Public Services Committee
Wednesday 21st October 2026
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11:12
Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Able to. expect so that they're therefore able to achieve able to participate in a amount of time with the right amount of support and the right amount of. opportunities that we would be. education at similar rates to children who aren't in the care system. And that when those young people, those children, become young people and they move into adulthood, that as other parents, we support them at that stage, as so many parents do, when their children get to 18 and they go off to. university and they, they they're on the end of the phone to be able to, to, to support them.
We need to be able to do the same for children in the care system. So we give them that support, we give them that the what they need to help move on into. adulthood so that in.
We need to be able to do the same for children in the care system. So we give them that support, we give them that the what they need to help move on into. adulthood so that in.
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11:12
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Far as I would see it. Thank you. Yeah. Really, really agree with what Nicholas said there. And I think we are, broadly speaking, on the right track with the reform programme. The the family first model spans the whole spectrum of the system. So we're looking at, obviously much better support for children to remain safely within their.
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11:13
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Whole family support. We then move up into the kind of kinship space for children who aren't able to remain with their families, where there's much better support for kinship arrangements and, crucially, that they're kind of. sustainable over time, and that kinship carers have what they need. They're not kind of doing this in the face of total.
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11:13
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Because they're committed to caring for the child, that it actually works for the whole family in that situation. And then for children who who do need to go into care. We have a, a family first. model where. fostering is. prioritised for the majority of children, though crucially, and this is a really key message that I want want to land today. There must be recognition within that that fostering cannot work for all children. It's the majority, but it is not all. And for those children who do need to go into residential care, we need to do a lot more thinking about what residential care looks like.
It is. largely children with high and complex needs. They need a lot of therapeutic input. And for me, that part of the system needs to be much more squarely focused on on, on. therapeutic care and outcomes. And then equally, that that family first model then needs to go beyond that. So we're thinking about how children can return home. We need a lot more post removal support for families. So where children are going into care in the prospect as they will be in care for some.
It is. largely children with high and complex needs. They need a lot of therapeutic input. And for me, that part of the system needs to be much more squarely focused on on, on. therapeutic care and outcomes. And then equally, that that family first model then needs to go beyond that. So we're thinking about how children can return home. We need a lot more post removal support for families. So where children are going into care in the prospect as they will be in care for some.
11:14
11:14
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
You don't go, okay, job done. They've gone into care. We know they're safe. We know they're getting the support they need. But actually there is that continuity of work with the. family so that in cases where where reunification would be appropriate, that that then becomes possible because the work has been done with the family. Ivan and I work on reunification policy a lot together, and I know that she'll say a lot more about that this morning. So I think, broadly speaking, we are on the right track there. It's just we're at the very start of this process, right.
And we are essentially unpicking large scale system dysfunction. We have a system that has been designed for younger. children for harms within the home. And we now, I'm sure you guys have heard lots from DfE about the fact that we now have an aging cohort within care. We are looking at. adolescents a lot now. And in that space, we're talking about extra familial harms, harms outside the home. How do we get good outcomes for those children in a system that is not really designed for them? We need a lot more kind of specialist. expertise in adolescence.
We need professionals who are on the front foot of emerging trends among teenagers and all that kind of thing. But I think a really. crucial thing for me, and this comes back to what Nicola was saying, we need to look much more. holistically at . outcomes . We need to look at, particularly for children in care, not not just what is their. experience of care, which is largely where Ofsted's focus is. It is about what does their life look like outside of that? What does it look like at school, in. relationships with their existing. community and all of that, so that we build up this picture, which then allows us to look at the child's.
journey rather than looking at a snapshot in time, which is what the system and the data that we have in the system is largely doing. We need to look at the trajectory. Where have they moved on to from a starting point. And I think we're quite good at doing this in the education space, but we haven't got there on children's social care. So I think that's a really key point. We need to move away from that kind of snapshot in time. Another thing, I think, on what kind of an ideal system would look like to be achieving better outcomes is about being much better at.
capturing subjective .
And we are essentially unpicking large scale system dysfunction. We have a system that has been designed for younger. children for harms within the home. And we now, I'm sure you guys have heard lots from DfE about the fact that we now have an aging cohort within care. We are looking at. adolescents a lot now. And in that space, we're talking about extra familial harms, harms outside the home. How do we get good outcomes for those children in a system that is not really designed for them? We need a lot more kind of specialist. expertise in adolescence.
We need professionals who are on the front foot of emerging trends among teenagers and all that kind of thing. But I think a really. crucial thing for me, and this comes back to what Nicola was saying, we need to look much more. holistically at . outcomes . We need to look at, particularly for children in care, not not just what is their. experience of care, which is largely where Ofsted's focus is. It is about what does their life look like outside of that? What does it look like at school, in. relationships with their existing. community and all of that, so that we build up this picture, which then allows us to look at the child's.
journey rather than looking at a snapshot in time, which is what the system and the data that we have in the system is largely doing. We need to look at the trajectory. Where have they moved on to from a starting point. And I think we're quite good at doing this in the education space, but we haven't got there on children's social care. So I think that's a really key point. We need to move away from that kind of snapshot in time. Another thing, I think, on what kind of an ideal system would look like to be achieving better outcomes is about being much better at.
capturing subjective .
11:17
11:17
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
And this is really hard to do. Well, I know Ofsted are trying are trying with this, DfE are trying with this, but in a lot of. cases it's a bit of an add on. It's a bit of, oh, let's go and talk to some children and some parents and. carers and then you get into a whole issue around kind of, you know.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Particularly where there's complex needs or there's. communication needs, or you've got a child in an out-of-area placement, and then there's a local authority being inspected. And actually that child is now out of that local authority area and all that, all that sort of thing. It needs to be kind of a very. focused effort where we. recognise that what we refer to in the sector as. participation is recognized as a specialist skill. And it isn't just an add on, it isn't just about having, you know, a board of children and young people who meet quarterly or whatever it is.
And we just need to be a bit more upfront. I think about how tricky it can be to, to obtain that kind of very.
And we just need to be a bit more upfront. I think about how tricky it can be to, to obtain that kind of very.
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
In the sector as well. In all honesty, thank you very much. And just to add, yeah, I'd agree with everything that's been said so far. I think, you know, a system that works well, a system that's good and is delivering good outcomes for children is going to be one that is preventative, that one that's focused on prevention at every stage of the child's journey. So Jess set out some of that just there. But I think, you know, at the moment we're obviously on in the process of delivering wide scale children's social care reform. And there's lots of hope in that and lots of optimism in terms of the ideas that are behind that, of building this more preventative system.
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11:19
Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
A report jointly, our charities together, as well as children's, the Children's Society and NCB . Earlier this year, the Children's Social Care Funding Alliance report that we've done for the past. I can't even remember how many years now, many years of. Yeah. And you know, that showcased to us what we've seen over previous years, which is at the moment, 80% of children's social care funding is being spent on late stage intervention and crisis support, and there's been about a 40% reduction of early support funding. So funding that's focused on those early preventative. services over a ten year period.
So that's really concerning. We have these reforms that are really focused on this, you know, this family first kind of model that is investing in preventative early support. But it's going to take time. It's going to take time for those to filter through the system for us to actually see the impact of those reforms over time. And for that to impact, you know, the number of children that are reaching crisis point. And I think there's some things that we need to talk about there in terms of how long that will take and being realistic about that, and what that kind of investment needs to be over time to make it so we can really see those things come through into the system.
I think I'd also point to the fact that, you know, neglect, for example, is a really, I'd say, illustrative example of where the system doesn't work in a preventative way, isn't sort of targeting harm early enough. We we know from speaking to local authorities, we produce some research in. 2024 where we spoke to local authorities about neglect and actually what multi-agency professionals were telling us, including social workers, was actually that. often they feel very confident identifying neglect and they feel confident in, you know, spotting the signs of it. But actually, because of the way the system is structured, neglect, often in terms of incidents that they spot, it doesn't reach that threshold of intervention.
And so they are essentially told that they need to wait for that harm to escalate before support can be put in place. And so, you know, that's really wrong for children and families because we're allowing them to stay in these harmful situations for, for a protracted period of time. But it's also really awful for the system because we're allowing them to get to that crisis point, those later stage.
So that's really concerning. We have these reforms that are really focused on this, you know, this family first kind of model that is investing in preventative early support. But it's going to take time. It's going to take time for those to filter through the system for us to actually see the impact of those reforms over time. And for that to impact, you know, the number of children that are reaching crisis point. And I think there's some things that we need to talk about there in terms of how long that will take and being realistic about that, and what that kind of investment needs to be over time to make it so we can really see those things come through into the system.
