly a very serious matter, and Southend council takes it very seriously. However, as the Minister will hear when she meets a delegation from the local authority on 1 April, because of the financial settlement, it is going to be very difficult to meet her aspirations, which are also the aspirations that Southend councillors hold.
The Health Committee took evidence from Lord Laming on 27 March 2003. It was an excellent session, and the whole Committee was shocked by the evidence that we were given. Peter Beresford said of Victoria Climbié:
- "Her death has become one of those major modern occasions where there seems to have been a collective sense of empathy for a stranger's fate. She has become an embodiment of the betrayal, vulnerability and public abandonment of children. The inquiry must mark the end of child protection policy built on a hopeless process of child care tragedy, scandal, inquiry, findings, brief media interest and ad hoc political response. There is now a rare chance to take stock and rebuild."
- "Failure of communication between different staff and agencies.
Inexperience and lack of skill of individual social workers.
Failure to follow established procedures.
Inadequate resources to meet demands."
- "gross failure of the system."
- "had the presence of mind to follow what are relatively straightforward procedures on how to respond to a child about whom there is concern of deliberate harm."
On average, 80 children die every year as a result of abuse. To date, there have been 70 public inquiries into such cases since 1945. I gave some examples in the Select Committee:
- "We have Dennis O'Neil in 1945, Maria Colwell in 1973, Jasmine Beckford in 1984, Tyra Henry in 1984, Kimberley Carlile in 1986, Doreen Mason in 1987, Leanne White in 1992, Rickie Neave in 1994, Chelsea Brown in 1999, Victoria Climbié in 2000, Lauren Wright in 2000, Ainlee Walker in 2002."
I shall end with some observations about Southend borough council. Its leader, Councillor Howard Briggs, has expressed concern on behalf of the local authority about the proposed amalgamation resulting in a children's department. He believes that it will be an administrative nightmare both for officers and for members of the local authority. He wondered whether the Government were aware that, at the moment, it is very difficult to recruit people in this field because of the blight. I must say to the Minister, who is to receive the delegation on 1 April, that when Southend council got the local government settlement, it could not believe it. In the formula spending share, the average increase for England to be spent on children's social services was 4.9 per cent., but for Southend, it was only 2.4 per cent.
The number of children in the care of our council has increased from 265 to 293—an 11 per cent. rise. Younger adults, who need considerably more support in social care, gained a 4.1 per cent. increase nationally, but in Southend they got only 1.4 per cent.
A similar authority—Hammersmith and Fulham—has 30,000 children, while Southend has 35,000, so it is very unfair that Hammersmith and Fulham gets £33 million while Southend gets £30 million. Unfortunately, we have heard from the Minister for Children and from this rotten Government that it is all done on party political grounds—Southend has two Conservative Members of Parliament—which is an absolute disgrace for our vulnerable children in Southend.
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