Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Grand Committee

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I would like to support what the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, has just said. The Select Committee responsible for the post-adoption legislative inquiry came to the conclusion that I and one or two other Peers who served on the committee ought to meet children. We met a group of around a dozen adopted children to ask about their experiences. We then thought that it would only be fair to meet children who are in care, and again we spoke to about a dozen of those children. Everything that the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, has just said we experienced, and it was very moving. I was the only Peer actually to talk to those children and their enablers. They told me frankly how they felt, and nearly everything they talked about was in relation to their brothers and sisters. One young person who was just about to leave care had been the father figure to three or four younger children. They were taken away and all divided up between different families. He said, “I was responsible for them. No one will even tell me how they are getting on. I think of them every night”. It was really terrible. The idea that siblings are taken into account should not be part of the actual law of the land seems utterly wrong.

We know that local authorities are in difficulties, and I am not suggesting that every sibling, perhaps particularly the eldest of 13, should be able to see every one of their brothers and sisters once a week; that would be silly. The use of Skype, Facebook and so on provides an opportunity to be in touch but, unless it is a requirement, it is extremely easy to overlook. That is why it needs to be in primary legislation.

I am a grandmother, six times over I am glad to say, but I am also a not-particularly effective president of the Grandparents’ Association and, on its behalf, I would like to say how important grandparents are—and the stories I have heard of how grandparents are taken for granted. If they are able to look after the children, that is great, but when they come in asking to take over the care of children, who basically they have been looking after for years and years, they are utterly disregarded. In the best of local authorities and, I have to say, the best of CAFCASS, they are taken into account, but many times they are not. It is about time that also was on the face of primary legislation. I should add, of course, that not every grandparent is a good one—one has to recognise this. The fact they are on primary legislation does not mean the local authority has to deal with thoroughly obstructive, unhelpful grandparents, who are trying to destroy whatever the situation is. Speaking now as a former judge, I had that sort of grandparent too, so one has to be realistic. But the majority of grandparents love their grandchildren and work incredibly hard for them, and they really should be recognised.

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

My Lords, I also support very strongly the amendments tabled by my noble friends and other noble Baronesses and noble Lords in this group. I will speak briefly but very particularly in relation to the points about siblings and grandparents. The noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, and the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, have spoken very movingly about the importance to children of contact with their siblings. The new and rising role of grandparents also means that we have to look at that in terms of policy, as well.

I want to reflect on something that I find quite depressing. Most people in this room now were also participants when we debated the Children and Families Bill, not too long ago. We had extensive debates then about the importance of contact with siblings and the importance of considering kinship care before alternatives were gone towards too quickly, yet it seems to be the default position of the Department for Education not to recognise this in primary legislation. When he replies, I hope the Minister will speak to that, because I thought we had convinced him and his officials then, when we debated that Bill—but here we are again, with other legislation presented to us, that completely disregards siblings and other important family members. As the evidence my noble friend cited from the Family Rights Group and others shows, there is still very poor practice. Unless we put these issues in legislation to demonstrate their importance when the decisions about individual children and families are being made, we will still keep going around in circles. We will come back with another Bill and they will still not be there, and we will still have children separated from their brothers and sisters. Now is the time really to put this right.

Serious Crime Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Tuesday 28th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

I shall pick up that point. It is perfectly obvious to me as a former president of the Family Division that it does not matter which piece of legislation it is as long as the work done in relation to female genital mutilation is allocated to the single family court and heard either by High Court judges or circuit judges who are ticketed to try family cases. This is really not for the ordinary civil judges in what was the county court.

I am interested by this talk about the High Court or the county court. We should actually be talking about—I say this respectfully to the Government—the single family court. It does not matter whether it goes into the Family Law Act as is suggested in the excellent opposition amendments, which I largely support. What matters is who actually tries it. Just as with forced marriages and every other child protection issue, we have here issues of crime, but we know perfectly well that there has not yet been a single conviction of anyone who has done this. It is a question of culture, too. One has to train people in this country that this is not an acceptable practice. The Government are to be enormously congratulated for working on that—as were the previous Government when introducing the 2003 Act—but nothing has gone far enough.

I totally agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lester. I would like to see what is good in each set of amendments put together. Therefore, I hope that the Opposition and the Government will get together after Report and thrash out what would be the best of everything and get that into one list that could go into Third Reading. I do not think that the Government go quite far enough. A great deal of what the Opposition are saying is exactly what we need, but it all needs to be put together. Certainly, the most important thing is that it should go to the single family court and be tried by High Court or circuit judges who have specialist family experience.