I think I'd also point to the fact that, you know, neglect, for example, is a really, I'd say, illustrative example of where the system doesn't work in a preventative way, isn't sort of targeting harm early enough. We we know from speaking to local authorities, we produce some research in. 2024 where we spoke to local authorities about neglect and actually what multi-agency professionals were telling us, including social workers, was actually that. often they feel very confident identifying neglect and they feel confident in, you know, spotting the signs of it. But actually, because of the way the system is structured, neglect, often in terms of incidents that they spot, it doesn't reach that threshold of intervention.
And so they are essentially told that they need to wait for that harm to escalate before support can be put in place. And so, you know, that's really wrong for children and families because we're allowing them to stay in these harmful situations for, for a protracted period of time. But it's also really awful for the system because we're allowing them to get to that crisis point, those later stage.
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11:21
Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
Skewing the kind of, you know, the funding, but also it being a really awful situation for those children and families. So I think, you know, that's a really good example where there should be more focus. Actually, the reform programme at the moment doesn't have a sort of specific focus on particular harms, like neglect and how it's going to tackle a greater investment and greater kind of upskilling of the workforce to do that. One of the things that we've talked about is looking at the definition of neglect. Actually, at the moment, the definition of neglect stipulates that neglect needs to be assessed as being persistent.
And actually that's really difficult for a practitioner to to observe because you're looking at it's a cumulative harm often so that the incidents that you might see, there's a kind of drip, drip effect in terms of the harm that's building for that child. And actually, it's really wrong that we're saying in that definition that the support in place can't be sort of given until it reaches that point of persistence, because then essentially, we're losing. opportunities for earlier support in place. And then, yeah, Jess mentioned some other areas as well that I'd absolutely echo. So thinking, I think, you know, the preventative kind of model and this idea of working with.
families in a holistic way in, you know, really honing into the, the belief that I think we all have that wherever possible, children should stay with their families if the support can be in place to allow that to happen safely. I think those. principles really need to be applied at every single point in the system. So there's a lot of focus on how we can prevent children entering care. And that's absolutely right. But as Jess mentioned, what can we do to actually say when a child could safely return home? How can we make sure that is possible?
At the moment, what we often have is if children or children do return home. And I would say that quite often that does happen in an unplanned way, or if they are supported to return home in a planned way. Local authorities are telling us we produce some research in.
And actually that's really difficult for a practitioner to to observe because you're looking at it's a cumulative harm often so that the incidents that you might see, there's a kind of drip, drip effect in terms of the harm that's building for that child. And actually, it's really wrong that we're saying in that definition that the support in place can't be sort of given until it reaches that point of persistence, because then essentially, we're losing. opportunities for earlier support in place. And then, yeah, Jess mentioned some other areas as well that I'd absolutely echo. So thinking, I think, you know, the preventative kind of model and this idea of working with.
families in a holistic way in, you know, really honing into the, the belief that I think we all have that wherever possible, children should stay with their families if the support can be in place to allow that to happen safely. I think those. principles really need to be applied at every single point in the system. So there's a lot of focus on how we can prevent children entering care. And that's absolutely right. But as Jess mentioned, what can we do to actually say when a child could safely return home? How can we make sure that is possible?
At the moment, what we often have is if children or children do return home. And I would say that quite often that does happen in an unplanned way, or if they are supported to return home in a planned way. Local authorities are telling us we produce some research in.
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
Jointly with action for children on this, that. actually they want to provide more support in the longer term. So to support families before that return home happens as well as after. But actually, they really struggle to sustain that support that they think is. important because they just don't have the resources to do so. And that's a real problem because essentially what's happening then is children and families are kind of reaching this cliff edge where they may return home. And actually, if the support is then cut off at that point, then of course, the problems that kind of resulted in them going into care in the first place could well, you know.
resurface and then that return home breaks down and they return to care. And we know that that's happening from the data that we do have, return to care rates are really high. And that's worrying. And there's, you know, there's a really good economic case for the government paying more attention to this as well. So we did some we commissioned Professor Lisa Holmes to do some research on this. And I'll get make sure I get the exact figure. We know that the government is spending around. 300 million per year on return homes that break down. Actually, we also know that if they were to invest in more support for.
resurface and then that return home breaks down and they return to care. And we know that that's happening from the data that we do have, return to care rates are really high. And that's worrying. And there's, you know, there's a really good economic case for the government paying more attention to this as well. So we did some we commissioned Professor Lisa Holmes to do some research on this. And I'll get make sure I get the exact figure. We know that the government is spending around. 300 million per year on return homes that break down. Actually, we also know that if they were to invest in more support for.
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11:24
Baroness Shawcross-Wolfson
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Baroness Shawcross-Wolfson
Looked at throughout the whole system. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. That's incredibly rich answers. And I know my colleagues are very keen to start digging in. Can I just come back on one point you talk to we've got some great material here about what good looks like. There was one thing I wanted to come back to, to you on Jessica, which is it sounded like we don't. necessarily have a very clear idea about what good looks like for .
11:24
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Children with very complex needs. Yeah. Is that fair? Yeah, I think it is fair. And I think some of that comes from we don't always really know what we mean when we talk about complex needs. For me, there's a bit of a split. between complex needs which are inherent in the child, and they are things to do with health and learning needs, all that kind of thing. Then then we have complex, complex risks.
And this is about harms in the child's.
And this is about harms in the child's.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Whether it's a harm to them or by them. And then we have. complex children and complex situations. And this is about kind of, you know, their, their environment really, and. structural structural issues like, you know, poor quality housing and kind of pressures that the family are facing poverty and all that kind of thing. And I think those. definitions need unpicking a little bit. But, but key to that is.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
We know that actually for under under nines and particularly under fives, that's dropped significantly. And then the adolescent cohort has increased particularly on on 16 plus. And this is there is some you have to be careful with the data because there are significant kind of influencing factors like unaccompanied asylum seeking children are included within within the care cohort. But we know that a lot of this a lot of this.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
We are probably not going to get to the point where the foster sector is able to meet that sort of need. And and this is why I'm keen. I'm keen for you to kind of take away points around the importance of looking at children's homes and not. minimising the role that they play within that fostering debate, and particularly where we're talking about complex.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Whether we are talking about complex needs or we're talking about complex. risks where there are high needs, you know, they're not adolescents, and it's due to. neurodiversity and autism, health needs, all those sorts of things that we're all very familiar with. We must. recognise that the children's home sector has a key role to play. It will always have a key role to play.
11:28
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
As a whole, I think I think really there's a there's a lot of there's a lot of discussion around having a therapeutic sector. But my sense is that there are a lot of providers that aren't actually delivering genuinely. therapeutic care, and that's really critical in this complex needs space. But what needs to go before that is really understanding the cohort and .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Inadvertently worsened the state of the system? Yeah, I haven't thought about that before. That's a really interesting one. I definitely think there's been drift over time. I think we also have to be a bit careful about what we mean by. dysfunction as well. I know there's a lot of there's a lot of media interest and kind of public discourse around deprivation of liberty orders and the rise in use and use of unregistered homes and high costs and all of that. And some of the time that that sort of conversation, I think, masks the. reality of, of what's of what's going on in the system and particularly on, on this high costs point, as I was, as I was just kind of previously implying like the care requirements for a lot of the children that are in the cohort now, they will be high costs.
You know, that that is what the requirement is. And we need to make the distinction between what is a justified high cost and what isn't. In order to do that, we need better data. And I know Dfee are working on that. They are they're wanting to develop a dashboard where you're able to kind of do like for like. comparisons across different placement types. So I think, yeah, the dysfunction has certainly emerged over time.
I think in the care.
You know, that that is what the requirement is. And we need to make the distinction between what is a justified high cost and what isn't. In order to do that, we need better data. And I know Dfee are working on that. They are they're wanting to develop a dashboard where you're able to kind of do like for like. comparisons across different placement types. So I think, yeah, the dysfunction has certainly emerged over time.
I think in the care.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
The market has been left to kind of do do what it wants. I don't think there's enough national oversight of what the market looks like, the inherent risks in it, the ability to kind of shape the market as you would want it to look for the for the current cohort of children just hasn't existed. And we're now doing that very late. And I think the, the market, the set of market reforms that have been proposed are very.
comprehensive and they will get us to a better place. But .
comprehensive and they will get us to a better place. But .
