Mr.
Kidney: Is there not a slight difference under section 34,
because if the local authority fails to allow the contact that it is
supposed to be promoting, as the Minister explained, the person who is
dissatisfied—I am arguing on behalf of the other
sibling—could apply to the court for an order to make it happen?
The one third or so of children in care who have no contact with a
sibling, and that sibling, could go to court to force the hand of local
authorities that are not doing what they are supposed to be
doing.
Beverley
Hughes: I agree with my hon. Friend. However, my argument
is—I think that his point reinforces it—that we do not
need further legislation or changes to it; what we need is the current
law to be implemented much more effectively. Although I recognise that
there is some very good practice in relation to sibling contact, I
agree with him and other Members that it is very patchy. I do not
believe for a minute that sufficient priority is given in practice to
ensuring that that contact happens. For that reason, we have included
the requirement that contacts are reflected in the child care plan, the
placement plan and the integrated children’s system, and that
the IRO must pay particular attention to that matter. That is what we
are trying to do throughout the Bill. Where we need to strengthen
legislation, we are doing so, as in new section 22C(8)(c), but where
legislative provisions already exist, we should strengthen their
implementation.
I have
already mentioned the ICS in relation to another clause, and shall not
rehearse the details, except to say that there will be specific
requirements on social workers to include in the ICS care plan all the
details of siblings, including step and half siblings, arrangements for
contact and the practicalities of how contact will be maintained.
Guidance notices within the records will reiterate and emphasise the
importance of that contact. Those new provisions, together with
existing legislation, cover the intentions behind the amendments. The
real challenge is to use the other measures in the
Bill—particularly those on the strengthening of the IRO’s
role, which we will get to shortly, and the requirements through the
recording systems and the detailed guidance that we will insist on in
the care plan—to achieve results in practice.
I hope that
the Committee accepts my assurances on those points. We have a job to
do that does not require further legislation, or changes to existing
legislation. We need simply to implement the levers in place to improve
the quality of social work practice.
Tim
Loughton: Again, the Minister and I seem to be coming at
this from the same direction as far as intentions are concerned. I am
slightly nonplussed by the reference to the Interpretation Act
1976—
Tim
Loughton: I’m terribly sorry—that makes all
the difference. On that basis, will she explain a reference in new
section 22C(10),
that “The
local authority may determine...the terms of any
arrangements”. Surely
to be consistent that should be “arrangement” on the
basis that the 1978 Act requires a reference only to the singular,
rather than the
plural?
Beverley
Hughes: Far be it from me to question parliamentary
counsel. I simply refer the hon. Gentleman to what I said, which is
that unless the contrary intent appears, words importing the singular
include the plural and vice versa. It is a matter of decision in the
drafting as to whether the singular or the plural is actually written
down, but in either case, it always includes the
opposite.
Tim
Loughton: I hope that is clearer than mud to people other
than me. Clearly that Act needs revisiting, because if a singular or a
plural can be used arbitrarily,
without having any effect at all, something is a bit
wrong. What if one wanted to refer only to the singular rather than the
plural? Anyway, that is for another committee on another day, but I am
very grateful for the Minister’s explanation of
sorts. I
do not think that the right hon. Lady entirely took my points about
amendment No. 8. She assumes that a decent social worker would clearly
want to maintain a placement with siblings for as long as possible, but
we cannot take it as read that the social worker would always do
everything to make it possible to keep siblings together—not
just living together but placed together in a sustainable placement
that enabled those two or more siblings to live together in a stable
family environment for as long as possible. I think we might have to
agree to disagree. I do not think that what the Minister says actually
achieves our aim in amendment No. 8, but we are very much agreed on the
necessary intention.
I will not
get bogged down in the Interpretation Act 1978, and I beg to withdraw
the amendment and the new
clause. Amendment,
by leave, withdrawn.
Tim
Loughton: I beg to move amendment No. 9, in
clause 9, page 7, line 41, at
end insert— ‘( ) The local
authority must ensure that C does not have more than three placements
within a 12 month period or more than two placements within the last
year of compulsory schooling, or submit a written explanation of why
this was not
possible.’.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss new
clause 3— Reviews for social worker
turnover— ‘A
local authority must conduct a review of a child’s experience of
care if, during a child’s time in care, he or she has been
looked after by three or more different social workers during the
course of one single
year.’.
