Expansion of Free Childcare
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(7 months ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
First, it is more than an aspiration. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State talked about aiming for 150,000 additional children taking up the entitlement offer in April. As I said, we are at just over 200,000, and we think that that number will continue to tick up, so it is more than an aspiration. Secondly, I was genuinely having this conversation at dinner with a friend, whose granddaughter was thinking about what to do with her career. There are fantastic opportunities in early years and childcare, such as apprenticeships and bootcamps, and we are introducing a route for people with experience but perhaps not the same formal qualifications. These are for all age groups and stages, and they include men as well as women.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the increase in free childcare hours is a welcome development, especially for families with the least and with the greatest needs. It is a step along the way. Could the Minister assure the House that there are plans in place to extend the facilities across the country, to make sure that there is availability of these important services?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord is right that one part of delivering this is to do with workforce, and we are focused on delivering that, but the other part is to do with the physical buildings and facilities, particularly for much younger children. We have supported local authorities with £100 million of capital funding and we are also testing a pilot in school and college facilities where they have spare space, to determine how that might be made suitable for childcare provision.
Ofsted: Pupil Absence Rates
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(9 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
My noble friend needs to consider also the patterns of attendance before the pandemic. The curriculum was the same before the pandemic as post-pandemic, but attendance rates are very different. Linking absence entirely to the curriculum may require further consideration.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister will recall that in the Children’s Commissioner’s latest report, on absenteeism, she says:
“For some, the pandemic has led to disengagement. Schools and families have said that they feel like the social contract between parents and schools has been broken”.
Could we be assured that an Ofsted report will consider also the positive and creative engagement of parents in school life?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord makes a good point. We need not wait just for Ofsted in order to look at the positive engagement of parents. Many of the schools I visit are focused substantially on that and on making sure that parents get positive feedback about their children in school—not just a call when their child is not there.
Coram’s Charter for Children
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(10 months, 1 week ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
I remind the noble Baroness that this Government have extended school meal eligibility more than any other, including through universal infant free school meals and for families with no recourse to public funds. Our strategy has been to support families in a major way, with £104 billion of support between 2022 and 2025 and, rightly, giving parents discretion on its use.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister well understands that in recent years there has been a steady run-down of family support services, at considerable cost to some children who would normally have been able to depend on this kind of help and support at a critical stage in their lives. Sadly, those children from the poorest homes who are affected in this way are also likely to be persistently absent from schools, thereby limiting their development. Will there be opportunities in future to increase family support services?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I would slightly reframe the noble Lord’s first assertion. There has been a redirection of resources to increasingly complex cases in child protection and a displacement of resources from some of the earlier help services. The House is aware of the Government’s commitment to rolling out family hubs and providing really comprehensive, targeted support to families who need it the most. I share the noble Lord’s deep concerns about attendance. All Ministers across the department have this as a primary focus.
Home and Online Schooling
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(11 months, 1 week ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
Obviously I cannot comment on the timing of a Private Member’s Bill. On the very valid points raised by the noble Baroness about the inspection regime, that is one of the things that we are looking at in the consultation, which closes on 18 January. In particular, we are looking at how to judge the suitability of education. Importantly, much of the work that has gone into preparing that consultation has been done with parents and local authorities together so that we can build trust in both communities going forward.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the noble Baroness has set out very helpfully the figures relating to children who are not in school on a regular basis. This is such an important matter at a formative stage in their development. Can the House assume from these figures that each of these children has a named place in school? If so, can the Minister say, in particular, what is happening to enforce the law of the land so that these children have a proper education?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I do not want to say that every single child has a named place, as children can move around and there can be a time lag, but obviously it is the right of every child in this country to have a named place. On enforcement, the noble Lord understands very well that there is a balance to be struck. We need first to understand why the child is not in school and aim to address that; then, if enforcement is appropriate, that should be followed through.
Children’s Care Homes: Reform
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(1 year ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Baroness will be aware that in some cases there is a duty of care up to age 25 for children who have certain special educational needs and disabilities. I share my noble friend’s gratitude for local authorities and the work they do in this area.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister understands that many local authorities rushed into outsourcing these services. They then quickly discovered that not only were they facing increased demands, but the new providers could set their fees wherever they wanted and could select whichever young people they wanted. One of the terrible results of this is that young people are being placed in hugely distant parts of the United Kingdom and are losing contact with their extended family, their schools and their friends. Would the Minister consider setting up a review of the current situation in residential childcare so that we can do better for the most vulnerable young people?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I absolutely accept that far too many children who are in children’s homes—around two-thirds last year—were placed outside their local authority area. Obviously, I enormously respect the noble Lord’s expertise in this area. I hope he would agree with me that we have done a lot of reviewing. We are doing a lot of consulting, and we are very focused on growing the response from foster carers and increasing that part of the market, particularly in relation to kinship care, which I think the House believes may be the best solution for many of these children.