11:31
Lord Johnson of Marylebone
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Lord Johnson of Marylebone
Obviously that doesn't do anything for the children currently in the system. Thank you. Chair, can I just have a very quick follow up in your remarks just now, you slipped in that a significant. Well, first of all, your description of the dynamics within the age groups of the children in care was interesting. I haven't seen that in the briefing material that we've had so far, that the younger group populations are stable or falling, and the adolescent children are increasing as a proportion of the overall mix. And you said that the percentage of unaccompanied asylum seeking.
children was a growing part of that was was an important part of that story. Could you help us understand the dynamics of what's going on in the in the older population and the extent to .
children was a growing part of that was was an important part of that story. Could you help us understand the dynamics of what's going on in the in the older population and the extent to .
11:32
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Which unaccompanied asylum seeking children are a part of it? Yes. So obviously you'd get you'd get. fluctuations over time of, of unaccompanied asylum seeking children entering the care. cohort and you that tends to largely affect the the adolescent cohort. And I think we've perhaps in the. past made some. assumptions about the extent to which that is driving those increases in in the care in the older. cohort and given less focus to actually the non uasc cohort and the extra familial harms that are having , having the impact there. So certainly like when we do our children's Services funding alliance report, there will always be a line in there on as a sort of caveat that Uasc are included within, within the.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Children in the care system are currently unaccompanied asylum seeking children. How has that changed over time ? In terms of the percentage? I'm not I'm not completely sure in terms of the percentage. What I can say is, if you look at children in care and the increase of children in care over the the last ten years, the amount that unaccompanied asylum seekers in that is. comparatively small. There's definitely bigger issues at play. If you look only over the last 1 or 2 years, a lot of the increase .
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Baroness Redfern
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Baroness Redfern
Going to ask you to do that, please. Yes. Baroness Redfern? Yes. Can I just ask? Morning. Anyway, social worker instability. I see. 24% of young people. experience three or more different social workers in. 1 in 1 year. Have we got difficulties in recruitment in certain areas or it just seems quite a lot for a child to have three .
11:37
Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
Social workers in a year. I mean, there's definitely difficulties in recruitment and retention. I think that's. absolutely agreed. I guess I'd kind of look at that as thinking about a couple of different separate. issues and thinking about the reform programme. At the moment we're really supportive, for example, of, you know, the new family help model is trying to address the fact that we need fewer assessments, we need fewer handovers, overs of care. There needs to be kind of less sort of unnecessary thresholds that determine kind of, you know, who is working with a family and what type of support they get.
So we really support that idea that, you know, having a more streamlined system, which could, you know, one of the effects of that could be that there'd be fewer social workers or fewer workers who work with the family and they have more consistency. So that's really helpful, I would say, and I'll let others maybe talk about some of the. retention issues as well. But I would say one thing that we have kind of thought about in relation to that, that that. change is the fact that. actually what we know is that we need, as I've talked about at the beginning, we need preventative prevention across the whole system.
And actually in some local areas we've spoken to, there are real issues maybe around skills and expertise. So for.
So we really support that idea that, you know, having a more streamlined system, which could, you know, one of the effects of that could be that there'd be fewer social workers or fewer workers who work with the family and they have more consistency. So that's really helpful, I would say, and I'll let others maybe talk about some of the. retention issues as well. But I would say one thing that we have kind of thought about in relation to that, that that. change is the fact that. actually what we know is that we need, as I've talked about at the beginning, we need preventative prevention across the whole system.
And actually in some local areas we've spoken to, there are real issues maybe around skills and expertise. So for.
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
Which should then mean that there should be sort of social work oversight. But essentially there could be, in that instance, non-social workers holding those cases . And that, for example, we've heard from local authorities could place additional pressures actually on those workers to not be able to, you know, a lack of confidence or a lack of skills. And, you know, they are worried that that could could sort of hamper retention potentially as well. So yeah, it's, it's definitely shouldn't be happening. That's not the ideal system for a, for a, for a, for a child or for a family.
We want consistency of care. We want it to be able to be sort of relationship based and sort of trauma informed. And we know from evidence that actually that's much more effective. If they can have consistency of workers and if they can have consistency of.
We want consistency of care. We want it to be able to be sort of relationship based and sort of trauma informed. And we know from evidence that actually that's much more effective. If they can have consistency of workers and if they can have consistency of.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Their confidence. If this is what, what does happen in certain areas? Yeah, I'm not sure if Dfee mentioned to you that there's an enduring. relationship strategy now, which is all premised on this idea that we need to get better at recognizing the importance of. continuous trusted relationships. And I think in the within that.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
The ability to deliver that is very difficult in the face of the. workforce issues, not only. because it is the workforce that facilitate that process of kind of finding those. relationships and maintaining them and nurturing them. But because those. relationships are also directly with the. workforce and the issues with with social workers around. recruitment and. retention are replicated across the system. I would say in local authorities. You also have. alongside the social work teams, you also have leaving care teams. And there are figures within those teams called personal advisors, who work with care leavers in that in that transition out of care.
And I think that role is very variable across different areas. The work, the workload, the. caseload is very variable. And I think the some of the kind of.
And I think that role is very variable across different areas. The work, the workload, the. caseload is very variable. And I think the some of the kind of.
11:46
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
All of the. different sort of challenges and risks around that. transition to. independence and leaving care and not always fully sort of understood. And I'm not sure that necessarily the expertise is always there. across all those sort of, I think what you'd refer to as life domains. So you're looking at health and wellbeing and.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Housing and all of that. And I think we need to have a system where those teams and personal advisors really know what those what those challenges are, and what is the support available locally, regionally, nationally for, for those young people to sort of tap into. But as with social work, you know, what, what, what meaningful work can you really do when you've got a, you know, a high, high caseload and all the rest of it? I know, I think we're going to get on to a conversation about. residential care, but I would say within, within this context that the the residential care.
workforce also needs a lot of attention. DfE have recently. commissioned a residential workforce review that's looking across, you know, training, CPD qualifications and all that sort of thing. And I'm quite hopeful that that is going to support a support this.
workforce also needs a lot of attention. DfE have recently. commissioned a residential workforce review that's looking across, you know, training, CPD qualifications and all that sort of thing. And I'm quite hopeful that that is going to support a support this.
11:48
Lord Faulkner of Worcester
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Lord Faulkner of Worcester
Thank you very much. Question two indeed. And that's going to be the area I'm going to ask you about. Thank you very much for coming to see us this morning. Two of you have experience on working for organisations which run residential care homes. Can you tell me tell us a little bit about your experience. How extensive are you able to how extensive is your coverage? How much more would you like to do, and why is it that it is so much more expensive to put children into residential care than to have them in foster homes?
And of course, the numbers are going in the other direction. Jessica, you said that you were strongly favoured fostering, but the numbers are coming down. And I'd .
And of course, the numbers are going in the other direction. Jessica, you said that you were strongly favoured fostering, but the numbers are coming down. And I'd .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
A lot of those placements can ultimately end up being. inappropriate to the child that is matched to them. So you hear a lot about. instability in placement, placement moves out of area moves and all of that. And I think some of the time when you see children eventually going into children's homes, they've bounced through several foster. placements that, to be honest, a lot of the time, I think we're probably never really that likely to work because they weren't they weren't sort of they weren't adequately matched enough. Whether that's due to. The carers, you know, the carers.
skills and the.
skills and the.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Ability to meet the needs or whether actually maybe it wasn't the child's preference to go into a foster placement in the first place. And we do we do hear about that. And when you when you add that together with rising complex needs, you do. You do obviously start to see many more children going into children's.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
We definitely need a much more mixed market in the residential space if we are going to adequately meet needs and we're going to be able to do very careful matching of the child to the home in terms of what the home can offer, but also matching to the children who are already in the home and making sure that all those peer groups are going to work. The voluntary sector. I'm sure Nicola will tell you about this as well. The voluntary sector is doing a lot of the sort of.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
I think we we need to recognise properly the role that the voluntary sector is playing in that space. All the all the work that the government are doing around the market needs to really recognize that when we talk about a. diversified market and mixed market, reducing private sector dominance and all of that sort of thing, and we need to really think about what it is we need to do to sort of unblock. voluntary sector. growth so that we can, you know, play, play a bigger role in this. I've mentioned previously that I think in our view, action for children, we need to really understand what we mean by therapeutic care.
We need to make sure that residential homes are really are really offering that and making sure that it's, it's evidence based and there's an evidence based, sort of psychologically informed practice model that is understood by the workforce in quite practical terms. So .