Tim
Loughton: Not wishing to appear churlish, let me say at
the outset what another good addition the clause, and this particular
subsection of the clause, is to the Bill, and that we want to make it
even better. I hope that satisfies the hon. Member for
Stafford.
There is one
amendment and a new clause dealing with the related subjects of
multiple placements and multiple social workers. They are on a similar
theme. I quoted earlier figures from a table showing alarming
differences in the local authorities who have children who have been in
three or more placements during the year ending March 2007, which is a
cause of great concern. The basic theme of all our discussions on the
Bill has been the need to maintain some stability, continuity and
familiarity with environment and carers. If a child has multiple
placements—we have set a benchmark of more than three in the
space of a 12-month period—that cannot be conducive to giving
that child a chance of regaining some degree of stability. It is
particularly important given the impact on education which is quite
rightly also part of the clause.
As
constituency Members, we have seen foster placements breaking down for
various reasons—in many cases it is because suitable and
appropriate support was not given to the foster family to enable them
to cope with perhaps a particularly difficult child who has particular
behavioural problems or needs—so a new foster placement has to
be found. Given the shortage of fostering places—we heard
recently that the Local Government Association has identified an
immediate deficit of 5,250 foster carers—often
it is not practically possible to find an alternative appropriate foster
carer in the vicinity. That can mean, particularly within large county
authority areas, placing a child many miles away, often at the opposite
end of a large county, which makes the maintenance of that child at his
or her school practically impossible, or possible only at great expense
and with great time taken to ship them from an out-of-area placement to
a school. My local authority is West Sussex county council, and I have
no reason to think that West Sussex is any better or worse than other
authorities
are. We
need to do a lot more to ensure that multiple placements are avoided at
all costs. When one looks at the table that I quoted from this morning
showing that a quarter of children in the care system in Cornwall and
one fifth of children in the care system in Stoke-on-Trent had three or
more placements in the previous year, one becomes deeply alarmed. That
figure needs to be reduced considerably. That could mean sharing the
best practice of places such as Barnet, which are able to do something
about the number of placements.
The two
issues are interlinked. Some years ago, Barnet very boldly decided to
invest in its social work work force, particularly child social
workers. It launched a recruitment campaign called, “Got a new
Barnet?” It attracted social workers, gave them special
allowances to enable them to live in the area and focused on the
welfare of its children in care. It developed a buddy system, whereby
every child in care was buddied up with an officer from the local
authority, from the chief executive down. That person would be the
“pushy parent” in the background looking out for that
child’s educational achievement, health records and so on, and
asking awkward questions of the relevant department, social worker or
officer when that child appeared to be achieving less than expected.
The scheme proved to be very
successful. In
Barnet, the number of looked-after children going to university or into
equivalent further education is about 12 per cent., compared with 1 to
2 per cent. of the looked-after children population as a whole. The
last time that I checked with the former director of children’s
services, the vacancy rate in Barnet was less than 4 per cent.; it is
20 per cent. in other London boroughs. Barnet identified as a priority,
and invested in, a well motivated, well resourced and well rewarded
social work work force. That led to much lower turnover in the work
force, a much better service for the children they were there to look
after, and an investment in foster carers, which meant that more foster
placements were likely to succeed than to break down. Such action is
not rocket science and certain authorities are better than others at
doing something about the problems.
We need an
extra safeguard to avoid multiple placements at all costs. I refer back
to the office of the children’s rights director for
England’s report that I and the hon. Member for Stafford quoted
from earlier. It is very rich in appropriate statistics on the
attitudes of young people in the care system towards social workers.
According to that report, children said that their social worker moved
them when they were just settling down—a major gripe. Others
said that a big issue was that social workers kept changing. One child
is quoted as
saying: “I
have had around 30 social workers in 10
years.” The
office of the children’s rights director heard from many young
people about how important it is not to keep having new social
workers.
As
I mentioned earlier, many children said that they had no say in the
selection of their social worker, even though they rightly identified
that it is important to get on well with one’s social worker.