Prison: Support for Dependent Children
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(1 year, 4 months ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Baroness is right, of course, that the welfare of the child should be paramount. There has been a significant reduction in the number of women receiving custodial sentences, but the figures that she cites on the number of children who are then unable to stay in the family home are striking. We are working very hard, with our review of Working Together to Safeguard Children and our review of children’s social care, building on the important work of my noble friend Lord Farmer and the review of women in prison.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, I am sure that the Minister will recognise that innocent dependent children should not also experience something like a prison sentence. That being so, will she use her good offices to ensure a statement of assessment about the arrangements that will be made to ensure that young dependent children are suitably cared for while their mother is in prison?
Baroness Barran (Con)
Obviously, part of the pre-sentence report focuses on whether there are dependent children in the family, as the noble Lord knows very well. In all too many cases, when women end up in prison their children are already known to children’s services. That also presents an opportunity for earlier intervention and continuity of support and care. This also ties in with our strategy around kinship care and the support that a woman offender’s wider family can offer to her children.
School Buildings: Safety
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(1 year, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
I am very happy to give the noble Baroness reassurance on that point. To be clear, the returns that we have had from schools about whether they suspect RAAC on their estate indicate that a significant percentage believe they do, but then when we send the surveyors in, in fact they do not. When RAAC is identified, some poses a risk, but some does not. In every case where a risk is posed, whether in a single store cupboard or a whole block, we send our team in and work closely with the school, trust and local authority to provide both practical and financial support to address issues as quickly as possible.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the noble Baroness knows that schools have made great progress on incorporating children who have special needs of all kinds. Sometimes, the buildings are an impediment to this. Has work been undertaken to ensure that schools are adapted to meet the needs of children with very special needs?
Baroness Barran (Con)
That is extremely important. Access to and the shape of a building should never be an impediment to a child’s learning. That is more straightforward in the new schools we are building, but we are making adjustments and supporting schools through our existing capital programmes to address exactly the needs that the noble Lord raises.
Children in Care: Gone Too Far Report
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(1 year, 6 months ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord is right. I acknowledged some of those impacts that he has eloquently described about isolation, stigma and resilience. That is why we are investing in a number of major initiatives, including £259 million to support local authorities with capital funding to expand both open and secure children’s homes and, crucially, £27 million over the next two years to deliver a fostering recruitment and retention programme so that children can live close to their roots.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister has already mentioned the importance of retaining some stability in the lives of these children. Things that are familiar are all the more important for children who have the least, and these children have had very disturbed upbringings. These numbers are disturbing, to say the least, and while it is understandable that children might be sent to a specialist facility that is better placed to meet their needs, sending them to Scotland does not fit into that arrangement. Does she agree that the time has come to put pressure on local authorities to provide proper provision in their area? They have parental responsibility for these children, and this must be done, and quickly.
Baroness Barran (Con)
I agree with the noble Lord, although I add that the number of children going to Scotland is, happily, very small. He is right that we need to put pressure on local authorities, but I think he would also agree that it is not just about pressure: it is about reforming the way in which we approach provision. We are doing that through the foster care strategy, and the support we are giving to kinship carers but also, crucially, the establishment of regional care co-operatives, which will really change the way that we commission and deliver these placements in future.
Schools: “Ghost Children”
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(1 year, 6 months ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
There is a safeguarding risk, but there is also a danger of conflating different groups of children. Of those who are persistently absent—those who miss 10% or more of sessions in school—the vast majority have authorised absence for sickness reasons. However, the right reverend Prelate is right that we need to focus on particularly vulnerable children; we have set out new guidance with expectations that local authorities should have termly targeted support meetings with schools to put together a plan for exactly the sort of pupil to which the right reverend Prelate refers.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister will agree that education is essential for every child, not just for academic study but for their emotional and social development. Does someone actually visit the homes of these children to ascertain why they are not in school and to remind their parents that there is a statutory duty entitling the child to a proper education?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord is right that education is essential, for the reasons that he gave. Whether and by whom a child’s door might be knocked on will depend on whether they have a social worker, but best practice in these cases is clear and we see many schools and trusts doing it: knocking on the doors of children who are not in school and trying to do so as early as possible, before it becomes a persistent issue.
