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4.45 pm
Jim Cousins (Newcastle upon Tyne, Central) (Lab): It seems to me that the hon. Gentleman should be rather less surprised by the attitude of the British Association of Social Workers. The purpose of serious case reviews is not and should not be to seek individual blame, but unless a fuller account is given than the one that is available in executive summaries prepared by organisations, it may be much harder to see the resource issues and the issues of institutional practice and culture which underpin so many of the meaningful conclusions that should be drawn from such reviews.
Tim Loughton: I agree. It is not merely a case of identifying certain individuals who did not perform the job to the required standard. It is necessary to find out why. Were there enough staff to cover the cases? Was the case overload too great? That has been the situation in many local authorities. Were resources not available when they were needed? Was all the work going on in the department reactive rather than preventive? Were social workers spending far too much time at their computers, having to fill in assessment forms, as is now the case?
According to Unison, up to 80 per cent. of a social worker's time in child protection is spent filling in assessment forms, rather than at the sharp end with those children. Surely the most likely way of preventing harm to vulnerable children and families is for a professional, well-trained, well-resourced and well-motivated social worker to knock on a door and spend quality face-to-face time with that vulnerable family and the child. The social worker would then be able to make an informed decision as to whether intervention was required and at what level, rather than trying to second-guess it from a computer screen or from papers a long distance away in an office.
Serious case reviews should consider and analyse such questions in order to draw conclusions and make recommendations. That cannot be properly communicated in the space of an 11-page executive summary, whether or not it is called comprehensive, and that is the sort of thing that we need to know.
John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD): Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the absence of more detail in serious case reviews makes it difficult to look for patterns? It is the analysis of patterns that is key in identifying the circumstances where intervention is necessary. He is probably aware of Birmingham's analysis, from which the council found that judgment was very poor. We need to analyse patterns, and for that we need detailed serious case reviews.
Tim Loughton: The hon. Gentleman is right. It is no good just looking at a serious case review in isolation, though we need to do that in full. If there are clear systemic weaknesses affecting many children's services departments, that is a serious job for central Government to undertake, rather than a localised issue for a local authority. One of my amendments, which I shall come to later, deals with analysing the work of local safeguarding children boards, which refers to the hon. Gentleman's point.
There have been objections to the publication of serious case reviews, along the lines that social workers would be compromised in their work if the reviews were published in full, or that the identity of the children and
families involved would be revealed. Clearly, many social workers working at the sharp end do not buy that argument. I do not buy that argument; I never have. Publication is in the best interests of social workers.
Inevitably, when there is a tragedy such as the baby Peter case, the Doncaster case or others, social workers are always panned first. It is always assumed that if a baby or child who was on a local authority's radar dies in gruesome circumstances, it must be the fault of social workers. In some cases, that is true; in many cases, the system is at fault, as the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, Central (Jim Cousins) said; and in many other cases, other agencies have not done their bit. In the case of baby Peter, the paediatrician, whom we have heard about in the news this week, potentially had some shortcomings, and the police did not come out of it very well, either. However, social workers are always at the front of the queue to be panned, and they are always at the back of the queue to be congratulated and praised when things go right. They usually do go right, but that does not make for good news on the front page of a tabloid newspaper.
Mr. Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con): The Select Committee on Children, Schools and Families heard evidence that many children's social workers are the least experienced in the work force. They are put on the most complicated and difficult cases at the beginning of their career, and they can arrive in post having had placements and training that did not include children's social work. We need the full picture to ensure that, as my hon. Friend rightly says, social workers are not hung out to dry when there is systemic failure and a lack of support for often young and inexperienced people who are doing their best. We need to ensure that the true picture is seen so that people are not made scapegoats when they are not personally at fault.
Tim Loughton: My hon. Friend makes a valid point. We know that part of the problem is the huge case load placed on social workers, particularly those in child protection, and the worryingly high vacancy rates, which on average exceed 15 per cent. across various authorities, but in others, particularly those in London, are as high as 40 per cent. Newly qualified social workers, with hardly any on-the-job training in often complex and sensitive child protection work, are thrown in at the deep end with really challenging cases. However, social work is not a science or a clear case of black and white; it involves experience, intuition and sensitivity-qualities that one cannot learn just from a book, but must learn on the job, preferably alongside a mentor who has years of experience to pass on.
The morale of social workers has been so undermined, partly because of those high-profile tragic cases, that there is a serious problem with people going into social work. We have expressed serious reservations about the standard of training that many social workers receive; about the entry qualifications, which need to be higher, for a social work degree; about the low pass mark required to obtain that degree; and about the lack of on-the-job training for social work graduates.
That is why back in 2007, in the report that the Conservative party commissioned on the role of children's social workers, we made specific recommendations about newly qualified social workers and raising the standard of training. I am pleased to say that at long last
Moira Gibb's social worker task force has taken on board many of those recommendations, but they should have been taken on a long time before we reached this desperate impasse.
