Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Watson of Invergowrie

Thursday 18th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, if my Amendment 505C appears something of an outlier, it is only because it is. It would have been more appropriate for it to have been introduced in Part 1 of the Bill, but I have to be honest and say that, at the time, I was unaware of it as an issue. Being even more honest, I have to say that, had I been following the progress of the Mental Health Bill, I might well have been. I acknowledge the assistance of the clerks in the Public Bill Office for finding me a peg on which to hang this, and also the assistance of JUSTICE, the law reform charity, for briefings and context.

Whatever the view of noble Lords on the contracting out of vital public services, I am confident enough to say that nobody on any side of your Lordships’ House wants people to be treated less decently and with fewer human rights because a service is being provided by an outside contractor rather than directly. The Human Rights Act is an essential tool for individuals to hold public bodies to account. It requires public authorities to act in compatibility with the rights set out in the European Convention on Human Rights, and this definition of a public authority has been narrowly interpreted by the courts. In a 2008 case, it was found that a private care home was not a public authority, despite the plaintiff’s placement being funded entirely by that local authority.

The years since then have of course seen a large expansion of core government services contracted out to the private sector, leading to an accountability gap in our human rights legislation. In the care sector, more than 80% of children’s homes are now run by private companies. That is an increase of 20% since 2010, and the figure continues to rise.

In 2014, an attempt was made to fill that accountability gap for care provision with the Care Act of that year. The then coalition Government made it clear that

“it wishes all providers of publicly arranged care services to consider themselves bound by the Human Rights Act, including private providers under contracts with local authorities”.

But a 2024 case demonstrated that this was not sufficient. A man with chronic and treatment-resistant schizophrenia, whose care and treatment had been funded by a combination of Manchester City Council and an NHS trust, sadly died. His family brought a claim against the private nursing home provider and the trust, arguing that his death had resulted from the private provider’s breaches of the Human Rights Act. However, the High Court struck out the human rights aspect of the claim, ruling that the man’s circumstances fell outside the scope of the provisions of Section 73 of the Care Act 2014.

That ruling highlights significant wider concerns for commissioned children’s health and social care services—although they are not covered by Section 73 of the Care Act because, as things stand, a private provider does not have human rights obligations to children in their publicly funded care. This is particularly important given the scale of outsourcing in the children’s social care market. Some 90% of children’s social care services shut down by Ofsted for not meeting standards to protect children, or where there was evidence of harm, are operated by private organisations.

Since four out of five children’s homes are operated by for-profit companies, there are reasons to be concerned about how well children’s human rights are protected in that social care sector. Children’s care settings provide services to some of the most vulnerable children in our society, and the Children’s Commissioner said in highlighting this last year:

“Children in care have the most prescribed rights in law, and yet these rights are often the least reflected in their experience. … We cannot meet children’s rights unless our public services are of sufficient quality to provide what children need”.


In January, when the Bill had its Second Reading in another place, the Minister of State said that the Bill would

“stop vulnerable children falling through the cracks in our services”.—[Official Report, Commons, 8/1/25; col. 953.]

The Human Rights Act is a crucial safeguard for individuals up and down this country on a day-to-day basis, especially for those with vulnerabilities who rely on the state. As the Care Quality Commission set out in 2023, a focus on human rights

“ensures people receive good care and helps us fulfil our duties and purpose by meeting our legal obligations”.

However, people do fall through the cracks, and not just young people. The uncertainty in the law means that private providers may have no direct statutory obligation to act compatibly with children’s ECHR rights and that children—and, by definition, their families—may have no direct remedy against private providers for human rights violations. The Bill is an important opportunity to extend human rights protections to all those in commissioned children’s care, irrespective of who the provider is.

It is not sufficient to say that it may be possible for a claim to be brought against a local authority. Why should parents be required to do that? The Joint Committee on Human Rights dealt with this during the passage of the Care Act 2014, making it clear that:

“The inadequacy of such indirect protection has long been a matter of consensus in debates and reports about this issue”.


It has also been a cross-party position for many years that those in publicly funded care deserve full human rights protections and that providers must be directly accountable for breaching human rights, as was demonstrated by the cross-party support for changing the law through the Mental Health Bill earlier this year. During Report of that Bill in your Lordships’ House, when my noble friend Lady Keeley proposed an amendment on adult mental health care and treatment, the Minister—my noble friend Lady Blake—said that the Government were

“particularly conscious of the references to children’s services”,

and that it was

“an issue that we have, of course, been discussing with the DfE”.—[Official Report, 2/4/25; col. 337.]