Children: Bereavement Support in Schools
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(1 year, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
I do not have the breakdown that the noble Baroness refers to. She referred to the 2020 return programme, which was followed by the recovery programme in 2021. Looking at those two years, I am aware that 14,000 schools and colleges, out of roughly 22,000 nationally, got those resources.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister well understands that teachers are faced with a range of very human situations. Could she use her good offices to ensure that Ofsted inspections place an emphasis not just on learning but on the pastoral responsibilities that schools have, particularly in these very emotionally disturbing situations?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I hear what the noble Lord says. I am slightly surprised, because I think there has been a real focus by Ofsted on safeguarding in its broadest sense and the important pastoral role that schools provide—but I will, of course, take what he says back.
Child Hunger in Schools
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
I have already referred to the point about breakfast clubs. The Government are already investing in breakfast clubs and we remain open to new evidence, but our focus is on the most vulnerable.
Lord Laming (CB)
The Minister well understands that the children who are hungry at school may well have other vulnerabilities, and therefore the one point of contact between the child and the state is their school. Could the Minister continue to do all that she is doing—I know she is doing a lot—to make sure that schools are aware of looking at the whole child and not just thinking about academic subjects, important though they are?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord, as ever, makes an important point. We really are looking at that closely, not just in a school setting but, as importantly, in relation to early years and nursery settings. He will be aware that, post Covid, many children are arriving at school who are not school-ready in the way that we expected, and we are looking at that.
Kinship Care
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
I understand and respect the noble Baroness’s point. The Government are committed to making the means and merits testing the same, be it private or public law proceedings. She will also be aware that legal aid funding has been extended so that prospective special guardianship proceedings will also get means and merits-tested legal aid funding.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister will well understand that the state services do not exactly have an unblemished record in taking over the parenting of other people’s children. That being so, will the Minister do all she can to ensure that the extended family is considered more in cases of this kind, and that members of the extended family are recognised as having something really personal and important for children who have had the worst start in life?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord is absolutely right. In the Question we debated last week about the protective effect of family, as picked up by the Children’s Commissioner, the same points were raised. The noble Lord will be aware that extensive recommendations were made in Josh MacAlister’s review about the role of family. The Government absolutely recognise, value and are grateful to those families who care for an estimated 150,000 children.
Schools: Resources
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
As I said in my opening response, the department is absolutely committed to supporting schools. We have worked through our school resource management teams and saved more than £1 billion so far, and our School Resource Management strategy sets out work with schools to save another £1 billion. In the school sector we see pressure on all schools—I do not dispute that for a second—but some schools are finding it easier than others. We need to work to understand how we can share that best practice across the whole sector.
Lord Laming (CB)
The Minister knows very well that a number of schools employ specialist staff who help children who have difficulty in school. Many of these children come from disturbed homes or have particular problems in their own lives. Will the Minister assure the House that the department will continue to place an emphasis on this kind of staff, so that these children are not lost to the education system?
Baroness Barran (Con)
As ever, the noble Lord raises an important point. Obviously, we will be able to say more about that in our responses to a number of the reviews into this area towards the end of the year. He will also be aware that we have raised funding for high needs by £1 billion to £9.1 billion. We remain very committed to that area.
Children in Care
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years, 1 month ago)
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Lord Laming
To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the quality of life of children in care.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education (Baroness Barran) (Con)
My Lords, we want to improve children and young people’s lives and outcomes, to strengthen families and to realise the benefits of establishing firm and loving foundations early in life. It was for this reason that we asked Josh MacAlister to review the children’s social care system, engaging directly with those with experience of care. This, with other reviews, has provided a comprehensive assessment, and we are committed to publishing an ambitious and detailed implementation strategy later this year.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, I am grateful. The noble Baroness has vast experience and well understands that children do not come into care unless they have had an awful start to their young lives. It is for that reason that the state has to intervene and be a good parent to these children. Recent reports indicate that some of these children are having numerous placements in their young lives, which often entails a change to a different school, therefore reinforcing the instability in their lives. Are the Government willing to look at why these children are having these multiple placements and what can be done to improve the quality of their lives in care?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The Government absolutely agree with the noble Lord about the importance of stability. There is clear evidence of a link between changes in care placements and a decrease in outcomes at key stage 4. Seven out of 10 children in care have one placement a year, although the noble Lord is right to focus on the three in 10 who have multiple placements. We are using data to inform our policy, and next month will publish our stability index. I would be delighted to meet with the noble Lord and other noble Lords who are interested in this important issue, to go through that data.