There is a further question. Why would social workers not want to co-operate with a serious case review that was going to be published in full? Why would they not want to co-operate with an investigation, when their profession may or may not be at fault in the tragic death of a vulnerable child? However anonymous and unpublicised serious case reviews are at the moment, that did not stop the names of key players in the baby Peter case and other tragic cases being splashed all over the front pages of certain newspapers. It did not stop the identity of culprits and, indeed, of children and siblings being exposed and made available in a matter of seconds on the internet.
Clearly, it should be possible to publish a full serious case review without compromising the identity of the key players involved. That is why our amendments are heavily subjected to key caveats: first, that serious case reviews should be published in full only where such publication did not compromise the welfare of surviving children or siblings, and it would have to be shown that that was the case; secondly, that those serious case reviews would be duly anonymised; and thirdly, that they would be appropriately redacted where that was necessary, say, to protect the identity and sensitivities of surviving children and families.
We have researched widely how we think that the new system should be structured. After deliberations with social workers, directors of children's services, departments of social work, academics and others, we think that a practical and suitable way ahead is to base the model of publication of serious case reviews on the practice that has existed for many years in mental health homicide reviews. Mental health homicide reviews are published in full, with various names of individuals anonymised-they may refer to "Dr. A" or "Nurse B"-and they are made widely available. It is generally agreed that they are good, thorough learning tools from which a much wider constituency of professionals can learn from the mistakes that have been made and determine what changes to the system, locally or nationally, need to be made to try to avoid their happening in future.
The mental health homicide review into the tragic killing of Jonathan Zito ran to 177 pages. It was a tragic, but thorough and worthwhile report. One could contrast that with the 16-page executive summary on the death of baby Peter, which was found not to be worth the paper it was written on and had to be rewritten after the whole case came to light back in November. Why cannot we use a model, if not based on, then certainly much closer to, that which already exists and has worked perfectly well for many years for mental health homicides? The practice in those cases is that following a murder involving a patient who has recently been treated by the local mental health service, there must be an immediate investigation to identify what urgent action needs to be taken within 72 hours-a succinct internal investigation that is urgently done and urgently acted on. That is followed up by a much longer-in the Zito case, 177 pages-in-depth review, which is then published, subject to the various caveats about protecting anonymity, and so on.
In new clause 1, we suggest that following the death of a child in connection with local children's services, there should be an initial review within 72 hours, and then a full-blown serious case review commissioned by an author approved by a body established by the Secretary of State under an order made by statutory instrument. It would then be incumbent on the local safeguarding children board to publish the serious case review in full, excluding any information that might lead to the identification of living parties.
Subsection (2) refers to the authorship of such serious case reviews, because another issue comes up when we look at how they are commissioned. At the moment, it is up to the local safeguarding children board to find an author for a serious case review and commission him or her to produce the report, which is then written and submitted to the board.
We need to ensure that the professionalism, probity and independence of serious case reviews are protected if they are to be meaningful, credible and effective documents. The trouble is that after the baby Peter case, Ofsted produced a report revealing that, at that stage, no fewer than 41 per cent. of the serious case reviews that were being produced on behalf of local safeguarding children boards were unsatisfactory. The quality of the reviews was seriously called into question.
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I have spoken to a number of authors of serious case reviews-professionals and academics who are regularly called on to write them. There is at least anecdotal evidence that in some cases vested interests can operate in the preparation of reviews. The LSCB appoints a familiar author to produce a serious case review, in the hope that they will not condemn too heavily the local authority in the care of which a child has been killed. The author of the review wants repeat business from the local authority, and so may go light on their criticism of it. I am not saying that that practice is widespread-I certainly hope not-but there is clear potential for a conflict of interest. Given the depths to which confidence in the whole system has sunk, we need to do more to safeguard the credibility and probity of serious case reviews.
That is why we suggest in our new clauses and amendments that when a serious case review is required, the LSCB should request an author from a centrally held register of professional SCR authors. The Secretary of State should appoint a body to hold that register of authors-a similar but rather beefed-up version of a system of expert witnesses who can be called upon to appear in court. That body would be responsible for ensuring that the authors on its register came up to scratch, that they had the necessary qualifications, and that they were monitored on an ongoing basis to ensure that the quality of their work was up to scratch.
I do not really mind what that body is. It might be a children's charity such as Barnardo's, or it might be the Local Government Association, for example. Indeed, the various local authorities across London have already been using a pool system of serious case review authors to call upon. If we had such a system, the reports that were produced would be much more likely to be above reproach. We desperately need such a change to restore confidence in the whole system. If the reports were then put in the public domain, so that all interested parties
could see the full chronology of events, the full cast of characters involved, duly anonymised, and where the lines of weakness lay and action was specifically required, we could be confident that they were objective, thorough and professional.
I have some sympathy with proposals that an action plan should be included with a serious case review, requiring a subsequent audit of measures taken that were recommended in the review. That is proposed in new clause 21, tabled by the Liberal Democrats, with which I have a good deal of sympathy. It is no good just producing a serious case review, published or not, if it does not result in action. There is no formal checking mechanism at the moment, and there will not be one even if the changes that were discussed in the Government's December document about having some sort of subsequent audit are put in place.
