Examination of Witnesses (Questions 42-76)
TIM LOUGHTON MP
15 DECEMBER 2010
Q42 Chair: Minister, it is a great
pleasure to have you with us. This Committee, including in its
previous guise, has always taken a close interest in the welfare
of looked-after children. We are all, cross-party, enormously
pleased and confident that we have in place a Minister with such
a long record of involvement in the issues, so our hopes and expectations
of you within the Government are extraordinarily high. We know
you will be able to satisfy that confidence in your answers to
our questions this morning. We have a lot to get through, so if
we can keep questions and answers brief and to the point, that
would be fantastic. I don't know whether to start or end with
this. I think I'll start with it while you're on the spot and
just having arrived. The predecessor Committee in the previous
Parliament produced our looked-after children report and, obviously,
the Government had to respond. The whole Committee wishes to make
this request, so can I begin by requesting that you and the new
Government respond to that report again, formally to the Committee,
so that we have a clear steer from the Government about what they
think of the issues raised and the recommendations made by the
predecessor Committee. I wonder whether you'd be prepared to do
that.
Tim Loughton: I am very happy
to do that. I think that we have done a lot in the first six or
seven months to justify quite an update. I am very happy to take
up that offer.
Q43 Chair: Brilliant. We very
much appreciate that.
Is the structure of children's services too
complex for "the child" to have a proper voice? We have
directors of children's services, children's trusts, the LSCB,
IROs, the Children's Commissioner and, still, at the moment, the
Children's Rights Director, etc. It is a very complex world. How
does the voice of an individual child with real needs get heard
in such a system?
Tim Loughton: First, Chairman,
thank you for inviting me again—the second time in three
months, I think—to this Committee. It is always a joy and
a pleasure, and I am sure it will be again. I welcome the fact
that the Committee is doing a report into looked-after children,
which is a very important and often overlooked area, but something
I have been banging a drum on for all the years that I have held
the brief, in opposition and now. Over—
Q44 Chair: I apologise for interrupting.
This is a one-off session, following our report from last time.
We are not planning to produce a report from this—our evidence
will be put in the public domain, and the evidence from you and
the predecessor panel will form our evidence on this occasion.
Tim Loughton: But it's very important,
the evidence you are taking and, hopefully, the profile it will
gain.
In all the years that I had this brief in opposition
and, certainly, in all the things to do with children that have
happened post-Victoria Climbié—in particular, post
the Children Act 2004 and, actually, post the Adoption and Children
Act 2002—there has been an enormous amount of legislation,
regulation, structural change, name changes, and new individuals
and committees, all around children. It is not through lack of
trying, but it is a question of whether the quantity has got in
the way of the quality. I think that we have a slightly cluttered
landscape as to children. Is there the danger that the children's
voice—the welfare of the child is the absolutely paramount
consideration of all of us, going back to the Children Act 1989—has
somewhere been lost? We can't see the wood for the trees, as it
were. That is why the Eileen Munro review of the whole structure
around child protection and social work is looking at the interaction
between all these different responsibilities, individuals and
organisations. Having said that, the last thing I want is yet
more structural upheaval—I think I made that clear on my
previous appearance before the Committee. The whole sector has
suffered from too much structural upheaval—whether it was
right or wrong I make no comment. There were certainly advantages
in bringing together children's services departments with children's
social care and education. That was a huge structural upheaval,
and there is still fallout from that with the responsibilities
of certain directors—whether they have children and adult
social care in their brief, whether it is education or children's
social care, etc.
We are looking at that, but as far as I am concerned,
the prime consideration must be what most impacts beneficially
on the child—in this case, vulnerable children in the care
system—and gives them a better chance. I want to do that
first. If it turns out that we need some form of structural change
in order to make that easier, or because the structure is standing
in the way of achieving that, it will be secondary. I want to
make sure that we get the best deal for children first.
Q45 Chair: A quick follow-up to
my first question: who should be responsible for the individual
budget for a looked-after child, to ensure that when they move
school, foster home or, conceivably, even local authority area,
their specific needs and the level and quality of support are
seamlessly maintained? It seems that even with a lot of people
with good will, there are endless breaks that stop that seamless
delivery.
Tim Loughton: The local authority
is responsible for children in the care system; specifically,
a responsible social worker is the professional directly in contact
with a child in the care system. That social worker is required
and should be trusted to make the best decisions in the best interests
of the child. That is subject to all sorts of checks and balances,
with statutory responsibilities for what is in the best interests
of the child in legislation and in guidance. Among the checks
and balances is the independent reviewing officer who, if a child
is not getting a fair deal, can take up the cudgels on behalf
of that child.
Chair: We know IROs who sit there being
the only stable person with whom the looked-after children seem
to have a stable relationship. The social workers change again
and again, and when the children go to see the IRO, the IRO sometimes
seems to be the only person who stays the same. How can we create
stability and make sure that there is continuity?
Tim Loughton: That is part of
the problem. The IROs should not have to do a job; if the system
is working properly their role becomes redundant—it is not,
because they have a hell of a challenge. There is also the Children's
Rights Director, who is taking up the cause of children in care,
generally, as to what is going wrong. That is why we have to get
stability in the system. That starts with stability and continuity
of the front-line care available to that child in care, which
starts with the professional social worker. There is still too
great a turnover in social workers for all sorts of problems that
we know about—largely the huge vacancy rates that we still
have, and the huge work loads, pressures and stresses on social
workers. That is why Eileen Munro's review is looking at how we
can make it easier for social workers to do the job they came
into the profession for—staying at the front line more,
staying there longer and staying with their charges. Vulnerable
children and vulnerable families, probably more than any other
group of people, need the continuity—particularly younger
children who have been cast out or have had to leave their birth
families. The last thing they need is continued instability in
their life. If that stability can be provided by a friendly, understanding,
empathetic social worker, working closely with a friendly, skilled,
suitable foster family—or whatever the placement is—that
is what we have to improve. We are a long way off doing that,
but everything I am doing aims to achieve that greater stability.