Family-strengthening Policies
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years, 1 month ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord will be aware of the work that was done by Josh MacAlister in his independent review of children’s social care and by the Competition and Markets Authority on children’s homes. We have said that we are considering both those reports, and we will report back later this year.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, the Minister will know very well that there has been a marked reduction in family support services in recent years, in particular day centres and Sure Start centres, which can support families at a critical time in their lives when they are experiencing a crisis. Can the Minister reassure the House that everything will be done to recover these preventive services so that children do not come into care unnecessarily?
Baroness Barran (Con)
Obviously the noble Lord is a great expert in this area. I will do my best to reassure him. The Government recently announced over £1 billion in programmes to develop early help at any point from childhood to adulthood; as the noble Lord hinted, none of us always knows when a crisis might emerge. More specifically, on reducing the number of children in care, we are investing £84 million in the Strengthening Families, Protecting Children programme, which is working with the 17 local authorities with the highest numbers of children in the care system.
Independent Review of Children’s Social Care
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, this is a most important report, and we are grateful for the points the Minister has already made. I commend the Government on commissioning this review. and congratulate Josh MacAlister and his team on producing what I regard as an inspiring report because it focuses so much on the needs of children and families.
By any standards, this is a substantial document, and it will repay very careful study by all of us. The strength of the report is the way in which it focuses unrelentingly on children and families who could and should have been helped through difficult periods in their lives. Too often in recent years, these children and families have had to fit in with the needs of the services—not their needs, yet these very services were created to meet the needs of the children at risk. This is despite the legislation making it clear that the well-being of the child is of paramount importance, and we must hold on to that.
During the last decade, as has already been mentioned, we have witnessed a remarkable reduction in family support and preventive services. I am told that even when a child and family have been identified as being in difficulty and have been referred to the appropriate services, it has sometimes been decided that the crisis is not yet sufficiently serious and therefore they have been denied the opportunity for support and help at that critical time.
Today, we have a crisis-driven set of services. In other words, they wait for the crisis to be apparent before they react. That is contrary to what the legislation and all the practice guidance says. No wonder, therefore, that there has been a large increase in the number of children coming into state care. This report gives us the opportunity to reverse that process. I am very pleased that the decision has been taken to establish a national implementation board and I wish it great success.
I will end with a quote from the report, which I hope will stay with us:
“This moment is a once in a generation opportunity to reset children’s social care”.
I hope the Minister will show the House that she and other Ministers will do everything possible to ensure that this report is fully implemented. I commend the report.
Baroness Barran (Con)
I am sure that I am not the only person in this House who has been inspired by the noble Lord’s work over decades, and I thank him deeply for that and for the leadership and hope he brings in this area. I will pass on his remarks to my colleagues in the department.
I would say two things in response to his reflections. First, investment in preventive services is absolutely critical and we will be reviewing that in detail. Secondly, we also need to push ourselves to understand the local authorities prioritising those services, how they are making that work and how we can replicate that across the country. The noble Lord will be familiar with the Hertfordshire family safeguarding model; there are other early intervention models in Leeds and other places around the country. We want to understand those too so that we can act on evidence of what actually works in practice. On the commitment from the Secretary of State and the ministerial team, I cannot underline strongly enough how passionately we aim to address this.
Safeguarding of Young Children
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Laming
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to improve the safeguarding of young children against abuse and death caused by adult members of their household.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education (Baroness Barran) (Con)
My Lords, every child should grow up in a stable, loving home but, in rare circumstances, children are harmed by those who should protect them. We have commissioned the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel to make recommendations about how local and national safeguarding practice should change to protect children in future, and the panel reports on Thursday this week. We will carefully consider its recommendations, alongside the reforms in the care review, with an ambitious and detailed implementation strategy later this year.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, who has vast experience in these matters, but does she agree that, in these absolutely awful cases, there are three consistent features? The first is that the child was not hidden away but was known to the services; the second is that the dysfunctional nature of the family was known; and, thirdly, opportunities to protect the child had been missed in each case? In these circumstances, will the Government send a letter to each of the key frontline services, reminding them of their duties in law to safeguard children at risk and to work together, sharing information which is vital to the child’s needs?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord is absolutely right. I remember in a former role publishing research on this entitled In Plain Sight, about abuse of children, so I entirely recognise the issues he raises. He will remember that Ministers from the DfE, the Home Office, and the Department of Health and Social Care wrote to all chief constables, local authority chief executives and clinical commissioning groups’ accountable officers at the end of last year, reminding them of their duties in this regard. We are absolutely clear on the importance of this, both locally and in central government.