My noble friend pledged to take the matter forward, and she did so very effectively, because it resulted in what is now Clause 52 of that Bill, which amends the Human Rights Act 1998 and states,

“A registered care provider is to be regarded for the purposes of section 6(3)(b) of the Human Rights Act 1998 as exercising a function of a public nature in providing any of the services mentioned in subsection (2) (to the extent that it would not otherwise be so regarded)”.


The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill is, as I said, an important opportunity to ensure that all private providers of children’s services commissioned by local authorities, whether in social care, education or disability-related services, are treated as public authorities under the Human Rights Act. I very much hope that my noble friend the Minister will signify that the Government intend to follow the lead of her Ministerial colleagues on the Mental Health Bill when this Bill reaches Report. If she is unwilling or unable to do so, I hope that she will arrange for the statement called for in Amendment 505C to be published.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, as we have heard, this group of amendments would introduce a number of reviews of the Bill. Those in the name of my noble friend Lord Wei also seek to limit the new powers in the Bill in relation to elective home-educated children.

Amendment 502C from my noble friend Lord Norton of Louth would introduce a review of the Act after five years, and my noble friend made an extremely articulate and clear case for this. I think my noble friend said that there were already over 20 examples of amendments seeking reviews of different parts of the Bill. Although concerns about Part 2—which we have debated more recently—are certainly uppermost in my mind, those of us with long memories will remember some of the concerns about the pace of and evidence base for the reforms to children’s social care in Part 1.

My noble friend set out some criteria for post-legislative scrutiny: it should be a substantial Bill—I think that, on day 12, we can agree this is a substantial Bill; it should introduce major changes; it has unquestionably been controversial; and it did not have pre-legislative scrutiny. I thought almost the strongest point is that this would allow the Government to demonstrate their confidence that the Bill will deliver on the changes that the Government seek and the impact that the Government desire, so I hope very much that the noble Baroness will be able to accept my noble friend’s amendment.

Amendment 505C in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Watson of Invergowrie, again very ably presented, highlights concerns about the responsibilities of private providers of children’s social care in relation to children’s human rights. Again, it would be helpful to hear the Minister’s response to this. For my part, I suppose I would prefer the Government’s focus to be on the quality of care that children receive when they are in local authority care, in a children’s home or, potentially, in foster care, as in this case. They already have considerable rights enshrined in legislation, as the noble Lord said; what we need is for the culture in those organisations to make sure that children receive the care that they so very rightly deserve.

Education (Assemblies) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Watson of Invergowrie

2nd reading
Friday 7th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, I too congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Burt of Solihull, on securing a Second Reading for her Bill, and I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to the debate. As we have heard this morning, when the Bill was considered in 2021, it did not pass through the Commons due to lack of time. But, at that time, the Conservative Government were unable to support it, and I am afraid—I guess this will not surprise the noble Baroness—our position has not changed. I will briefly outline my concerns, some of which were much more eloquently represented by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chelmsford and the noble Lord, Lord Weir of Ballyholme.

The first point, which other noble Lords have made, is that collective worship is important and gives children in school a time to learn and to reflect but to do that with a sense of community, and religion allows children to learn some of the essential values of life. Many of the topics that the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, cited as possible topics for secular collective worship are part of Christianity and often already form part of the collective worship that happens in our schools every day. As the House is aware, there are already curriculum requirements for the spiritual, moral, social and cultural education of pupils through the PSHE curriculum. As we know, the Government have asked Professor Becky Francis to lead a review of the curriculum and make an assessment, and I am sure that if any changes are required she will bring them to the Government’s attention.

As the right reverend Prelate and the noble Lord, Lord Weir, both pointed out, the existing legislation is flexible, and I feel that it is unjust to describe it as an imposition or a coercion of children or their parents. As noble Lords know, it is already possible for children or indeed whole schools to be exempted from this practice. Therefore, we believe that this legislation is unnecessary. That of course includes schools where the principal religion is not Christianity.

I was interested to hear the thoughts of the noble Lord, Lord Weir, about removing parents’ right to remove their children if they were unhappy with a new collective worship or reflection—I am not sure what we would call it, but collective assembly—and the risk that it would exclude important commemorations. Obviously, we accept that social attitudes are changing, but one can also then make the argument that it is more important than ever that we have some common core that children understand and learn from, because they are unlikely to learn it elsewhere in modern society, other than possibly at home. The Judeo-Christian principles, which I am sure we could have many good debates about, underpin our culture and have withstood the test of time. We unravel at our peril that understanding and shared sense of who we are as a community, and the commonality across religions of some of those principles.

