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Baroness Gould of Potternewton: My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, is absolutely right: sometimes persistence does pay off. On this occasion, I can only say I am delighted that the Government have accepted this amendment, and that changes need to be made to court processes. I repeat, however, that this amendment is not the total answer, but it will make a difference, and will ultimately provide a safer environment for so many children. I take the caveats about resources and training, and look forward to hearing that those will be made available, but it gives me great pleasure to commend my amendment to the House.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Adonis moved Amendment No. 20:
"(ii) may, by addressing a person's violent behaviour, enable or facilitate contact with a child;"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
7 pm
Lord Northbourne moved Amendment No. 21:
"( ) Subject to subsection (9), in considering whether to make a contact activity direction, the court shall have regard to the desirability of each birth parent assuming their obligations to provide (or procure) for the child the support, care and education which he needs."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I should say that I forgot to explain to the House that my noble friend Lady Finlay cannot be here because she has had to go to support her mother due to the death of a relative in France.
(6)This is a probing amendment. In the past 20 years the proportion of children born to unmarried parents has increased dramatically. While many unmarried fathers share parental responsibility, as defined in the Children Act, with the mother, it is estimated that more than 1 million do not. These fathers are in a kind
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of legal limbo. Many accept the full obligation of being a good father, unconscious of the fact that they have no right in relation to their child or its welfare. On the other hand, an increasing number of others consider that to father a large number of children is a macho achievement, and persuade themselves that it is up to the mother and the state to concern themselves with bringing up the child.
Setting aside entirely any moral considerations that may or may not be involved, I am concerned about the practical implications of this state of affairs for the welfare, well-being and future prospects of an increasingly substantial minority of the nation's children, and about the increasing cost to the state of assuming the responsibilities of more and more indigent fathers. This uncertainty in the law—and indeed in the shared values of our society—about the responsibilities of unmarried fathers means that children cannot be taught their responsibilities as citizens in this respect in school or elsewhere. Because we are a multicultural society, there are some ethnic groups whose cultures and values relating to parental responsibility are different from ours. How can they learn what it is to be a British citizen if we have no established norm?
At the root of the problem that this Bill is designed to address is the increase in the number of children exposed to family breakdown. How can this be reversed if there is fundamental uncertainty in the law about the responsibility of those 1 million citizens who have children but no parental responsibility?
So I ask the question: what are the obligations of a citizen who becomes a father, first towards his child, and secondly towards the state? This amendment, like its predecessor in Grand Committee, is a probing amendment to draw the attention of the House to the need to give some clear guidance on the obligations to his child of a father who does not have parental responsibility, and to ask the Government whether they are prepared to clarify the law on the obligations of unmarried fathers; and if not, why not? I beg to move.
Baroness Morris of Bolton: My Lords, I speak to Amendment No. 22. I thank the Minister for his reply in Committee. However, we believe that delay is the enemy of resolving many of these problems. This amendment would require the court to consider the time by which a contact activity can be provided, and is likely to be completed, before making a direction, in order to allow sufficient time to work with the parent or family concerned, but to avoid such directions in themselves causing delay if the facility is not available. The amendment also highlights the need for adequate resources for the provision of a framework or range of contact activity services across the country in order that children and their families may benefit from them.
As I said in Committee, there is an acknowledged need for better facilitation of contact orders, and this amendment was suggested by the Law Society. However, we are concerned that there should be adequate resources for the provision of contact services across the country, in order that children and
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their families may benefit from them in a timely manner with less need for recourse to more lengthy or further court proceedings.
The range of options to assist the implementation of an order needs to be sufficiently flexible to address the problem, and the options themselves need to be available. For example, there is no point directing a parent to undertake a parenting programme designed to address intractable contact disputes if the facility is not available locally and is not accessible. In order to avoid directions in themselves causing delay, we therefore suggest that the court should be required to consider the time by which this time can be provided, and whether it can be provided over the likely appropriate period of time in respect of the family concerned.
There is already continuing concern among practitioners on the ground about the capacity of existing resources in some areas. For example, I believe that in some courts CAFCASS is not yet in a position to provide the additional facilitation and support services to fulfil its intended changing role in resolution, or supervised contact centre services may be unavailable. I believe that only one contact centre is available in Wales. In Committee, the Minister stated that he thought that the amendment,
"would impose an unnecessary burden on the courts and the providers to specify a precise time period over which the contact activity is to be provided".