Q46 Chair: I have one more question
before I open it up to the rest of the Committee. What can be
done to reform fostering and adoption panels to help minimise
the still inordinate delays in care proceedings?
Tim Loughton: Again, these are
all part of bigger problems, such as the shortage of and turnover
in social workers and being able to bring reports to courts, or
to panels, in a timely fashion. I have sat in on adoption panels
and family court proceedings and time and time again, you will
be told that the social worker presenting there is not the social
worker who started off the case. That can only add to delay—a
report hasn't been filed, something's gone missing, or the judge
wants further evidence from an expert witness because he or she
is not content with the presentations made by the social worker.
We know that the courts are clogged up at the moment. We are working
with CAFCASS, and there are signs of some progress. All these
things are interlinked. I sat in on an adoption panel recently,
when I spent a week being a social worker in Stockport. It was
a very good adoption panel—highly rated—but they had
huge amounts of paperwork to get through, which was a big job
of work. I was asking them, "What are the delays in the system?";
they were saying, "Big problems with the courts and the timetable
of the courts." I have had a number of meetings with Sir
Nicholas Wall, the president of the family division of the High
Court, who will make some criticisms of the adoption system, and
CAFCASS and adoption panels. One thing that I have done—it
is not rocket science—is write to every local authority
asking, "Would your adoption panels please go and speak with
the local family court judges?" Sir Nicholas Wall has kindly
offered to impart the same message to all his judges, to have
a dialogue with adoption panels, because they don't seem to be
talking. We could get some easy wins if we had better communication
to make sure that the system is working better before we see how
to change it to make it much more streamlined and ensure that
it is working more speedily in the best interests of the child.
Chair: Excellent. Thank you very much.
Q47 Neil Carmichael: Tim, you
said that you are not going to tackle any changes in structure
unless or until it becomes obvious that some are necessary. In
some of Maxine's evidence she talked about the number of different
agencies, and so forth—151, I think. We have also been hearing
about variation. Have you any plans to introduce policies to tackle
the variations of delivery and standards?
Tim Loughton: One of the biggest
challenges at the moment is that more children have been coming
into the care system, which is an immediate response to Baby Peter,
and the fallout from that will last for some time to come. There
are various things that we have instituted, and I have been writing
to local authorities. We have a bigger group of children to deal
with, and we have continuing problems about recruitment of social
workers. The professional work force is still stretched, and we
are doing things to try and improve that. We've got all the problems
with the courts and the delays there. Within that, we have huge
variations in experiences between local authorities—in the
timeliness with which children come into care and in the level
of placements. There has been some progress, I am pleased to see,
in that the number of children having three or more placements
in a year, which is scandalous in itself, was just over 11% of
children in care but is now just below 11%, so there is progress,
slight though it is. But that is an average, and it hides a huge
variation in some authorities, where children are having many
multiple placements. Some authorities can get it right; others
aren't getting it right. In many cases, they are similar authorities—this
is like for like. I can quote you examples from education as well.
In one London borough, more than 18% of looked-after children
go to university; there are other boroughs where the figure is
2%. Why is it that some authorities are doing well and some aren't?
My aim is to try to get everybody up to the standard of the best
and to try to learn from best practice. The thing that struck
me is that we are just very bad at disseminating best practice.
In going round the country and dealing with local authorities,
different children in the care of different authorities and different
IROs and other agencies, I am trying to grandstand some examples
of best practice. Particularly where you've got authorities that
are deemed to be poorer performers by Ofsted, I am trying to do
some buddying up with authorities that are doing particularly
well in certain areas. There is a lot of peer supporting and mentoring
that we can do before we have to bring in the heavy squad from
outside as well.
Q48 Neil Carmichael: The Chairman
mentioned our predecessor Committee's inquiry and report, and
one of its focuses was the emphasis on keeping children with families,
as opposed to going down the adoption route and so forth. Is that
something you will endorse, or will you have a different approach,
perhaps encouraging a different balance?