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford (Lab)]

My Lords, I very much agree with the noble and learned Baroness. In doing so, I ask the Minister to give thought to taking away the government amendment to come back at Third Reading with a composite amendment that deals with the two issues that my noble friend related in moving the amendment. The issue of definition is as important as the issue of where this matter is located in law. There is concern out there that the definition that we have may not comply with the World Health Organization definition; even if it does, the way in which it was formulated in the 2003 Act, because of where we were then, is not clear enough to the whole range of professionals. As my noble friend identified, a number of health bodies, even in their own guidance, are telling their practitioners that reinfibulation does not come within the definition of female genital mutilation in the current Act. That has to be dealt with. I welcome the Government’s approach to looking further at what we need to do in the Bill. We have an opportunity here to ensure that we get things right, and the definition is one important issue.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Monday 18th November 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I have also put my name to three amendments and support the others in this group. It is absolutely crucial that the appointment of the Children’s Commissioner is taken very seriously, particularly that it should be somebody who can be genuinely independent of Government. May I suggest—perhaps unpopularly to any Government —that it requires someone who is prepared to be a thorn in the flesh. We do not want anyone who would be a yes-man or a yes-woman. Splendidly, the present Children’s Commissioner is certainly not that. I know her well and I have huge respect for her, but she does not have enough funding to do what she has to do and she certainly cannot do anything else.

If I may relay a short anecdote: the noble Lord, Lord McColl of Dulwich, and I managed to be persuaded by the Government not to pursue an amendment in an earlier Bill on getting a children’s legal advocate for trafficked children, on the basis that the Children’s Commissioner would investigate what happened to a child who was identified as trafficked from the moment of identification to the point at which the child would be able to be settled, one way or another. That promise was made outside the Chamber. The Children’s Commissioner then said, “I cannot do this job. I do not have the money”. The noble Lord, Lord McColl, and I went to see her and discussed it with her. There was, with the Children’s Society and the Refugee Council, a shortened, abbreviated and, despite all their efforts, inadequate investigation, because it did not do what the Children’s Commissioner would have done, which was to take it from day one of identification through to the moment when the child would be settled. They did their best with very limited funding.

This was absolutely the sort of thing that should have been done by the Children’s Commissioner and the Children’s Commissioner would like to have done it, but the resources were not there. This is just one example. I know we lack money and that this is difficult, but children matter—they absolutely matter—and the Children’s Commissioner matters. He or she must be independent and properly appointed as somebody who really knows what he or she is doing. As the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, has just said, the Children’s Commissioner must be able to consult the children and bring their voice into decision-making—as this commissioner has done in an excellent way. For those reasons, I strongly support these amendments.

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

My Lords, we have heard some very powerful arguments in favour of strengthening the process of appointment and the independence of the commissioner. I am not going to rehearse all the arguments that have been put very ably by my noble friend Lady Massey and everybody in the Committee. Now that we are several years on and there has been a review of the role of the Children’s Commissioner, it is right that we take this opportunity to see how that role can be strengthened. It is the right time to do this based on our experience and the outcomes of that review. I support the amendments in this group in general and will speak to Amendments 255A, 258, 259 and 261 in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Jones.

Amendments 258, 259 and 261 reflect other amendments in this group, by stipulating the involvement of various parliamentarians and requiring the Secretary of State to consider their views on the process and the detail of appointments, or to have their consent to appoint. All those issues reflect the concern of the committee to make sure that there is a wide involvement of different groups, so that we get it right.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Wednesday 23rd October 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford (Lab)]

My Lords, I will not dwell on this because it rehearses a theme that we spent a great length of time on in discussing Part 1 of the Bill—that is, the importance for children, when their families break up or they are taken into care, of keeping in contact with their birth family as appropriate, particularly with their siblings. The Minister was not the Minister discussing the Bill with us when we talked about Part 1. Therefore, he did not hear the strength of feeling across the Committee on this issue, which was such that the Minister—the noble Lord, Lord Nash—acknowledged it and agreed to take the issue of sibling contact back and look at it. So I hope, when the Minister sums up, that I will not need to rehearse the arguments; I hope he will take that on trust and, similarly, look at it with his colleague, the Minister in the Department for Education, and come back on Report.

The amendment is, however, different from the amendment that we talked about in relation to Part 1. It would require the court, at the stage of considering permanence for a child, to pay particular attention to any siblings and where they are, and to continued contact between siblings when making or approving the permanence plan for a child through a care order. Amendment 65 would therefore insert “and sibling placement arrangements” after “provisions”. It is very important that this issue is considered not only by social workers and professionals, as we discussed when we looked at the amendment to Part 1, but particularly at the court stage. Clause 15, as it is worded, does not include arrangements for siblings to be placed together where possible. It does not include anything that requires the court specifically to consider the arrangements for brothers and sisters.