I was struck by the noble Lord, Lord Watson, very cunningly—in a good way—finding a Question from 25 years ago. I wonder whether he agrees with me that the question might be the same, but I do not think what we would see in the classroom or school hall would be the same. That is an important point in all this. Our teachers are absolutely aware of how our society is changing; they are aware of the diversity in their communities, and they have the skill and sensitivity to make sure that it is translated every morning to the collective worship—

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

Just in response to the noble Baroness, I understand what she is saying about teachers reflecting the current situation in classroom. That is why I support the Bill—because things have moved on from the time of that 1999 Question to which I referred. To some extent, that is the whole point of the Bill; that was then and this is now.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I think that equally plays into the argument that the Bill is not needed. If our system is naturally evolving with a strong core, the argument is made for the Bill being unnecessary. As I listened to some of the moral questions that the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, and the right reverend Prelate posed, I thought that in some way many of those moral questions are exactly the same. We are achieving that in a gradual and evolutionary way in responding to those issues in our schools. Therefore, while I thank the noble Baroness for bringing the Bill to the House, I am afraid I cannot support it.

Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Barran and Lord Watson of Invergowrie

Committee stage
Tuesday 26th November 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I was just looking through my noble friend Lord Blunkett’s Amendments 28, 29 and 30, to which I added my name. I am sure noble Lords will be aware that, since Skills England was announced, the DfE has been using a pretty coloured diagram in five sections to describe the planned functions of the new executive agency. One of the sections says that Skills England

“identifies priorities for and shapes technical education to respond to skills needs”.

Having done that, it will need to update the necessary technical standards and work with sectoral industry bodies to develop them. Indeed, the Government will need to set out which functions currently with IfATE will be delegated to sectoral organisations and regional bodies. That is what Amendment 28 seeks to achieve.

My noble friend the Minister said in Committee last week that there needs to be “a sectoral approach” to the way that skills are developed across the economy. Of course, that is right. With that in mind, it is necessary that the Government’s plans for the powers that they anticipate will be required are set out, and this amendment would facilitate that.

Another of the sections in that DfE diagram says that Skills England will ensure

“national and regional systems are meeting skills needs”,

explaining that this will entail:

“Working with Mayoral Combined Authorities, Employer Representative Bodies, and other regional organisations to align national and regional systems with each other and with skills needs”.


All that seems fairly straightforward, but it is not clear how Skills England will achieve that without the necessary powers and some resources. We do not as yet know what these might be, so it is important that criteria for national skills priorities are set out and that the expectations of departments other than the DfE are made clear. My noble friend the Minister stated on several occasions how important the effect of joined-up government will be for the involvement of a wide range of stakeholders. Amendment 29 offers the opportunity for that to be spelled out.

Finally, there is more than a little uncertainty as to how the plethora of qualifications to be transferred will be subject to oversight. My noble friend Lord Blunkett has covered this, but I will simply say that qualifications at levels 3 and 4 are crucial in allowing young people the opportunity to build their skills in an environment in which they are not intimidated by unrealistic expectations or other barriers to entry, as has been the case too often with apprenticeships. The unfortunate tangle—let me put it no less kindly than that—that we currently have involving the introduction of T-levels and the consequent often rash and sometimes reckless defunding of some BTECs must not be allowed to happen with the transfer of the many essential qualifications validated by IfATE in its short lifetime.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 27 and in support of Amendment 28 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett. I start by noting that I support very much the spirit of the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, and the aspiration of the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Addington, although I have a certain sympathy with the Minister in trying to actually deliver on that.

My Amendment 27—I thank my noble friend Lady Evans of Bowes Park for adding her name to it—aims to ensure that the Government’s strategy is up to date and relevant for local areas and that the Government do this by consulting the relevant bodies. I suggest local skills improvement partnerships and mayoral combined authorities although, in his Amendment 36B and his extremely helpful, clear and practical explanation of it, the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, raises the relevance of other groups and the importance of making sure that we do not miss out significant parts of the population as we try to aggregate and understand these local views.

What we are trying to do is to balance technical education qualifications that can be tailored, to a degree, and that best support the needs of a local area, with the ability to aggregate and use the data and intelligence from them to inform national policy. That needs to then feed into an ability for the Government and those to whom they devolve their powers to understand where providers are delivering efficiently on these plans and where they are not, identifying gaps and seeking to address them.

I also want to speak to the importance of the Government setting out how they intend to delegate these powers that are being centralised. As my noble friend Lady Evans said, what the Government talk about and what is actually happening in terms of centralisation rather jars, so I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, has brought this forward through his Amendment 28. I do not think anyone is suggesting to the Minister that this is an easy task—if it was easy, somebody would have cracked it already—but it is clearly a very important task and the more she can say about how these different groups will interact with Skills England and how there will be lines of communication from the local to the national and back again, the more confident the Committee will feel.