Tim Loughton: I absolutely endorse
that. I had highlighted various factors for many years, and most
of them were taken up in the Children, Schools and Families Act—sorry,
the Children and Young Persons Act 2008; there have been so many
bits of legislation, Chairman, as you know. The 2008 Act introduced
various requirements on local authorities as regards children
in care, many of which come into effect in April next year; in
fact, just this morning, I signed the commencement order for many
of them. Two things came out of that legislation. One was a requirement
that children in the care system should be kept closer to home
wherever possible. A sufficiency principle was applied to local
authorities to make sure that there are places in their area,
where it is suitable. It will not be suitable to keep some children
in their home environment, because of threats to their safety,
or because of family members who may be a threat rather than a
benefit, or whatever the case may be. Keeping children closer
to their home, familiar environment is important. Into that flows
greater continuity in terms of children being able, hopefully,
to stay in their school. Secondly, there is continuity and familiarity
in terms of the people looking after children. All the studies
show that, statistically, children will usually, although not
exclusively, be best suited by being with an extended family member
or familiar kinship carer where possible. That will typically
be a grandparent, and I am sure that we will all, as constituency
MPs, have had grandparents coming to our constituency surgeries
saying that they want to take over responsibility for a grandchild
because the parents have gone off the rails. My figures may be
slightly out of date, but up to a few years ago, only 3% or 4%
of social worker-instigated placements in this country were with
kinship carers, whereas if you go somewhere like Denmark, the
figure is over 25%. Although there is a requirement in guidance,
I don't think it's being followed as aggressively and enthusiastically
as it might be. You can see reasons for that. A social worker,
under pressure, may be faced with a child who needs to come into
the care system, and for whom a placement needs to be found. You
have a pool—albeit there is usually a shortage—of
foster carers who have a track record, who have worked with the
authority before and who you know are up to scratch. Then you
have a grandparent. You don't know anything about the grandparent,
and you are going to have to do quite a lot of assessment on that
grandparent to see if the placement is safe. The easier option
may be to go with the foster carer that you're familiar with.
The more difficult option, although it may statistically be the
more rewarding placement option, and is more likely to be long
term, is to go with a kinship carer. We need to make sure that
the social worker is absolutely exhausting the kinship carer option
before going to somebody unfamiliar.
Q49 Chair: May I press you on
that? Part of the point was not just about kinship caring, but
about the tendency of the system to resist taking children into
care. We had evidence previously that there was too great a tendency
to give the family the chance, which left children at risk, and
that compared with Scandinavian countries, we are rather less
inclined to take children into care, and we might have better
outcomes if we intervened earlier, acted, took them into care
and got them on a decent placement. It is actually easier at an
earlier age as well, when they have suffered less abuse and damage.
Tim Loughton: We could have a
whole conversation about your last report, and I had this conversation
with the hon. Member for Huddersfield when he was chairing the
Committee, although I did not give evidence to it. The comparable
figures for children in care in this country against some Scandinavian
countries, particularly Denmark, are not that dissimilar. The
thing that queers the figures is that they don't do adoption in
those countries, and if we were to add children who have gone
into adoptive placements in this country, it brings the overall
total rather closer to Scandinavia. Is the system more reluctant
to bring children into care? Clearly, in the last couple of years,
no, because the figures in the last year for the number of children
coming to the care system have gone up 6%, so now it is 64,500.
Is that a short-term, knee-jerk, risk-averse reaction? Possibly,
although the CAFCASS report shows that for children coming before
the courts to be placed into care, there is good cause for them
to be in the care system. Pre-Peter, were we being complacent?
Was the system not working well enough to pick up some of the
children who should have been picked up and are now being picked
up? I think the jury is out on that. To an extent, I don't know
whether we have too many or too few children coming to care. What
I am most concerned about is that we have the right children coming
into care. We often face our social workers with the judgment
of Solomon as to whether it is better to bring a child into care.
If you bring a child into care, it must be for one of two reasons:
first, because it is better for them and they will have a better
chance of a decent upbringing, or secondly, because it would be
dangerous to leave them with their parents. Given the outcomes
for children in care, which are scandalous across too many areas,
one has to make a good case for why bringing them into care would
be an improvement. I see social workers, in my time out on the
front line with them, go the extra mile to work intensively with
families to try to keep them together. Only when it becomes quite
clear that that family is going to be incapable—either in
the short term or permanently—of bringing up that child
do they take the decision to initiate care proceedings. I am sure
that in some cases they take that decision too early, and in some
cases, clearly—we know from high-profile tragedies in the
extreme—they take that decision too late, or they haven't
taken it at all, and then it is too late. We have to have a social-work
work force who work closely with the courts and have the professional
confidence to make well-informed value judgments and to see them
through. That is the key to getting it right. I don't think that
there is a systemic over-tendency or reluctance to bring into
care, but there are divergences, where you have some good children's
services departments that are better geared up to making the right,
best informed value judgments about what is right for that individual
child.
Q50 Neil Carmichael: Do you think
decisions to intervene are based on sufficiently holistic evidence
on all the issues that arise, especially in terms of communication
between agencies?
Tim Loughton: Sometimes not. When
you have social workers spending up to 80% of their time in front
of a computer screen, my contention is that they are not best
placed to gather all the evidence to make the best informed value
judgment. Whether or not you take a child into care is not a science.
It is a subjective value judgment. That judgment is best made
by eyeballing—literally—the people you are there to
look after and potentially intervene with, working with other
agencies to put the pieces of a jigsaw together, which was the
description I used at my last appearance here. Ultimately, it
is not just down to people sitting around talking and exchanging
information, it is somebody picking up the ball and acting—somebody
making the decision that something is wrong and that we need to
do this now. We need to take that child into care under whatever
section order it might be, and this is the game plan. Too often,
that person picking up the ball and coming up with the action
plan is what is lacking. We have to give confidence back to them,
and have manageable case loads and good well-functioning teams
to be able to make those decisions. That is entirely the mission
that Eileen Munro's report is all about.
Q51 Neil Carmichael: Do you think
that social services and social care is held sufficiently accountable
by our local authorities?
Tim Loughton: It should be, and
it is probably rather more accountable now than it has been in
the past, on the basis that the last thing any leader or chairman
of a council, cabinet member for children's services or director
of children's services wants to see is his or her appearance on
the front page of a tabloid newspaper because a Baby P has happened
in that borough or county. Yes, the awareness and the importance
placed on getting it right for vulnerable children has shot up
enormously, alas as a result of tragic circumstances. In that
respect, there has been an improvement.