Children and Young People in Care: Accommodation
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years, 11 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education (Baroness Barran) (Con)
My Lords, all children in care deserve to live in homes that meet their needs and keep them safe; that is why we are reforming unregulated provision for children aged 16 and 17 and have banned the placement of under-16s. This week, we have announced that we will invest over £140 million to introduce mandatory national standards and Ofsted registration. We are also investing £259 million to maintain and build more places in open and secure children’s homes.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, I am very grateful indeed to the Minister for that helpful Answer. As the House knows, no child is taken into care without there being clear evidence of the child’s safety being severely at risk. Indeed, some of us, or I guess all of us, wish that some local authorities had acted more quickly in respect of recent terrible cases. The Minister knows that the Competition and Markets Authority recently highlighted in its report the number of children who are still being placed in unregulated and inappropriate accommodation. Can the Minister kindly expand on what steps are being taken to rectify this worrying situation?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his question, and echo his sentiment, and the sentiment of the House, in relation to the two recent cases to which I think he was referring.
In relation to the CMA report, the department is extremely grateful to the CMA, which is addressing fundamental and important issues. We believe that the steps that we have announced this week will make an important difference in securing the safety of 16 and 17 year-olds in particular. The investment that we are making in open and secure children’s homes will also help to boost supply—but we are waiting for the full report to give our official response.
Child Safeguarding
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(2 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, I, too, am grateful for the repeat of the Statement and I shall be very brief, but it is necessary to emphasise, yet again, that the awful suffering and death of this defenceless child at the hands of those to whom the child looked for love and protection must stay with us. It must be part of our thinking as we go forward.
The law makes it very clear, for all services dealing with child protection work, that the child must be at the centre and the focus of all their activities: the child is of paramount concern . It is very tough work being on the front line, and the noble Lord, Lord Watson, was correct to say that each of those front-line workers deserves the support of more experienced staff around them who can take a more objective view and support them in what they are doing. As has been said, we must not fall into the trap of scapegoating the youngest, least experienced and most junior of people who go into this area of work.
The review is greatly to be welcomed, but I say to the Minister that it is right to say that since 2019 there has been an increase in local authority funding, but, boy, for the decade before 2019 there were cuts and cuts and cuts, year after year. That has meant that many of the support, preventive and family services that social workers could rely on to look at the relationship between the child and the family have disappeared.
I welcome the review, but it will take some time for it to complete its work, and I wish it well. But, to take some action now, would the Government be willing to write a strong letter to the senior people in each of these key services to remind them of their duties and responsibilities in law to protect children subject to the possibility of abuse or danger? It could be said these people already know this, but we have to be seen to react and we have to get across our concern and say, not just to the people of Solihull but to people nationwide who carry the responsibility for protecting children that now is the time for them to look at and support their front-line services to ensure that no child in their patch experiences this level of abuse and awful suffering. I hope the Government will consider doing that.
Baroness Barran (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his comments. His remark at the beginning that we should never forget the terrible suffering of Arthur reminds me of when I founded the domestic abuse charity SafeLives. As I was having lunch with the noble Lord, I thought I should read his report into the tragic death of Victoria Climbié. As your Lordships can imagine, it was possibly the most terrible thing I have ever read. But reading it is obviously less awful than what these children have suffered, so I absolutely share his view that we need to keep that front of mind, and of course I will talk to colleagues in the department about his suggestion.
Football: European Super League
Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Laming(3 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Barran (Con)
We absolutely agree that this is an attack on our heritage, and nothing is off the table when it comes to protecting it, as my right honourable friend the Secretary of State said yesterday.
Lord Laming (CB) [V]
My Lords, the clubs supporting this proposal often claim that their fans are the beating heart of all that they do, yet sometimes it seems as if the loyalty of these very fans counts for little. Yesterday’s ministerial Statement was most welcome, but can the noble Baroness assure the House that, before any further action is taken, each of these clubs will be required to put the proposal to a vote, at least of their season ticket holders?
Baroness Barran (Con)
It will be up to the football authorities in the first instance to determine how to deal with this proposal but, as I have made clear, they have our full backing.