We need to make sure that residential homes are really are really offering that and making sure that it's, it's evidence based and there's an evidence based, sort of psychologically informed practice model that is understood by the workforce in quite practical terms. So .
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
As well. It'd be helpful to have a similar figure from Barnardos too. Please. Yeah, we again, I'd have to if I could absolutely check the figure, but I believe it's about ten across the market. I think there's, there's. definitely a lot that that, that Jessica said that I would agree with. I think when we talk a bit about and going back to Lord Johnson's question about like, how did we end up here and this sense of market drift that that has sort of happened is that it feels very much that the residential care market was kind of ignored for a certain amount of time, that.
basically there wasn't a lot of focus on it. And as we were seeing more and more older children entering care, more and more. complex children with complex needs entering care. And also we're seeing a lack of reduction in foster carers. You know, we've lost about.
basically there wasn't a lot of focus on it. And as we were seeing more and more older children entering care, more and more. complex children with complex needs entering care. And also we're seeing a lack of reduction in foster carers. You know, we've lost about.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Just over 7000 foster carers from the foster care market in the last four years. This is resulting in much greater pressure on residential care homes to be able to take children often as as as Jessica said, because foster placements have broken down. But we also know, I mean, Ofsted did some research a couple of years ago where they looked at children's care plans and discovered that only 50% of children in residential care were in residential care, with residential care on their their care plan, and a third of them had had fostering on their care plan.
So clearly, the. residential care market is taking some children. One part of your your question why. So growth in residential care. It is because we haven't had those foster carers coming through the system. We've had a reduction in foster carers, we've .
So clearly, the. residential care market is taking some children. One part of your your question why. So growth in residential care. It is because we haven't had those foster carers coming through the system. We've had a reduction in foster carers, we've .
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
You think the role of the regional care. cooperatives is going to be? The role of the regional care cooperatives? I think it's a it it has the. potential as a as a system to help improve some of local authority practice in terms of. commissioning of services. At the moment, every local authority does it on their own. And when it comes down to things that you need to do, like sufficiency, planning, working out how many foster carers you need, what types of foster carers you're doing it on an individual basis.
If you put everybody.
If you put everybody.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
You can block a. commission rather than spot. purchasing and spot purchasing at a sort of relatively last minute. So it does have potential. However, my. nervousness and I have some nervousness around regional care cooperatives. One of the things that I think might happen is once you start commissioning at a regional level, you can only provide or you're going to encourage people who can provide at a regional level, and they're the bigger providers. We currently know that there are some very small providers out there who might only operate in one town or one city. They do a very good job, but they're very small, and they could end up pushed out in a regional commissioning market, which could result in less.
providers rather than more. So we're a bit concerned about that point. The other point that I am concerned about, and this very much takes from our experience of adoption, and they did a. regionalization program in adoption. And this is the idea that we could split the care system. I know we've talked a lot on this panel this morning about the importance of. prevention and things like.
providers rather than more. So we're a bit concerned about that point. The other point that I am concerned about, and this very much takes from our experience of adoption, and they did a. regionalization program in adoption. And this is the idea that we could split the care system. I know we've talked a lot on this panel this morning about the importance of. prevention and things like.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
With some family support is on the agenda. Could we end up splitting all of that? Because different people are doing different things in different places, and they're not talking to each other? I think it's. possible that we could get round those with the regional care cooperative program, but I do think it needs careful rollout. I do think that we need to be learning from the pilots. We do need to be really. investigating what's going on there.
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
And there are some concerns around it. So can I add to that as well? Just to say, I'd really, really encourage the. committee not to look at residential care in isolation. So when you when you look at this, you know, we need to appreciate that the pressures on the residential care market are obviously and we've talked about this really influenced by these wider pressures on children's social care in general. And yeah, we need to look at market reform. And this is all really important. And Nicola and Jess are speaking to that. But we need to continually assess that support.
upstream and ask whether families are receiving that support before needs escalate. Because, you know, the placement pressures are not just a market issue, but there are a reflection of the kind of wider pressures on the system. And then to sort of Nicola's point there about the kind of, you know, them sitting in different places, I think that's really important because actually, you know, the legal status of a child, whether they're in care or it's sort of pre proceedings on their edge of care, etc., you know, shouldn't determine the amount of support that a family might be getting to enable the.
possibility of them either staying at home or returning home. And I think too often we do think about. children as being either in care or kind of out of care, when actually the reality is that families needs don't disappear because of that child's legal status. And actually, if we think about it in that way, it's really from a child protection point of view, really dangerous. You know, the recent awful case of, of the death of baby Victoria Martin actually really showed that the fact that, you know, there was previous children that had been taken into care and Victoria was going to be taken into care.
And the presumption was then the risk was removed. But actually, you know, risk doesn't remove isn't removed because a child is taken into care because that child may, for example, return home. Or in the case of.
upstream and ask whether families are receiving that support before needs escalate. Because, you know, the placement pressures are not just a market issue, but there are a reflection of the kind of wider pressures on the system. And then to sort of Nicola's point there about the kind of, you know, them sitting in different places, I think that's really important because actually, you know, the legal status of a child, whether they're in care or it's sort of pre proceedings on their edge of care, etc., you know, shouldn't determine the amount of support that a family might be getting to enable the.
possibility of them either staying at home or returning home. And I think too often we do think about. children as being either in care or kind of out of care, when actually the reality is that families needs don't disappear because of that child's legal status. And actually, if we think about it in that way, it's really from a child protection point of view, really dangerous. You know, the recent awful case of, of the death of baby Victoria Martin actually really showed that the fact that, you know, there was previous children that had been taken into care and Victoria was going to be taken into care.
And the presumption was then the risk was removed. But actually, you know, risk doesn't remove isn't removed because a child is taken into care because that child may, for example, return home. Or in the case of.
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
Her previous siblings had been taken into care, but she was an unborn child and the risk remained there. And actually like working with families, I think in in the longer term and having a sort of commitment and. understanding that maybe in lots of instances, it's right to work with families in the longer term, not to close cases early, not to sort of stop that support when a child enters the care system is, is the right way to go. And sort of going back to.
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
We really saw that through our research that NSPCC and action did together, where local authorities Coventry was a good example, and I'd be happy to sort of find the case studies and submit those to the committee as well. But they really committed to investing in this idea that they would work with a family for as long as was.
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
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Baroness Nichols of Selby
That they wouldn't close cases, and that actually that was the right thing to do. Because, you know, as long as they had that, you know, the level of support needs might sort of drop down potentially, and it might become less intrusive. But actually, if those relationships were good and if that support was. collaborative and that family had that good.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
And then privately run, which is what we've seen a lot in the news because, I mean, the trend I know over 20, 30 years was for local authorities to close down the their own homes, either to pass them to others, to manage or close them because they've got so many children putting into foster care. But the shift in the you've described to us would suggest they need those homes now. And of course, they're not there, and hence the private sector set in. Is there any data? I can't give you numbers, but I can give you percentages.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Of the residential care. market as as as you might call it, is now run by the private sector. And I think some things that we haven't included, which I would I'd also like to emphasize, I mean, it should be said, you know, many private homes are very, very good. They run very good provision for children and do meet their needs. But the growth of the private sector has also resulted in real.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
With residential care. We now have four times as many children's homes in the northwest as we do in London, which is a you know, there are more children in care in the North west. It means that children end up being cared for very far from home, which is one of the ways in which we we don't meet their needs. And the reason for that is because when we've become so. Or one of the reasons. When we become so reliant on the private sector, the private sector, buy homes where homes are cheap, there where property is cheap, and therefore that's why they've bought a lot of property in the North west.
But that isn't. necessarily where the children need the homes. So we do need, and I very much agree with Jess, to diversify the market, to be able to bring back local authority provision, to be able to bring back more. voluntary sector provision as much, to be able to ensure that we have. And going back to the very first question, the homes that children need, where they need them. So we don't end up .
But that isn't. necessarily where the children need the homes. So we do need, and I very much agree with Jess, to diversify the market, to be able to bring back local authority provision, to be able to bring back more. voluntary sector provision as much, to be able to ensure that we have. And going back to the very first question, the homes that children need, where they need them. So we don't end up .
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Baroness Shawcross-Wolfson
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Baroness Shawcross-Wolfson
Residential care homes, 80% of all of our residential care homes are run by the private sector. Is there any you may not have this, but if you had, it would be very interesting to see if there was a level of analysis under that in terms of spaces for children. So not just homes, but sizes of Ofsteds do this annually. Spending. How much of spending goes to. Because it would be interesting .