Annette Brooke (Mid-Dorset and North Poole) (LD): Does the hon. Gentleman agree with the point made in new clause 21 that the assessment of compliance should be independent?
Tim Loughton: Absolutely. That is entirely in harmony with the approach in our proposals. We need a very clear wall between the commissioners and the authors of reports. For the same reason, we need to ensure that whoever comes in subsequently to conduct an audit has no agenda of their own or conflict of interest. However, that could still mean someone whose name is held on the register that we are proposing. Someone with the professionalism, background and training to carry out initial SCRs could also carry out the audit to find out whether a review had been acted upon. The answer to the hon. Lady is yes-her proposal is very much along the same lines as ours.
Amendments 35 to 38 and 40 to 45 have the support of a number of outside organisations, notably the General Medical Council, the British Medical Association and the Children's Rights Alliance for England. Clauses 28 and 29, to which the amendments would apply, are very widely drawn in that they establish a statutory obligation to provide information to LSCBs for any or all of their functions. That could include the release of confidential information about children, parents, siblings or, in a clinical context, patients. I have a deal of sympathy with the GMC and the BMA, which are concerned that if people are statutorily obliged to provide information to an LSCB, when the purpose for which that information is required is not made clear, there is a serious risk to patient confidentiality. In addition, the CRAE has expressed fears about the breaching of child confidentiality, particularly regarding information given by one child about another. The requirement included in clauses 28 and 29 is very wide ranging, and we therefore think it should be modified. Our amendments would specify that such information could be required only in so far as it can be shown to be necessary for the compilation of an SCR, and on an anonymised basis.
I have some questions for the Minister. I would be grateful if he could say why the clauses are so widely drafted. Is that a further response to the Laming review, because the measures seem to go well beyond the scope envisaged in his second review of last year? Will the Minister define more closely the circumstances in which such information will be required? There is also a
question regarding the Data Protection Act 1998, which specifically requires that information is collected for a specified purpose, because under the clauses, nothing will be specified. May we have more detail about specified purposes? On what grounds, for example, could an agency withhold information? Could it withhold information if it believed that there was a risk of breaking the confidentiality of a child, a pupil or a patient? The CRAE has further said that any sharing of information by public bodies must be necessary, proportionate and in the pursuit of a legitimate aim in order to comply with human rights law. The question of whether the clauses as they are structured comply with that is a serious one.
The final tranche of proposals in this group is made up of amendments 46, 47 and 48. Amendment 46 would require the Secretary of State, by regulations, to make provisions for Ofsted to conduct reviews of LSCBs' performance of their specified functions. Clause 30 provides that the Secretary of State
"may by regulations make provision".
This is an old favourite in Committees-although we did not have the opportunity to make the argument there this time-because we think that "may" should become "will". Questions have been raised about the way in which local safeguarding children boards operate. For example, there is confusion about the boards' exact role and purpose vis-à-vis children's trusts. After the baby Peter affair, the Secretary of State made changes to the composition of LSCBs which amounted to adding two lay members, but I am not sure how that improved their quality other than by increasing the size of the tables around which the boards sit. I worry that any decisions that LSCBs make will always be subject to the lowest common denominator.
I have serious qualms about Ofsted's ability to inspect children's social care departments, because there is a severe shortage of children's social care experts working for, or on the board of, Ofsted, but the operation of LSCBs needs to be examined on a better defined and more regimented basis. If it is to be the inspecting body, Ofsted should also review the effectiveness of LSCBs as a whole. Are they working properly and how do they interact with other agencies? That is the purpose of amendment 48. We suggest that LSCBs should be able to name and shame those agencies that, for example, have not co-operated with them in the compilation of serious case reviews. That is the flipside to the earlier amendments that we tabled about the supply of information for serious case reviews.
The amendment also has another purpose. As matters stand, Ofsted does not inspect the way in which agencies work with each other in child protection. Clearly, a common feature of the failings that lead to serious case reviews is the weaknesses in inter-agency working. We think that Ofsted needs to look at that area of child protection and the operation of LSCBs much more carefully. Joined-up working is always an important part of the process and too often it is one of the failings that contribute to the tragedies that we see.
Those are the four sets of amendments within this group. I have some sympathy with the new clause tabled by the Liberal Democrats about serious case reviews, but they have also tabled new clause 10 on the definition of reasonable punishment. Children's Bills, in my experience in the last nine years in which I have been dealing with
them, would not be complete without somebody trying to hijack them by imposing anti-smacking provisions, and this Bill is no different. True to form, that is what new clause 10 seeks to do. I make no comment on the suitability of the new clause, other than to say that I am aware of the technical problem about the operation of certain religious organisations that have genuine concerns about whether corporal punishment may be used. However, I am also aware that the Secretary of State requested, in his letter on 28 January, that Sir Roger Singleton look into that matter in more detail. Given that we are awaiting the outcome of his deliberations, there is even more reason why, in this case-
Mr. Laws: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
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