He went on to say that this would run the risk of,
I argue the opposite. It will reduce flexibility and increase the burden only if the resources are not there. If they are not there in adequate measure, the principle of contact activities within this Bill will be empty, as they will not be able to be used in a timely and efficient manner.
The Earl of Listowel: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Bolton, for tabling this amendment, because it gives us another opportunity to emphasise the concern about the resourcing of contact. It also permits me to tell the Minister that I now recall it was Beverley Brooks—until quite recently the chair of the National Association of Contact Centres—who was appointed chair of the committee to look at the funding of contact centres. The committee found that to resource contact centres adequately cost £8 million a year, but, in her evidence to a Select Committee on this new Bill in the other place, she said something to the effect of: "Now you are asking contact centres to provide a lot of new services". So she expressed even more concern that contact was not being given the resources it needed to do the job required.
To the best of my recollection, the issue in Wales is that there is only one contact centre that provides supervised contact. That is important to our deliberations today.
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, for raising an
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important issue that he continually keeps us focused on: our responsibilities and obligations as parents, and particularly the rights of fathers, which is an issue of great concern to him.
I will not rise to the challenge of saying what we are going to do about unmarried fathers, because that is to suggest that there is a problem that lies only with people who happen to be unmarried. There are many stable relationships where marriage is not part of the relationship.
Lord Northbourne: My Lords, I purposefully said fathers without parental responsibility. I am concerned about that group—the 1,000 fathers who do not have parental responsibility. Some unmarried fathers have parental responsibility.
Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I understood what the noble Lord was saying. We must recognise the differences between different groups and that many take their responsibilities extremely seriously. Earlier the Child Support Agency was mentioned and my noble friend Lady Hollis, who is no longer in her place, pointed out that there are differences between those who contribute through the Child Support Agency and those who do not. It may be interesting to debate the various ways in which people approach the matter.
The noble Lord's amendment is interesting. We can offer him reassurance on the point of principle that he raised. In the Children Act 1989, there is a welfare checklist in Section 1(3). The checklist directs the court with respect to the child concerned to have regard to,
"how capable each of his parents, and any other person in relation to whom the court considers the question to be relevant, is of meeting his needs".
That is in the spirit of what the noble Lord is searching for in the Bill. I also accept that the noble Lord raises a much broader debate, which I shall not enter into with great gusto at this point, about how we ensure that people understand the importance of being a good parent, including education in its broadest sense, not just within the school framework. That is important long before people have children and it is important when they have children and a relationship ends and the situation comes within those covered by the Bill. I accept the importance and value of that, but I believe that we have covered that point in the Bill.
In Amendment No. 22, the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, considers the activity that will take place. There is a great deal in what she said. We have to be alive to the risk of delay for all the reasons mentioned by the noble Baroness. We shall ensure that the courts are guided by CAFCASS so that they can work out what is available locally and how quickly it can be made available. I believe that in the Bill we have covered the concerns of the noble Baroness and I hope that she will consider that. We have said that the courts must, before making a contact activity direction or condition, be satisfied that the suggested provider is suitable to provide the activity, that the activity is
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appropriate in the circumstances and that it is provided in a place to which the individual can reasonably be expected to travel.
We have established that the provider who is suitable to provide the activity will, in light of the no-delay principle in a Children Act, include establishing that the activity can be provided within the timescale. The combination of the no-delay principle within the Act combined with that point does what the noble Baroness wants to do. I hope that that gives her the assurance she seeks within the legislation. We shall undertake a full mapping exercise to ensure that we understand exactly what provision is available. I have already said that we want to ensure that the £7.5 million is spent well on child contact centres, notwithstanding what the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, has said—I am grateful to him for explaining that in more detail. We know there are issues about contact centres, both in terms of geographical reach and in what they are able to offer. The matter does not rest with my department any more, but I know from contact with my noble friend at the Department for Education and Skills that his department is looking at that. I am sure that he will write to the noble Earl to tell him more about that. We shall deal with this issue. I believe the amendment is covered in the Bill already.
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