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Baroness Watkins of Tavistock
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Baroness Watkins of Tavistock
Yeah, please send it in. Baroness Watkins thank you very much indeed. I'm just very interested in this housing issue. We have section. 108 in housing on new developments. And we usually look for a school or a health provision. But I don't think we've. routinely looked at whether we should ensure that section 108 is used for a children's home as well.
Just thinking, as we're about to build several new towns and some big.
Just thinking, as we're about to build several new towns and some big.
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
To to add to another question, Lord Barber, thank you very much, sir. I've learnt a lot in the last half hour or so. Really really impressive. I want to ask about one particular bit of the market that we heard about from the DfE last week, and is clearly an issue which is the use of. unregistered children's homes. What extra risks does it pose to the children, to society? This regular routine .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
I think for me, what the risks boil down to are there's issues about the property itself, the safety and suitability of the property for the for the child. Those equally apply to the staff around safety, vetting, all that sort of thing. The risk of harm and. exploitation increases because these places are flying under the radar and the staff are not necessarily skilled to manage that, that risk or to spot it, identify it, and .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
I think that the current approach is a bit carrot and stick. Right. And we've got a proposal. I'm not sure if you guys are aware of the Ofsted proposed reforms to Ilex and Skiff, the inspection frameworks. They are. proposing a what they're calling a limiting. criterion where local authorities will not be able to get above a certain. judgement if they are if they are seen to be.
using unregistered provision. And I think while we. support that really kind of.
using unregistered provision. And I think while we. support that really kind of.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
So it is a very nuanced issue. And I'm kind of conscious that the media interest in it doesn't always fully. represent that. So I think really that kind of limiting. criterion approach needs to be very careful. You need to be looking at the quality of oversight. The local authority has the extent to which they are proactively addressing their use. They are they are going to these unregistered providers, making sure they're getting registered or they're replacing that.
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
Of the use of it is very different in different local authorities. That's helpful. And I can imagine two, at least two categories of unregistered in listening to you. One is an unregistered home getting. Children funded through it. And the other is where it's on the on the track to. registration fairly soon, but might be a provider that's already providing registered care homes. And you would have probably I would anyway more faith in the latter than the former.
What. And my understanding is also from the conversation with the DFT, is technically an unregistered .
What. And my understanding is also from the conversation with the DFT, is technically an unregistered .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
For for situations that I'm. describing where where you are, you are in the planning process with Ofsted, you are kind of on, you know, you're on the map with them. You have they, they. understand who the provider is, what the kind of quality is that we're talking about. It's just a case of opening a new setting. The type of support that is going to be provided in the setting is very similar to the existing. footprint and all that kind of thing. And there is such a such a gulf between that and a setting that has just popped up.
Out of out of nowhere and there's no track record there. And it's sort of it's unhelpful .
Out of out of nowhere and there's no track record there. And it's sort of it's unhelpful .
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
In this conversation to talk about unregistered provision without making those. distinctions very important. Because obviously, if you're Barnardos and you've been providing homes for hundreds of years, that's a different thing from a kind of fly by night, suddenly existing children's home taking state funding. That's helpful. Thank you very much. And Ofsted should presumably inspect any home where children are, where the state is funding children.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Specifically on unregistered or generally speaking, on unregistered, on unregistered? I know there's certainly work underway. I think they're looking at. registration as a whole and that there is a big backlog on registration, whether it's on rent, you know, trying to tackle unregistered. settings or not. There is a.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
You are fast tracked. If you are opening in a geographical area of shortage, you are fast tracked. I think I would argue possibly Nicola as well, that there should also be a fast track for voluntary sector provision as well. Where you are a trusted provider. Yes, there are a few other measures as well that I think could be considered on this point around. We have an issue where we it would help a lot for us if we were able to transfer registered.
managers between settings within our own.
managers between settings within our own.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
But currently you have to go back through the whole registration process for that registered manager to move to a new setting. So there's things like that that I think could be, could be quite easily picked up. But I yeah, as I said, I don't think Ofsted is unaware of these issues and not tackling them. I think it is a .
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
Capacity issue around churning through these registration process. So if I listen to you, I can see that it is potentially it's not that it's a soluble problem. We could do away with. unregistered unregistered category because we have that temporary registration setting where there was already an. organisation like yours with a track record, you could fast track it. You could fast track it in certain other circumstances.
And the, the, the few that would then be left.
And the, the, the few that would then be left.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
You might think, well, do we really want those? Because they're just I mean, it should be said, like going back to everything that we've just talked about, about having enough places, having enough residential, can we get on to fostering? I mean, there are definitely. And when you look at the number of children who were subject to deprivation of liberty orders and the number of those who ended up in.
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Baroness Shawcross-Wolfson
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Baroness Shawcross-Wolfson
Simply they should not be. Yeah. Thank you. Any further questions? Just one quick one. When we talk about the backlog and the time it takes for registration, I don't have a sense if we're talking about months or years here. I wonder if you could I don't know if from your experiences of if you were opening a new .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Home, how long it would take you to get registration through from start to finish. I think we find it's really. variable across different local areas, but I know that. registration can happen within 12 weeks if everything is in place, if all the paperwork is sorted, registered manager. workforce and you've got all your DBS stuff. sorted and there's no planning issues to.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
You really want that stability. I mean, I suppose if we start off and yeah, I'd be incredibly positive. I've worked at Barnardos for a very long time and for pretty much all of that time, I've been calling for a national foster care campaign. And last week, the government actually launched a national foster care campaign. So there is there is a lot in this strategy to be very positive about. I think we. frequently as Barnardos, as I mentioned at the start, we are a foster care agency. We recruit foster carers ourselves. We know that within society there remain a lot of myths about who can be a foster carer, that you have to be married, that you have to own your own home.
And as one voluntary agency trying to dispel this myths, we do the best we can. But isn't it nice to get the whole engine of government. behind a national. conversation about what foster care is, particularly because foster care is, you know, it changes. It's not the same. You don't have to be a foster carer full time. You can do a short break care. We often have Barnardos. We offer things a sort of really quite sort of unusual foster care placements, like we do remand foster care for young people who would otherwise enter the criminal justice system, for example.
There are all sorts of these types of things. We don't think a national. conversation has happened in this way before. So I think it's very, very positive. I would also say I'm very pleased with other ways that the minister has really started to listen to some of the things foster care has been telling us for years. particularly around what it's like to be a foster carer in the system and the concept of delegated authority, which which is a posh term for being able to sign the form so that your child can go on a on a school trip.
He's looking at things like that, making that the.
And as one voluntary agency trying to dispel this myths, we do the best we can. But isn't it nice to get the whole engine of government. behind a national. conversation about what foster care is, particularly because foster care is, you know, it changes. It's not the same. You don't have to be a foster carer full time. You can do a short break care. We often have Barnardos. We offer things a sort of really quite sort of unusual foster care placements, like we do remand foster care for young people who would otherwise enter the criminal justice system, for example.
There are all sorts of these types of things. We don't think a national. conversation has happened in this way before. So I think it's very, very positive. I would also say I'm very pleased with other ways that the minister has really started to listen to some of the things foster care has been telling us for years. particularly around what it's like to be a foster carer in the system and the concept of delegated authority, which which is a posh term for being able to sign the form so that your child can go on a on a school trip.
He's looking at things like that, making that the.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
And that people generally are struggling with the housing market. So if there was a way to join up housing and I know the Education Select Committee, which did its inquiries, did talk about this issue, can we join up housing so that we we don't just build one bedroom flats, because that's not going to give us a spare room. So and it feels a little bit that housing is a bit missing from the strategy. There isn't a lot on housing in the foster care strategy. The other element that we'd really like to look at is great to get 10,000 foster carers in.
We've got to keep them there, so we've got to make sure that. retention is as important as recruitment. And I think that there are some things that we could do a little bit on a central government level, just to really say, as a country, how. important we think foster carers are. If we gave, say, foster carers a national exemption to council tax, for example. So we could say, you .
We've got to keep them there, so we've got to make sure that. retention is as important as recruitment. And I think that there are some things that we could do a little bit on a central government level, just to really say, as a country, how. important we think foster carers are. If we gave, say, foster carers a national exemption to council tax, for example. So we could say, you .
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Baroness Watkins of Tavistock
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Baroness Watkins of Tavistock
Know, we think we think foster carers are really, really important. Can you just can I just interrupt you there? I mean, I think that's a great example, but I've spoken to foster carers who say nobody understands what it's like for our finances. When a child we've worked with really well is either going back home or is leaving us because they're going, you know, to higher education perhaps, and then we have no income for three months.