It is essential that this is considered at the court stage because after that, while there are a number of possible opportunities for detailed arrangements in permanence plans to be considered, there are none really to go back and address this issue. Independent reviewing officers, for example, do not have the same authority as the courts to scrutinise care plans and they cannot take the matter back to court directly if they consider that the care plan is deficient in one way or another. They can only refer the matter to a CAFCASS officer who can then maybe bring a claim on behalf of the child if they consider that there are grounds for judicial review or a free-standing claim under the Human Rights Act. In practice, as I am sure Members can appreciate, that power is rarely used. Therefore, it is very important to get these issues about continued sibling contact right in at the front end when the courts are asked to scrutinise the arrangements for permanence when thinking about a care plan.

I will not rehearse all the arguments as to why that is important. I suspect the Minister may appreciate them. I will, though, rehearse one statistic that we used in the previous debate. I hope that the Minister will not say that the courts will do this anyway. The figures that we looked at then suggested that some 63% of children who go into care and have siblings who go into care lose contact with those siblings. Clearly, at various points in the process—in court, through social workers, through the placements—contact is being broken for the vast majority of children who go into care as part of a sibling group. I hope that the Minister will be prepared to look at this and respond positively to it. I beg to move.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I support the noble Baroness in this amendment. At his request, I will also speak to the amendment of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern. Is that separate? It is separate, so I will speak entirely to this amendment.

At the adoption stage, Part 1 of the Bill, a number of us spoke about the importance of sibling contact. I made the point—I make no apology for making it again to a different Minister—that the Select Committee on Adoption Legislation took informal evidence from a considerable number of children. One of the points made both by the group who were adopted and the group in care concerned the enormous sorrow they felt at losing contact with the siblings they knew. Very sensibly, one girl said, “I am not concerned about the siblings born after I left the family but I am very worried about my brothers and sisters”. Another child was almost in tears as he was so worried about his younger brother, not knowing what was happening to him and nobody being able to tell him. He said he woke up at night worrying about his brother. That is not acceptable. Therefore, it is important at each stage that those in charge of children or in charge of making arrangements and connections with children have the siblings in mind. The judge may well say that the social workers have given him all sorts of good reasons why they are not going to meet, but it is important that the judge asks. There is no requirement on the judge, or indeed the magistrates in the family proceedings court, to ask that question unless it is in legislation.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Butler-Sloss

Monday 14th October 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

My Lords, I am sure that Members of the Committee will recall that last week we debated the importance of kinship care and, unless there are reasons why this should not happen, the importance of children in care keeping in touch with members of their biological family one way or another. This amendment rehearses some of those arguments. Indeed, the importance of family contact and strengthening the potential for family contact for children in care will be a theme that I will return to a number of times as we go through the Bill.

The effect of Clause 7 is to clarify the existing law that any decision by a local authority about allowing a child in care—under a care or emergency protection order—contact with the parents or some other family member is subject to the local authority considering whether such contact would place the child at risk of harm. Obviously that is essential and, although the law probably currently provides for that, we have no objection to it being clarified here in Clause 7.

However, we think that if the Government are serious about the importance of continued family contact, they should go further and require local authorities to give specific consideration to enabling children in care to remain in contact with their siblings. That is the purpose of Amendment 32. We know that sibling contact has not always been a priority for agencies—certainly not the priority that it seems to be for the children themselves. We think that there is a need for the Government to enshrine sibling contact as a priority in the legislation.

There are two main reasons why we think that. First, 63% of children in care whose siblings are also in the care system are separated from them, so the vast majority of children in care who have siblings in care as well are not together. Those living in children’s homes are much more likely to be separated from their siblings than those in foster care, yet the sibling relationship is often the longest relationship in a child’s life, potentially offering the stability that is often absent from other aspects of the life of a child in care. The second reason is understandable: it is that young people in care themselves feel strongly that they generally have too little contact with their siblings. Some 85% of children in care thought it important to keep siblings together, and over three-quarters thought that councils should help children and young people to keep in touch with their brothers and sisters.

This amendment would make that sibling contact a priority in social work practice. I think we can all understand why continued contact with your brothers and sisters when you are in care is fundamental, yet it seems now that in many cases—the majority—siblings are separated and risk losing that contact, stability and link to their biological heritage. I hope that the Minister will accept the amendment. I beg to move.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I strongly support the amendment. As I think I said at our previous sitting, when I chaired the adoption committee we had two meetings with children, one with looked-after children and the other with children who were or were about to be adopted. Each group made it absolutely clear, particularly younger children—the seven, eight, 10 or 12 year-old children—how important their siblings were. They said to us that siblings were more important to them than parents. Some of them would have liked to have seen their parents; they all wanted to see their siblings. It was so sad; one little boy said, “I’m so worried about my brother. I don’t know what’s happening to him. Nobody will tell me and I’m not allowed to see him. I wake up at night wondering how he’s getting on”. That is not acceptable for children. The amendment would alert everybody to the importance of siblings, which is why I support it.