There was a way to change the social worker if the relationship was not
working from the child’s perspective—that might happen if
the child felt that the social worker was overpowering them, or if they
did not feel that their views, worries or feelings were being listened
to. The children’s rights director also heard that careful
matching was needed to get the right social worker for each child. The
young people who proposed that said that they had not had any choice in
who would be their social worker, even though getting on with them and
trusting them was vital. One of the quotations says
that “social
workers are like young people—you have your good and bad
ones”. Amendment
No. 9 would make it an absolute exception for a child to have more than
three placements in the space of 12 months. Ideally, they would stay in
the same placement and the local authority would do everything possible
to enable that. If a child had more than two placements in their last
year of compulsory schooling, when continuity is vital to their
achievement in their studies and examinations, a written explanation
would be required.
As with the
earlier amendment, it may be that the Minister will tell me that this
provision will be included in new guidance. It would be reassuring if
it were required in a different form. If it is not, the aim of avoiding
multiple placements, which can be so damaging, is a minimum requirement
of
acceptability. Similarly,
new clause 3 would require that if a child had been looked after by
three or more different social workers in the course of a year, the
local authority must account for it. It should not just be brushed
under the carpet of all of the pressures on the social work department.
It may well be a requirement in the performance assessments of social
worker practices that they are assessed on how few placements they are
able to achieve for one of the children for whom they are being paid a
bonus, as was set out in the recommendations, or they could be assessed
on whether children have had the continuity of just one social worker
wherever possible. If it is likely, as I envisage, that these
terminologies will be applied to the new social work practices, surely
we should ensure that they apply equally to social workers within the
existing local authority
remit. Hopefully,
these are constructive and positive proposals that will give greater
definition and detail in the Bill to what the Government are trying to
achieve and the goals that we all share. They make it explicit that
multiple placements and the use of multiple social workers has been
unacceptable for too long. A very strong message must go to the
relevant departments that everything must be done to avoid those things
so that we get more figures comparable with the likes of Barnet, rather
than authorities at the other end of the
spectrum.
Beverley
Hughes: As the hon. Gentleman rightly says, stability is
critical for children in care. That is why stability is one of the four
key principles that underpin the “Care Matters: Time for
Change” White Paper and that are at the heart of the Bill. We
know from our own
children that they should be able to rely on stable relationships, and
that applies particularly to looked-after children. They should be able
to attach to people, to trust people and to gain consistent support
from their carers and social workers. That kind of stability is
essential in allowing looked-after children to thrive and
achieve. It
is particularly crucial to minimise disruption during the two years of
key stage 4, as the hon. Gentleman mentioned. Such disruptions can have
a dramatic effect on the ability of children to achieve their
educational potential, particularly if they have to change
schools. 5.45
pm
Most
children who remain looked-after for more than a year stay in the same
placement. We want to increase the proportion of children in long-term,
stable care placements, because we know that that leads to the best
outcomes. At the other end of the spectrum, we want to reduce the
proportion of children facing three or more placement moves in a year.
That is why both the measures are part of the national indicator set
for local authorities and feature as a part of many recently finalised
local area agreements. Since they have been part of the national
indicator set, it is gratifying that there have been year-on-year
improvements in relation to both—not fast enough or big enough,
but the measures are none the less beginning to have a lever effect on
local authority practice. Coupled with clause 9, that will further
strengthen our leverage for ensuring continuous improvement at the
local
level. Decisions
about a child’s placement must be taken in the light of that
child’s needs and circumstances. I have no difficulty with the
amendment’s intentions, but I would like to put two issues to
the hon. Gentleman. The first concerns the amendment’s practical
effect. It would enshrine in primary legislation an assumption that it
is normal or acceptable for a child to face three placements in a year
as long as there are no more than three. Clearly, that is absolutely
contrary to his intention, but to enshrine that figure in a Bill would
not be helpful. Indeed, for the large majority of children, it would
set the bar far too low. Where it is in their interest, children should
ideally have a single placement where they can develop relationships
and find stability and continuity. For a very small minority of
children, there can be good reasons why several moves in a planned
progression might be needed to prepare them for permanent
attachment.
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