Q52 Neil Carmichael: In terms
of the number of looked-after children placed in adoption, do
you think that needs to be pushed a bit?
Tim Loughton: It does, and
I have, and I am. The statistics we had a couple of months ago
about the number of children coming into care and about placements,
stability and going on to adoption were quite worrying in many
respects. They were worrying because of the additional children
coming into care. They were also worrying for the number of children
being adopted, which has fallen from 3,300 to 3,200. Its peak
a few years ago was about 3,800. The vast majority of the 64,500
children in the care system will not be appropriate for adoption.
The vast majority of them go back to their families after a short
term in care, but I don't believe that we cannot do better than
3,200 children being given a suitable, loving family placement
that will give them a second chance at a stable family upbringing,
which they missed out first time round. I am particularly concerned
about the very low number—only 70 babies—who were
placed into adoption last year. We know it is important that the
most stable adoptive placements are those that can be done at
as young an age as possible. We need to speed up the system,
and it is taking too long to get children through the adoption
system. That is why we launched, in tandem with National Adoption
Week back in November, a campaign to promote adoption, to try
to counter some of the obstacles to adoption, of which there are
many. Across cultural adoptions there is reluctance to use voluntary
adoption agencies and other things like that. I absolutely want
to see adoption numbers rise. I am not going to set any targets—I
don't want to do it just because I want to see the numbers rise—but
there are too many children who very clearly could have a suitable
adoption placement, for whom adoptive parents could be found.
That would be better for them than staying in care for longer,
or in many cases permanently until they are adults.
Q53 Damian Hinds: Referring to
that figure, did you say only 70 babies went into adoption?
Tim Loughton: Yes.
Q54 Damian Hinds: Do the Government
have a gauge of how many potential adoptive parents are keen to
adopt a baby?
Tim Loughton: Well, babies are
the most popular.
Q55 Damian Hinds: I just want
a rough idea of the ratio. Do we have a number?
Tim Loughton: I probably do in
the file in front of me, and I may be able to find it before the
end of the session. Through the adoption register and other forms
of database, we have a lot of prospective adoptive parents for
whom the favoured adoption would be a young child, and preferably
a baby. Not enough of them are coming forward, when there are
clear signs that those children are never going to be able to
grow up with their parents. Very often they are single parents—usually,
but not exclusively single mothers—and typically with a
drug or alcohol addiction that they just haven't been able to
overcome.
There is a particular problem with children
from BME backgrounds, particularly black boys, who take at least
three times as long to be adopted as equivalent white children.
Too many of them don't get adopted at all, and are permanently
in care until adulthood. There is an argument that the trouble
is that there are not enough black adoptive parents coming forward.
The case that I have very clearly made is that a perfect ethnic
match is a bonus but not essential, and that what's most essential
is a stable, loving family who can offer the child a stable, loving
upbringing. That is better in many cases than the child staying
in care, with the lack of permanence that that can involve.
Chair: You have brilliantly anticipated
Neil's next question.
Neil Carmichael:
Yes, you have.
Chair: We'll move on swiftly then.
Q56 Charlotte Leslie: I have two
quick questions, one of which is slightly left-field. On the number
of adoptive parents who might be available, I know that couples
thinking about IVF treatment are asked if they have thought about
adoption. I just wondered what assessment you've made of the amount
of support and information provided on that option for those prospective
IVF parents.
Tim Loughton: That is a very good
point. When couples take the decision that they want to go ahead
with IVF treatment if they are unable to conceive, the normal
practice is for the health professionals to talk them through
that process—it's often quite a big undertaking—and
to point out that there are other options, one of which is adoption.
As to how strong and consistent that message is across different
health professionals, and how much it's pushed, I don't know,
and that's an area for me to have a dialogue on with colleagues
in the Department of Health. Adoption is a more attractive option
for many people than an IVF system that is expensive for many,
and can be exceeding cumbersome and often not successful. If they
were properly prepared for all the options, they might choose
to go for adoption.
Q57 Charlotte
Leslie: I have a second question, while I have you here. The
professionalism and professionalisation of the social services
work force seems to me to be at the bottom of a lot of what you're
talking about. Do you think that there's scope to increase the
status given to social services, and do you think that that would
solve a lot of the problems that are currently encountered?
Tim Loughton: Key to the setting
up of the Munro review, and to the commission on children's social
workers that I established in opposition in 2007 in the report
"No More Blame Game" that we produced, was the fact
that there was a crisis of confidence among social workers in
child protection. There is a crisis of confidence among the public
in the profession, and that has exacerbated a crisis of confidence
in the profession on the part of the profession itself. When I
address conferences or groups of social workers, I say that there
are three groups of people who are held in very low esteem: social
workers, bankers and MPs. Having worked for a bank before I became
an MP and then become the Minister responsible for social workers,
I feel their pain trebly, but it is in no one's interests for
any of those three groups, but particularly social workers, not
to be held in great esteem by the public. Social workers are the
fourth emergency service, and are absolutely essential to caring
for vulnerable children. It is absolutely essential that they
are confident enough to make the right decisions. That is why
transparency in the whole system is very important in restoring
public confidence, and that is why we wanted to publish serious
case reviews and raise the whole profile of child protection.