Is there also something.
Is there also something.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Does anybody else want to say anything and pick up the kinship? Can I add something on and I'll pass to Jess as well in a minute. I won't be long, because I know there'll probably be more to say on kind of the recruitment and retention, but I would just sort of really urge the committee and also government to sort of look at the fact that we also really welcome this kind of recognition of the vital role of kinship carers, and also the investment and the focus on getting more foster carers. We really want them to apply the same principles to ensuring there's adequate support to support children returning home to their families as well.
There's this focus on, you know, why are we looking at kinship care? Because we're. recognising the, the, the, the outcomes can be improved and that it might be right for a child to stay within that wider family network if possible. But we have not had that same level of focus when it comes to actually supporting the family to see if that return home could be possible as well. So I just I'd really echo that point. Like our research showed us that, you know, over half of local authorities don't have a policy or strategy for. reunification and how they can prioritise that.
There's no national strategy or guidance on reunification. So how local authorities are going to be incentivised to pick that up as an area that they can sort of focus on in terms of practice improvement, without that national.
There's this focus on, you know, why are we looking at kinship care? Because we're. recognising the, the, the, the outcomes can be improved and that it might be right for a child to stay within that wider family network if possible. But we have not had that same level of focus when it comes to actually supporting the family to see if that return home could be possible as well. So I just I'd really echo that point. Like our research showed us that, you know, over half of local authorities don't have a policy or strategy for. reunification and how they can prioritise that.
There's no national strategy or guidance on reunification. So how local authorities are going to be incentivised to pick that up as an area that they can sort of focus on in terms of practice improvement, without that national.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
We don't know. And we've seen some, you know, good examples of good practice. But on a national level, it isn't looking good because we know that. 1 in 5 children who return home, who return home, then actually return back into care within a year. So something is going quite badly wrong there. And so we really, really welcome this focus on kinship care and, and getting more foster carers with kinship in particular, we would say there's lots of learning and we want those principles to be applied to. reunification as well. The only other thing I'd add for, for fostering as well is to say that, and I'll let Jess come in on the retention and recruitment point, but I think there's some really interesting learning around, and we need to also focus on what we want the role of foster carers to be.
And of course, you know, bringing them in and recruiting them and retaining them is the first part of part of that. But there's some really interesting evidence internationally. And again, it links to the points that I'm making on reunification about how foster carers can actually work more. collaboratively with birth parents, how they can, you know, have play that supportive role of. modeling sort of parenting, and they can help build that. relationship and how that can really support those return homes when they're possible and safe to do so as well. So that kind of mentoring role.
So that's something I'd encourage the committee to look at as well, and happy .
And of course, you know, bringing them in and recruiting them and retaining them is the first part of part of that. But there's some really interesting evidence internationally. And again, it links to the points that I'm making on reunification about how foster carers can actually work more. collaboratively with birth parents, how they can, you know, have play that supportive role of. modeling sort of parenting, and they can help build that. relationship and how that can really support those return homes when they're possible and safe to do so as well. So that kind of mentoring role.
So that's something I'd encourage the committee to look at as well, and happy .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Do quick fire. Absolutely. The the the 10,000 places. ambition is really vital that it's a diverse pool of carers, just kind of recruiting, recruiting lots of the same people isn't going to isn't going to help to the extent that the government need it to help. As Nicola said, retention is really, really key. We have good retention as an independent fostering. agency and it is almost solely because we offer wraparound support for foster carers. We're talking about a short break respite care at weekends. We're talking about therapeutic input, all that, all that sort of thing.
And to Nicola's point on financial support. So we've got a commitment around inflation linked national minimum.
And to Nicola's point on financial support. So we've got a commitment around inflation linked national minimum.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Which is great. But I think the. consensus in the sector is that it still does not cover the full the cost of caring. We also have the fees, which is the opposite of the allowances. So the fees are skills. based and we don't have any. standardisation of that across the country. So that varies hugely. Staying put, I'm not sure if DfE spoke to you about the staying put scheme, which is the sort of stay on scheme for foster children beyond 18. There is no. baseline for. allowances in in staying put at all and I think that needs looking at on kinship.
So the organisation kinship are the key players in this space. And they've done a lot of work on the prevalence of poverty among kinship families. I sort of implied this in an earlier comment. And actually, I think what they know from their research is that it's financial issues that can often deter kinship arrangements. What the government wants to do is move a lot. Get as many kinship carers as kinship arrangements to sit outside of the formal care system, i.e.
not within the.
So the organisation kinship are the key players in this space. And they've done a lot of work on the prevalence of poverty among kinship families. I sort of implied this in an earlier comment. And actually, I think what they know from their research is that it's financial issues that can often deter kinship arrangements. What the government wants to do is move a lot. Get as many kinship carers as kinship arrangements to sit outside of the formal care system, i.e.
not within the.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
And there's a new piloting program, the kinship kinship zones, where financial support, among other things, is being piloted for kinship, you know, arrangements outside of foster care. And that's brilliant. And it's showing us a lot about what financial support can do to support stability of kinship arrangements. But the consequence of it, and this is obviously inherent in piloting things, is that we've now got a huge.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Kinship carers within the pilot who are who are having non-means tested allowances at the same level as foster. carers versus the rest of the country, who are means tested allowances. And the pilot is due to run for three years. And with the government being so committed to kinship, it sort of feels like a bit of a gap, really, that we could be doing something in the meantime. Final point paid employment leave for kinship carers is something that the organisation kinship are also really pushing. So that is that would be on the same level as adoption leave.
It is about that moment when the child.
It is about that moment when the child.
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Lord Mohammed of Tinsley
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Lord Mohammed of Tinsley
So let's move on to our next question, Lord Mohammed. Thank you chair. I mean, I'm just going to comment on what you said, Nicola. I mean, in Sheffield in the past, we have tried to have a rebate scheme of foster carers getting council tax back on certain bands. It's been signed off by the finance officers but it never got through budget. So it'd be interesting if we can get it as a national scheme. Yeah, but my question is on a separate note. But I think all of you raised it today, and I think the previous panel that gave evidence last week talked about the growing complex needs of our young people.
So the obvious question that flows .
So the obvious question that flows .
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Development of staff adequate? Yeah. I mean, I'd say maybe there's I'm thinking about that question. I'm maybe thinking about two different things. I'm thinking about, you know, the expertise and the training and the skills, as you say. But then it's also the system, the. resource and kind of what's in place to allow them to harness those that expertise and skills and put it in place to support children and families. So yeah, as you say, I do think, you know, there's, there's, we have this system or this landscape now where practitioners are increasingly working families with.
multiple interacting challenges and harms, and they kind of interact with other challenges, whether it be, you know, poverty or domestic abuse or mental health issues. And so, yeah, we have to think about how well skilled professionals are to work with that picture. I do from an NSPCC perspective, though, we would look at that to think about, okay, well, looking at the whole picture, how well is the workforce equipped at the moment to respond to one specific groups of children and to specific types of harm? And so there's a couple of things that I would sort of bring out on, on that point.
So I've talked about neglect and I'll I'll have to talk about it again, I'm afraid, because we do think it's really, really. important in that we know the system at the moment is not responding to neglect in the way that it needs to. We know that professionals are essentially being told. And the research that we did actually, and we spoke to professionals, multi agency professionals, they told us that often they're being told by their superiors above that they have to wait for it to escalate to a later point before they can have that. intervention sort of in place.
So that's not right for children and it's not right for the system. You know, I talked about changing the definition so that it. considers removing the kind of persistence point to make that kind of easier for easier for professionals to access support earlier. I think there's also something there about. recognising the contextual stresses on families as well. Scotland, in their definition of neglect. recognize poverty as a. contextual kind of system, stress that can sort of, you know, overload parents and be a contributory kind of risk factor. It doesn't mean that it's there's a direct correlation between poverty and neglect.
They're completely different things. And neglect can happen in any home. But it does mean that poverty can kind of work to overload parents, to make parenting more challenging. And most.
multiple interacting challenges and harms, and they kind of interact with other challenges, whether it be, you know, poverty or domestic abuse or mental health issues. And so, yeah, we have to think about how well skilled professionals are to work with that picture. I do from an NSPCC perspective, though, we would look at that to think about, okay, well, looking at the whole picture, how well is the workforce equipped at the moment to respond to one specific groups of children and to specific types of harm? And so there's a couple of things that I would sort of bring out on, on that point.