Q58 Charlotte Leslie: Finally,
I wanted your view on an anecdote that I have heard. A social
worker said that the problem was that all the really good experienced
social workers suddenly went on to the clerical-administrative
side of their job and weren't able to stay on the front line,
where their experience might be most valuable.
Tim Loughton: That is a very good
point. It is one that is often made and it is one which is very
much under consideration by Professor Munro. The solution to it
is to look at the Hackney model among others. If you are a senior
doctor in a hospital and you become a consultant, it does not
mean that you are deskbound. You still see patients and wear a
stethoscope, although you have some seniority at management level
within the hospital. Too often, in the current structures, a good
social worker, who performs well at the front line, gets promoted
to be a manager and is then not allowed on to the front line.
That seems to be an inordinate waste of talent and expertise.
The Hackney model has effectively invented a consultant social
worker model, who is the team leader of a multi-agency team, has
seniority at management level, but also goes out and looks after
cases. A number of other authorities have started to copy or replicate
that model in different forms. Professor Munro will comment on
that further, but it does seem to make a lot of sense. It is interesting
that, at a time of huge shortages of social workers, for every
one of the 48 consultant social workers they have been recruiting,
they have had 10 applicants and some good-quality people coming
forward. Clearly that model appeals to the profession itself as
well.
Q59 Chair: While we are on the
issue of models and social workers, how have the pilots of the
social work practices fared and is that something that the Government
are planning to take forward?
Tim Loughton: Yes. We very much
support the social work practice model that was set up in the
2008 Act, which we supported. I think that I have just signed
off the order to promote an expansion of that scheme and a number
of other authorities—I think it is 16—have come forward
to offer to expand social work practices in other areas of the
country as well. It is early days and research is still coming
in, but I am optimistic about the greater choice and expertise
available, particularly in dealing with vulnerable children, who
have some complex problems. The social work practice, which is
effectively a co-operative of social workers, is an additional
tool in the army that we need. I am positive, and we are very
keen to promote them and expand them as much as possible.
Q60 Tessa Munt: I want to ask
you about Government policy on fees for care and supervision orders.
Briefly, in May 2008, the Labour Government increased the fee
from £150 to £4,800, including the final hearing costs,
with the aim of getting some sort of cost recovery. In March 2009,
Lord Laming recommended a review, saying that one case that did
not go to court was one case too many, if the local authority
was deterred by the fees. In September 2009, the independent review
recommended a complete abolition of fees. In March 2010, the Labour
Government abolished the fees, and in October, you said fees are
back. I want to know why you said that. I assume that you are
saying that there is no evidence that they are a deterrent, but
you have to bear in mind the tension between social workers who
may want to make an application and the problem of the financial
situation in which we find ourselves. You have already said that
you want social workers who have well-informed value judgments,
but what about those financial pressures? How much are those fees
going to be?
Tim Loughton: First, this is not
a Department for Education decision. It is a Ministry of Justice
decision to place them on a full cost recovery basis. I think
the fees overall rise from £150 to £4,825 on a full
cost recovery basis.
Q61 Tessa Munt: But they don't
cover the full cost anyway, do they?
Tim Loughton: Well, that may be.
There are variations, but that is the maximum amount. The Government
have taken the view that funding to local authorities to cover
the future cost of the fees will be delivered through the SR2010
settlement. To help avoid any additional financial pressures on
local authorities, it has been agreed that any future increase
in the unit cost of the fees will be covered by MoJ budgets. Although
it sounds slightly bureaucratic, it is a recycling of that money.
What is absolutely vital, Tessa, is that decisions on bringing
care proceedings to court should be made on the basis of what
is in the best interest of the child. The fact that we will be
doing it on a full cost recovery basis, with the money coming
out at one end but going in the other end, should not affect that
decision being made in the best interest of the child.
Q62 Tessa Munt: Do you think there
is going to be any impact?
Tim Loughton: I hope not. The
MoJ will keep this decision under close scrutiny. It was a decision
made by the MoJ and the Treasury, and they obviously wanted to
be assured that it wouldn't impact on that, as did I. There is
no reason to think that it should, as long as the money is there,
coming through a different budget. If we see evidence that it's
having a detrimental impact—clearly, it hasn't so far—I
will want to know about it.
Q63 Damian Hinds: Minister, I
asked the previous panel exactly the same question, and you've
referred to elements of it already. It concerns the 2008 Act and
the requirement for local authorities to provide local provision
and also choice. First, I am interested to know how realistic
you think that is as an aim. Secondly, in terms of making good
the gap, you've already talked a bit about kinship care and promoting
and developing adoption. What else can and needs to be done to
increase the supply of quality placements?
Tim Loughton: Most placements
are through foster carers at the moment. We have a relatively
small number of children placed in residential homes. The standard
of those homes is mixed, although I think the standard has been
rising. In a country such as Denmark, many more children are housed
in municipally run children's homes. I think there is scope for
seeing whether a greater use of children's homes is appropriate.
We used to have many more children in children's homes before
the 1980s. They were rather under a cloud, because of a series
of scandals that went on some years ago, so there was a systemic
switch to children being placed in the community more than with
foster carers. There is some scope for looking at whether we can
do a bit more on residential children's homes, particularly residential
schools as well. However, the biggest single thing we can do at
the moment is, first, to recruit more foster carers. There remains
a shortage of foster carers. It has been estimated that we need
another 10,000 foster placements. Secondly, we can improve the
quality of those placements. There are foster placements provided
directly through local authorities and through fostering agencies.
I think there is a case for saying that some of those foster carers
coming through foster agencies have greater opportunities at training—and
some of the support services as well. I am in no way saying the
local authority is inferior, but we should learn from best practice.
There are evidence-based practices such as multi-dimensional treatment
foster care and multi-systemic therapy, which we are promoting
and have provided funds for in next year's settlement, which is
about improving the training to foster carers, particularly when
dealing with challenging children. There have been cases in the
past where a child has been deposited with a foster carer and
that child has some quite challenging behaviour—it may be
behavioural problems, learning disabilities, or physical problems
as well—and yet the foster carers have not been properly
briefed and prepared, and in some cases have been left completely
in the dark. It is not fair to the foster carer. More importantly,
it's not fair to the child.
Making sure the appropriate placement is there
and that the family is able to cope with the particular challenges
of that child is good sense. It's a false economy not to be doing
that. That is where I think local authorities can make a good
investment, because the cost of getting that wrong is multiple
placements, which cost more and they break down, and ultimately
it might end up with the child going into a residential care setting,
which is far more expensive and may not be the most appropriate
thing for the child—if only somebody had acted earlier and
got the right placement.
Q64 Damian Hinds: How much of
the recruitment gap do you think is down to the variability of
reimbursement allowances and fees? What other factors can be brought
in to attract more people to be foster carers?
Tim Loughton: I meet a lot of
foster carers—we have some fantastic foster carers. They
are a great unsung army. They need to be praised more—publicly—and
we need more of them to come forward. We need to promote foster
caring as a noble vocation, and we need publicity on just how
easy it is for people to be able to come forward. We need better
promotion of the benefits of foster carers. The differential in
fees may be a factor in some cases, but most foster carers tell
me that that is not the overriding effect. What they need is to
feel properly supported, so that if it all goes pear-shaped, they
can call on the local authority and that support will be brought
in. In too many cases, foster carers feel that they are rather
detached from the local authority. I am initiating something at
the moment. We are designing a foster carers charter, which will
be a basic set of principles—probably 10 core principles—on
what foster carers can expect from their local authority, what
should be expected of them and what their responsibilities are
as foster carers, and also what foster children should expect
from foster carers. That will not be prescriptive and compulsory,
but it is going to be a basic set of principles that I hope every
local authority in the country will sign up to. If foster carers
feel that they are being ignored and not getting a good deal,
they can say, "Look, this is not in accord with the principles
that I signed up to," and they will feel that they have some
leverage. If we get all that right, it will make existing foster
carers feel more loved, and they will want to stay and perhaps
expand—there are some practical things that we can do to
make it easier for foster carers to take on more foster children.
I hope that it might also encourage more of their friends, neighbours
and other people to come and try foster caring as well, because
it is a good thing to do. I wrote to all local authorities back
in August to say that, as far as I am concerned, foster children
should be treated by foster carers as if they were their birth
children. If there are any particular reasons why they should
not be able to go on sleepovers, or should not have their hair
cut in a certain way, that should all be set out in the care plan,
right at the beginning of the placement. It is in everybody's
interest—the foster carers will know where they stand with
the foster children, and the foster children will also know where
they stand. I have made that very clear to local authorities,
and that guidance has gone down very well.
Q65 Chair: To follow up on that,
Minister, some of the fostering agencies seem to have excellent
systems and much improved outcomes, which are well above the national
average. What can be done to encourage local authorities to use
agencies with a proven track record and improved outcomes for
children?
Tim Loughton: It needs to be a
level playing field. There is a mindset in some authorities that
it is much better to keep it in-house, and they are often under
the impression that it is much cheaper to keep it in-house. The
work done by Julie Selwyn of Bristol, particularly on adoption,
although the principle applies to fostering, is that the cost
of a voluntary adoption agency is equivalent to the cost of an
in-house local authority adoption and placement, when one takes
all the add-on and overhead costs into account. As I have said,
voluntary adoption agencies may provide better training to their
people and better support services that they can bring in. If
you add the cost of all of those to a local authority placement,
there is not a world of difference. What is important is what
the best and most appropriate outcome is for a child.
Q66 Chair: Sorry to labour this,
but how can local authorities be challenged? We all believe in
localism and in freedom, and we want them to be able to innovate,
but on the other hand, consistently failing to deliver standards
for the most vulnerable children in our country—that we
know agencies consistently deliver at a higher level—is
unacceptable. [Interruption.] Sorry, we'll have to wait
for the bells to stop ringing.
Tim Loughton: I've had time to
think about the answers—doesn't often happen, does it? My
job is to assess the differentials, and I come back to one of
my earlier points about the big differences in outcomes between
local authorities. Ofsted can assess that when they inspect, and
I am keeping a close tab on the performances of different local
authorities, and I will be asking awkward questions. Why is it
that local authority X has got only 5% of its children having
three or more placements, but the authority next door, with a
similar environment, has a figure of 15%? Why is it that that
authority appears to be using hardly any voluntary agency placements,
and the one next door, which is doing better, is—or vice
versa? I'm really drilling down to that data, and will be asking
challenging questions.
Q67 Chair: I think in technology,
and green technology in particular, they have a sort of top runner
methodology from Japan, where once you've got a type of pump that
is cleaner and better improved than anything else and used on
a regulatory basis, you say that within two years, every pump
must meet the standards that the best in the market now deliver,
or it can no longer be sold. With some notice, while still allowing
them to do it their own way, could you as Minister say, "Here
is a standard that we now believe can be a top runner and can
be delivered. In two or three years' time, if you are not delivering
it, we will come in and challenge your provision"? Something
needs to challenge from the outside where they aren't delivering.