So I've talked about neglect and I'll I'll have to talk about it again, I'm afraid, because we do think it's really, really. important in that we know the system at the moment is not responding to neglect in the way that it needs to. We know that professionals are essentially being told. And the research that we did actually, and we spoke to professionals, multi agency professionals, they told us that often they're being told by their superiors above that they have to wait for it to escalate to a later point before they can have that. intervention sort of in place.
So that's not right for children and it's not right for the system. You know, I talked about changing the definition so that it. considers removing the kind of persistence point to make that kind of easier for easier for professionals to access support earlier. I think there's also something there about. recognising the contextual stresses on families as well. Scotland, in their definition of neglect. recognize poverty as a. contextual kind of system, stress that can sort of, you know, overload parents and be a contributory kind of risk factor. It doesn't mean that it's there's a direct correlation between poverty and neglect.
They're completely different things. And neglect can happen in any home. But it does mean that poverty can kind of work to overload parents, to make parenting more challenging. And most.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Poverty can, you know, influence the likelihood of other risk factors like poor parental mental health or stressors. And those things we know from evidence can increase the likelihood of neglect. So that's the first thing that I'd, I'd raise in terms of a kind of harm that we don't think is being tackled in the system. Well, and we do think there needs to be kind of more skills and upskilling and training around. And we think that could be done through a national neglect strategy in the first instance.
And looking at that.
And looking at that.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
The the other area and the group of children I'd point out is babies and infants. So the NSPCC feel really strongly that the system needs to do far more to ensure there is kind of specialist understanding of child development. attachment and infant mental health to assess the kind of lived experience of babies and infants. You know, babies and infants represent. 34% of serious case reviews. So when a child is seriously harmed or killed as a result of abuse and neglect, that's really stark. It's persistent over time that hasn't reduced. So we're seeing that over the long term.
The system's not. responding to better protect babies and infants in the way that it needs to. We know that babies and the youngest children can't, you know, can't disclose harm in the way that older children do verbally. And so practitioners really need that confidence to identify risk through professional judgement.
The system's not. responding to better protect babies and infants in the way that it needs to. We know that babies and the youngest children can't, you know, can't disclose harm in the way that older children do verbally. And so practitioners really need that confidence to identify risk through professional judgement.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
And they weren't doing a good job to sort of assess risk and actually sort of bring to life the experience, the lived experience of, of the baby of star and that had, you know, horrific consequences. So that that feels like a really crucial area that we want more to be done on. I'd also say I'd highlight the children's social care response to child sexual abuse. There was a number of reviews, the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse and the Case Review. They've consistently found that practitioners are often, again, in a similar way to babies and infants, but in a different context, overly reliant on.
children verbally. disclosing abuse. And actually, in the context of particular. intrafamilial child sexual abuse, when there's a lot of shame and there's a lot of, you know, challenge for that verbal disclosure to come through the system, and professionals need to not be reliant on that. But in fact, they need to be really, you know, have that professional.
children verbally. disclosing abuse. And actually, in the context of particular. intrafamilial child sexual abuse, when there's a lot of shame and there's a lot of, you know, challenge for that verbal disclosure to come through the system, and professionals need to not be reliant on that. But in fact, they need to be really, you know, have that professional.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Analysis of patterns, understanding those behavioral indicators. And yet all the evidence does show us that there's real persistent challenges around the sort of skills and expertise to be able to do that within the system. So I'd point to those two areas in the first instance. And then I've also mentioned, but I'll say it again in this.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
There's, you know, two, two things maybe I'd mention now is one, the sort of scale of reforms and the timescale of reforms is placing a lot of pressure on local authorities. There's a lot of concern about, you know, when the money is going to run out, whether they're going to be able to implement in the time that has been given to actually allow that, that kind of impact of the preventative kind of measures to come through. There's also concern, I think this is very important when we look at prevention across the whole system that actually, with this new family help model, you know, it's very.
welcome that more. children will be. getting that level of, you know, the level of section 17 support that was in place before for a child who reached section 17, that support should now be in place for those children who were previously identified as sort of early targeted help, and it should be more streamlined and more comprehensive and robust. That's really welcome. What we do have concerns about, from speaking to local authorities, is actually that much earlier support services. So the true what previously was true early help in lots of areas. What they're doing to deliver family help is actually just combining the early help and combining the section 17 support.
But what that. means if if the new introduction that the government just consulted on goes ahead in terms of all of that support being then delivered under section 17, it could actually risk that threshold going up and that earlier.
welcome that more. children will be. getting that level of, you know, the level of section 17 support that was in place before for a child who reached section 17, that support should now be in place for those children who were previously identified as sort of early targeted help, and it should be more streamlined and more comprehensive and robust. That's really welcome. What we do have concerns about, from speaking to local authorities, is actually that much earlier support services. So the true what previously was true early help in lots of areas. What they're doing to deliver family help is actually just combining the early help and combining the section 17 support.
But what that. means if if the new introduction that the government just consulted on goes ahead in terms of all of that support being then delivered under section 17, it could actually risk that threshold going up and that earlier.
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
That real, you know, old school, early help support not being in place because it's been removed. So I think for this to work and for us , not just to be kind of shifting thresholds, but it to be preventative across the whole system, we also need that investment in the sort of true early help support services, as well .
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
Being rolled out at the moment. Thank you. It's very helpful. Lord Barber. Building on the question that my colleague asked to me, I understand all that you said about. identifying child abuse and all that. But I don't want to focus on that. To me, one of the big challenges, both in the homes and the.
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
And the schools, and one of you talked earlier on about Ofsted needing to. inspect the whole life of the child, not just the home. And I'm with that. I totally think that's important. But there's a real challenge for all the professionals. involved to do two things that are in tension. One is to have the highest possible expectations of this young person, and the other is to deal with the.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Ability to do that among you to do what I just described? Or is it I mean, I certainly can't think of a specific scheme. What I can say is that this is definitely when we look at Ofsted, something where it very much can come down to individual inspectors and individual approaches. So we always and I think the new framework for for inspection that Ofsted have recently consulted on does aim to do this, but we are very much keen to look at the sort of the starting point of the child and be able to get an.
understanding of the fact that some of the early. groundwork that we have put in to help progress. So to give you an actual real life.
understanding of the fact that some of the early. groundwork that we have put in to help progress. So to give you an actual real life.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Many, many behavioural issues, many sort of. difficulties interacting with services. And when we took them in for the sort of first sort of six months, the home had managed to work to a child who had never used an iPhone before, who'd never sat at a table before to, to, to do that, to sit down and have a meal. Now that isn't attending school, that isn't the higher outcomes and the higher things we absolutely do want. But it is very. important that the inspection regime. recognises that progress and is able to sort of acknowledge what the very good work that providers have done in that work, because it's the.
foundation to the next stage on at the moment. I find that very. Or we find it as Barnardos, very dependent upon the inspector and very dependent upon how the inspection ends up going. I do think that the current. framework very much starts talking. It. It looks far more to embed the experiences of children and young people within the inspection framework.
So I think it should maybe help, but it is very much going to be about individual inspectors. And to answer your actual question, do I know of .
foundation to the next stage on at the moment. I find that very. Or we find it as Barnardos, very dependent upon the inspector and very dependent upon how the inspection ends up going. I do think that the current. framework very much starts talking. It. It looks far more to embed the experiences of children and young people within the inspection framework.
So I think it should maybe help, but it is very much going to be about individual inspectors. And to answer your actual question, do I know of .
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Lord Bradley
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Lord Bradley
That's been able to achieve that? No, I don't maybe there isn't one. Okay. Thank you. We've talked a little bit about Ofsted in different ways, with unregistered homes in the. workforce and and the new inspection framework. How effectively do you think those. changes or what other. priorities should. Ofsted bring to the table in their .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
I'm happy to lead on this. We we feel really positive about the new inspection. regime in particularly in respect of the the proposed. evaluation areas and the new approach to. grading and reporting. We think that it could bring a much more a much more. consistent and thorough and sort of nuanced approach to how quality is assessed and then reported and communicated. But obviously, the proof is in the pudding. I think there are issues. around having having sort of proper buy in meaningful buy in from local authorities and providers. And we see this in the education space where what is the effect of not securing the buy in of the you know, the target of the inspection is quite serious.
And we're at a really critical point with with Ofsted now with how they're inspecting. Well, we can start doing some of this stuff much better, I think, for to secure buy in from those being inspected, local authorities and.