Tim Loughton: We will institute
the Stuart pump table of differential performances by local authorities.
I'm absolutely determined about this; there has been too much
complacency, and looked-after children have been an afterthought
and not regarded as a priority. That is a wholly false economy.
It is false economy for the outcomes and the personal experiences
of those children, and a completely false economy because we know
from the statistics that more of those children will end up in
the criminal justice system. More will end up homeless or as teenage
pregnancy figures and everything that goes with that. That is
a tragedy that we could be doing more to prevent.
Chair: And, Minister, that happened in
the good times. Now we're heading into a period of greater austerity,
looked-after children will rely even more on someone like yourself
championing them at the heart of Government.
Q68 Craig Whittaker: Good morning,
Minister. I want to talk about preparation for adulthood, and
educational attainment in particular. We heard this morning about
how the numbers of children in training and employment at age
19 have been slipping over the past few years. We know that the
attainment level of children declines as they go through the care
system. There is a crevice between those who are in care and those
who aren't. You have said today that many outcomes for children
in care are scandalous, and you started off by saying that for
far too long, these issues have been swept under the carpet. Now
you're the chap at the top of that pile—
Tim Loughton: Pile carpet.
Craig Whittaker: Of course. What policies
are you going to put in place to stop that slide and turn it around?
Tim Loughton: You raised that
question earlier and asked why children from the care system are
finding it harder to get jobs and whether there is a sort of prejudice
against them. What it comes down to is that educational achievement
is No. 1. The fact is that 18-year-olds who have been through
the care system are statistically likely to have far less favourable
qualifications than an average child who has been brought up with
his or her parents. That is why, and given the pressures on the
economy and jobs now, when there is a choice between somebody
better qualified and somebody less qualified, that militates against
children coming through the care system. It is not the fact that
they have been in care themselves, but it is about what being
in care actually means for them.
The number of care leavers in education, employment
or training was rising steadily. It was 65% in 2008, and only
last year, 2009, did it drop back to 62.1%. Some progress had
been made and it is absolutely essential to make sure that we
resume that. Tomorrow we will see the educational outcomes for
looked-after children and the latest figures. I haven't seen the
figures, but I am optimistic that the gap in educational achievement,
say at GCSE A to C level, between looked-after children and mainstream
children will narrow. In the past, the educational achievement
of looked-after children meant that something like 6% or 7% got
five A to Cs at GCSE. That number has risen and last year it was
15%. Over the same time, the number of children overall has risen
from 40-something per cent. to 70%. That gap is the most challenging
thing.
Q69 Craig Whittaker: What are
we going to do that is different? If you put in the same, you'll
get the same out. We need to do something very different to increase
the life chances of those children very quickly. What are we going
to do?
Tim Loughton: That means keeping
them at the same school wherever possible. If you are placed three
times in a year, quite often, particularly in a rural county such
as my county of West Sussex, you could be moved from a foster
placement at one end of the county to one at the other end of
the county. Then, either you have a 40-mile taxi or bus journey
to the school, or you start at another school. No child stands
an equal chance of being able to maintain an education standard
at school if every four months you have a different teacher, a
different set of classmates and maybe a different form of the
curriculum as well. That is absolutely key, and the local requirements
to keep a child closer to home, which will come in with the regulations
in April, is absolutely crucial, so that there is greater emphasis
and importance placed on keeping that child closer to home, in
familiar surroundings, in a familiar environment, with a familiar
friend set if possible, and familiar continuity with other family
members—but, crucially, at the same school as well, wherever
possible. We have done various things within schools so that there
is greater recognition of the needs of children in the care system.
Children in the care system will all benefit from the pupil premium—they
will be a key set of beneficiaries, which is absolutely right.
They have preference in going to schools of their first choice—that
is right, although it is providing pressures in certain parts
of the country where a lot of children are being placed, such
as in Kent. You have an awful lot of out-of-area looked-after
children competing for places with in-area looked-after children
and, down the chain, competing for places with indigenous—if
I can call them that—children with their own parents, in
that locality. That needs sorting out. But if those children are
kept closer to home, so local authorities have greater responsibility
to ensure that sufficiency is there locally, you might stand a
better chance of those kids getting on at school. There are things
like the designated teacher, which Roger Morgan mentioned earlier,
which I think is a good thing. Interestingly, I have set up two
groups, one of which is looked-after children who come to see
me on a quarterly basis. Roger Morgan organised it and they are
certainly not slow in coming forward with their views. When we
asked the group about the designated teacher, they were split
as to whether it was a good thing or not. Perceived wisdom is
that it is a good thing, so we need to think a bit smarter on
that as well. However, continuity of school is absolutely key,
and so is making sure that the kids turn up at school, and have
the ability to be able to perform on an equal basis with kids
who are lucky enough to be with their own parents.
Q70 Ian Mearns: On the pupil premium,
in a recession, how are you going to hold head teachers to account
to make sure that they are actually spending the pupil premium
for a looked-after child on that child?
Tim Loughton: Again, there is
a deal of de-ring-fencing that has come into all this. But I am,
as I keep saying, absolutely hot about wanting to see those attainment
figures for looked-after children increase. If we have schools
where there are a large number of looked-after children, so they
are getting a large amount of additional money for each of them,
then I want to see where the money is being spent if they are
not producing the goods at the end of it. I am going to be keeping
on everybody's tail on this. My Department now knows that for
me and for this Government this is an absolute priority, because
key is getting those kids achieving more, from an early education
level.
Q71 Craig Whittaker: This question
is supplementary to Ian's. Will the pupil premium be physically
attached to those children? If they are still in the process of
moving around from school to school, because things don't happen
overnight—
Tessa Munt: Craig, can you speak up?
Sorry.
Craig Whittaker: Sorry. I was talking
about the pupil premium and asking whether it would be physically
attached to the looked-after child, particularly if they are
moving quite frequently around schools.
Tim Loughton: That's a good point.
The pupil premium is attached to a child and it goes directly
to the schools, so if a child were to move around, my understanding—if
I am wrong, I will be corrected on this and officials will probably
start harrumphing in the background—is that it will go with
them. If a child goes to another school, then he or she would
take the pupil premium with them. As to how—
Q72 Chair: Would it only be at
the beginning of the financial year?
Tim Loughton: That's a very good
point. Whether it is cut off at the end of term—
Chair: When they're on roll, the money
will come, if they are not on roll, it won't. I am not an expert
on that.
Q73 Tessa Munt: There are certain
key dates, aren't there?
Tim Loughton: There may be key
dates. What I suggest, Chairman, is that I will find out about
the mechanics. Given that we only announced the pupil premium
details two days ago, I am not completely up to speed with some
of the mechanics, but the principle must be that the money follows
the child, because the money is for the child.
Q74 Craig Whittaker: Minister,
I just want to take you back to educational attainment, because
one of the key things that we now know is that children who aren't
in care normally leave home at about 24, but a very large proportion
of children in care leave at the ages of 16 and 17, which I am
sure is the inhibitor for them going on to further education.
The previous Government did the "Staying Put" pilot,
which took children up to 21. Will you make it a policy aim to
reduce figures for looked-after children who leave care at the
ages of 16 and 17?
Tim Loughton: Yes. The "Staying
Put" pilot is very good, and we will promote it. The pilots
going on at the moment have not finished, and I want to see the
full results from them when they do. The principle is that for
most children, whether or not they are in the care system, leaving
home at 16 is a very big challenge. Some children at 16—whether
they are in care or with their parents—may think that they
are worldly wise and big enough to do it, but for many of those
children, when they get to the age of 17 or 18, things suddenly
go pear-shaped. Their flat could fall through. They could get
chucked out of school, fail their exams or lose their job. All
of a sudden, they are not so worldly wise and big enough to look
after themselves. Yet we expect too many of the children who have
the most traumatic backgrounds—who do not have mum and dad
to take their washing home to and get a spare bed when it all
goes pear-shaped—to leave home and go out into the big wide
world at 16. Not surprisingly, many of them end up going off the
rails and that is a false economy. "Staying Put" pilots
are all about giving that extra safety net. What we need is not
a prescriptive system but flexibility. For those kids who make
it, fine. I am talking about those kids who need to dip back into
the support system and to be able to go back to a familiar foster
carer. I am also talking about when they go off to college as
well, because there is the problem about coming back for holidays.
Some local authorities are better than others in making a payment
to the foster carer to keep the bed vacant for that child during
university. Most of us who went to university came home during
the holidays with a great load of washing and all sorts of other
things as well. If you have been in the care system and you no
longer have that link, where do you go? None of this is rocket
science. There are different ways of doing it, but the principle
must be to provide a flexible safety net, because different children
have different requirements as they leave care. I have also set
up a group of young people who have left care and they come and
advise me. Again, they are pretty gobby and they come up with
some really interesting practical experiences from different parts
of the country, where certain authorities are doing it well and
they feel supported and others make them feel completely cast
adrift. My aim is to get best practice as the benchmark standard
rather than the postcode lottery that we have.
Q75 Nic Dakin: Minister, you come
across—it is really pleasing to hear—as somebody who
really champions looked-after children, and I think that's excellent.
In your championing of looked-after children, what do you think
of the proposal, backed by Barnardo's and Action for Children,
for an alternative to the child trust fund for looked-after children?
Tim Loughton: There have been
some discussions with Mark Hoban at the Treasury, and with Paul
Goggins, who has taken this up as a cause. I know that certain
Members of the Lords—Baroness Walmsley as well—have
been working with a charity to come up with some alternative proposals.
There are moves afoot to see whether some measures can be put
in place. It is not directly my responsibility because it is a
Treasury matter.
Q76 Nic Dakin: Are you positive
about those moves?
Tim Loughton: I am open to whatever
options are being put around. What is important is that local
authority money should be available to match what demands there
are for certain young children. A child will not be able to touch
the trust fund until they are 18, yet they might desperately need
some more music tuition—if they have a skill in music—or
some additional support in certain other areas. Some local authorities
offer quite imaginative bursary schemes to children at school.
Children with birth parents may automatically be able to get those
extramural activities, but children in care don't. There are other
ways of ensuring that we have the biggest impact rather than having
to wait until 18. I am open to see what discussions are going
on.
Chair: Thank you, Minister.
Tim Loughton: Is that it?
Chair: It is. It is nearly 11.50, so
we have time to rush to PMQs. Thank you very much for your evidence.
On behalf of all my colleagues, let me thank you for championing
looked-after children and for your promise to give a formal response
again, by Government, to our report and doubtless within the time
period, if not sooner, than would happen if we had just published
said report. Your nod to that can also be recorded by Hansard.
Tim Loughton: It was a twitch.
Chair: Thank you.
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