And we're at a really critical point with with Ofsted now with how they're inspecting. Well, we can start doing some of this stuff much better, I think, for to secure buy in from those being inspected, local authorities and.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
And also those that aren't. And we need to be serious about what those things are that are within their control. I think also having an an Nicola's earlier point, we need to see much more. consistency of of. inspections across both place and time, so that people feel confident that they are getting sort of fair treatment, I suppose, in a sense, and that they know when they're next.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
So that providers and local authorities are supported to go on this process of sort of continuous learning and improvement. And some of this, I think, is about the sort of. accessibility of the inspectors. It's about, you know, in an ideal world, you would have the same. inspector showing up over a period of time. They would be available between. inspections to, to have meaningful. discussions about, you know, I think quite basic things actually, like what is what, what are the. distinctions between the different grades? What do they mean in practical terms? How could you get, you know, what can you do better next time to get to that grade and remove some of that kind of slightly opaque.
process a lot of the time. And equally, there need to be feedback mechanisms. And when I speak to the operational directors who oversee all of our of our. provision at action for.
process a lot of the time. And equally, there need to be feedback mechanisms. And when I speak to the operational directors who oversee all of our of our. provision at action for.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
They will tell you that the feedback mechanism must sit outside of the formal complaints process, because there is not there's not. confidence that using the formal complaints process is not going to affect you. And, you know, in terms of your relationship with the inspector and potentially the outcomes there, I've talked about I've talked about this point around, you know, assessing outcomes relative to starting points and looking at the journey and the. trajectory and, you know, looking holistically at the child's life, beyond the setting and beyond the specific care that they're. receiving in the local authority.
And I think that's also within that. There's something about not making. comparisons between what are essentially non-equivalent. cohorts by.
And I think that's also within that. There's something about not making. comparisons between what are essentially non-equivalent. cohorts by.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
And another key point, just quickly that we raised in our response to the Ofsted. consultation is around the voice of children, parents and carers. And I think I mentioned this earlier in the session. There needs to be a lot of. proactivity on Ofsted's part about how this is done, offering different modes of engagement at different points in the inspection. processes and outside of them. And thinking about all those different groups are that you need to reach, and not just going for those who are sort of most, most available for the.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Final point quite specific. So there's a new evaluation area on enduring relationships. And this goes back to what I was saying earlier around DfE really wanting the whole sector to really focus on building and maintaining sort of continuous trusted. relationships for children. And that's really welcomed. The new evaluation area is really, you know, overdue, I think. But at the moment, I would say it's framed quite squarely on what is the local authority or the provider doing to support the child, to build and maintain relationships with, with family and friends and their. community and what we as a provider, particularly in the children's home space find, is that there's a lack of clarity around how those.
relationships can. continue with the workforce within the placement. So when a child leaves a placement, whether that's due to breakdown or because they move out of the.
relationships can. continue with the workforce within the placement. So when a child leaves a placement, whether that's due to breakdown or because they move out of the.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
What, what, what does good look like on that? And how can we navigate all the issues around consent and risk for some of those. relationships to. continue with the workforce? There's something that you hear quite commonly in in the sector around children who've left a children's home, being invited back for Sunday lunch every week. But in practical terms, that is quite hard to do in in some.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
But I think there is a gap there where there is guidance needed to support that process. So that settings feel really confident to to do it where obviously where the child has the preference to continue those relationships. And I think that new enduring. relationships evaluation area is, is really positive.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Missing part of it. Can I just come in with a couple of extra points? Most of that I agree with, and for time, I won't repeat. One thing that I think we found in the past is that Ofsted was some for for sort of kept a little bit aside from the. general direction of children's social care reform. So we introduced a new framework for children's social care in England, but we didn't update the the Ofsted inspection regime to go with it. Now that has changed because we've just had a consultation and we're very pleased to have had the consultation, as you will gather.
But going forward, as we've got a government reform programme, we do have to make sure that as we learn from things like the Family First. Pathfinder from regional care.
But going forward, as we've got a government reform programme, we do have to make sure that as we learn from things like the Family First. Pathfinder from regional care.
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Baroness Pidgeon
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Baroness Pidgeon
Because I think for a long while there was a certain sense of the government's telling us to do that, but Ofsted is telling us to do something different and that has an impact. The other element that I want to bring in, just to add a little bit to, to what Jess said about the involvement of children and young people, is actually thinking about the involvement of children and young people in the actual inspections themselves. We ourselves run what we call a young inspectors programme, where we get some of the children and young people from our own.
services to go and inspect our services for us, and they go and talk to the children, and they go and talk to the staff. And we find that. incredibly rich in terms of what they're able to tell us. Our young inspectors do about ten inspections a year, and they're able to give us a really different perspective than what we might get from an .
services to go and inspect our services for us, and they go and talk to the children, and they go and talk to the staff. And we find that. incredibly rich in terms of what they're able to tell us. Our young inspectors do about ten inspections a year, and they're able to give us a really different perspective than what we might get from an .
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Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
I'll just take . Yeah, I'll be very quick. I'm aware of the time. Just to say we did respond to the consultation that that has been mentioned. And yeah, really felt like it was a very welcome focus on children's experiences and kind of the stable relationship kind of element that that Jess pointed out. There's just three areas I'll be very quick that we did kind of point to that we think could be further strengthened as well. There was that element about children's voices that we were very pleased to see, and about the kind of, you know, much greater emphasis on kind of assessing how well the system was bringing in and listening to children's voices.
I would say, going back to the point I raised earlier about the vulnerability and the unique vulnerability of babies and infants, when we can't bring in the voice of babies and infants in the same way as we can for older children, I think what that inspection framework needs to include is a real clear assessment on how we're looking, how skilled. professionals are. themselves at bringing in the. voices of those who are less visible. So through the kind of observation and supervision mechanisms that can do that. So that's the first point I would raise. And then the second one was around kind of how the system is working to prevent harm from escalating.
So how, you know, whether we are responding early enough. And I think there was there was some elements that we kind of included in our consultation response about kind of strengthening that area of the framework as well. And then third was around how can and again, this kind of links to what Nicholas said about how we need real join up between these different changes and join up with the Ofsted inspection framework and the kind of wider. expectations in, in family help and sort of, you know, we were really pleased, for example, that in the family health guidance, there is we don't think there's enough because I would call for sort of national guidance or a strategy, but there is reference to how family health teams should be.
supporting and working around kind of supporting reunification. We need that in the off site inspection framework as well. So how can the inspection framework be examining the quality of reunification planning, for example, and that pre and post support as well, and how well that support is working with .
I would say, going back to the point I raised earlier about the vulnerability and the unique vulnerability of babies and infants, when we can't bring in the voice of babies and infants in the same way as we can for older children, I think what that inspection framework needs to include is a real clear assessment on how we're looking, how skilled. professionals are. themselves at bringing in the. voices of those who are less visible. So through the kind of observation and supervision mechanisms that can do that. So that's the first point I would raise. And then the second one was around kind of how the system is working to prevent harm from escalating.
So how, you know, whether we are responding early enough. And I think there was there was some elements that we kind of included in our consultation response about kind of strengthening that area of the framework as well. And then third was around how can and again, this kind of links to what Nicholas said about how we need real join up between these different changes and join up with the Ofsted inspection framework and the kind of wider. expectations in, in family help and sort of, you know, we were really pleased, for example, that in the family health guidance, there is we don't think there's enough because I would call for sort of national guidance or a strategy, but there is reference to how family health teams should be.
supporting and working around kind of supporting reunification. We need that in the off site inspection framework as well. So how can the inspection framework be examining the quality of reunification planning, for example, and that pre and post support as well, and how well that support is working with .
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
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Lord Barber of Chittlehampton
Deliver it at different points in the system as well. Thank you. Barbara. Last question. It's a small point, but it builds on what Nicola said, which I thought was very important. And I've seen this in the schools. inspection work since since Ofsted was invented in 1992. When you change the way the system works and what it's expecting, you need to change the Ofsted inspection framework, but you also need to invest in the.
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Lord Bradley
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Lord Bradley
Can't find it. Yeah. Or bad looks like that. Okay. Well, can I thank you immensely for the time and the amount of. information you've given us. This morning. I was going to ask you a question about priorities, but I think you've laid out very clearly what you think, where you think the priorities should be. But if there's any other matters that you don't feel we've covered, do write in to us.
But I say a huge thank you for your time this morning. It's been , I think all the committee would agree. Very helpful .
But I say a huge thank you for your time this morning. It's been , I think all the committee would agree. Very helpful .
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