Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Howarth of Breckland

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Grand Committee

[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.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

My lords, I believe that the latest Ofsted findings show that siblings are being kept together and placed without undue delay in most circumstances, which is extremely good news. I wonder if the Minister could verify that. Certainly, it was what was said at the presentation of the latest Ofsted report and I greeted the news with some joy. However, it does not mean that I do not support this amendment, because the very fact that Ofsted has to report on this and say how much better it is getting shows that we have had to reach a point of changing practice to make sure that children are able to talk to their brothers and sisters. I am delighted that it seems to be getting better, if that is so, but it does emphasise the need for this proposal. I am the very unlikely founder of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Grandparents—they could not find anybody else—but, as people know, I have brought up children and still find myself with my great-nieces and great-nephews for care, and for all the things that grandparents do.

What I have learned from working in the north of England, where all my family are, is that grandparents up there are mostly caring informally for their grandchildren. It is only when things go seriously wrong that they suddenly find that they are not adequate to care for those grandchildren, because the assessment says that they have to be moved somewhere else. That is where the two parts of this Bill meet, because we are looking for good assessment by a social worker. Of course, the child’s needs must be paramount; you do not leave a child with a grandparent who does not have the ability to care for that child—but surely it is better, if they have made that relationship and the grandparent is fit to care, that they continue. The recent death of Ellie Butler is an example of that.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Howarth of Breckland

Tuesday 7th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

My Lords, I support Amendment 40A moved by the noble Lord, Lord Rix, and colleagues. We supported him on this in Committee and it would still be our first preference as it would add health and social care provisions to the list of matters in respect of which children, young people and families could appeal to the First-tier Tribunal.

This was first moved in Committee by the noble Lord, Lord Storey, as he just reminded us. I recall that he subsequently said, as he has just done so, that he was unsure as to the feasibility of this approach in terms of the technicalities. For that reason, because we may not be able to evaluate those technicalities at this point, we have tabled Amendment 40B, which I will refer to in a moment. I do not know if the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Storey, mean that he would support that amendment but it has the intention of giving the Government time to resolve whatever the issues are.

As other noble Lords have said, the issue is simple: the Government want to establish an integrated system for meeting better the needs of disabled children and those with special educational needs. That integration would be at the point of assessment and planning education, health and social care. However, as the Bill stands, that integration is blown apart at the point of appeal. As we have heard, parents and young people would potentially have to go through three different routes of appeal simultaneously for the three different elements of their plan. Like the noble Lords, Lord Low and Lord Rix, I sense that behind this is the considerable resistance from the Department of Health and the Department for Communities and Local Government to any change.

Having previously been a Minister for some time, I feel quite strongly that agencies should bend for the benefit of families. Families should not be imposed with the burden of mobilising three bureaucratic systems that just happen to exist. It is the job of all of us, particularly the Government, to make those agencies bend, albeit by negotiation and discussion, to make the system work for the people that we are here for.

In a letter to noble Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Nash, said that the tribunal is only for special educational needs, and that, as we have heard:

“There are established routes of complaint about social care through the local authority complaints procedures”,

and, for health, to the health complaints procedure and the health ombudsman. That is not adequate, even if local authority and health appeals systems were simple—and they really are not, even for a Member of Parliament. I see the Minister for Children at the Bar and I am sure he will have tried to mobilise those complaints procedures on behalf of his constituents. It takes for ever, it is labyrinthine, it is completely not transparent and it is very bureaucratic. The idea of parents doing that on three fronts at once is simply unimaginable. There should be a single point of appeal and we support Amendment 40A.

However, should that not prevail tonight and the Government not accept it, we have tabled Amendment 40B which would require the Government actively to seek a way to secure a single point of appeal and to report back to Parliament within a year. That would keep the possibility alive. It would require the Government to do what they have not done and maybe have not had time to do so far: namely, to find a way to make this work for parents and families, to take on the resistance of those agencies and, if necessary, to change the law to establish a single point of appeal.

I am afraid that I do not share the optimism of the noble Lord, Lord Storey, that without anything done this evening there will at some point in future be a single point of appeal. I was constantly surprised and depressed by the inability sometimes to change some of our big public organisations. Without the drive and initiative from this and the other place, I do not think that will happen. I hope the Minister will take that on board.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

My Lords, I support Amendment 40A but particularly Amendment 40B. I agree absolutely with the principle of Amendment 40A but believe that the complexities that need working through to get a single point of entry are so great that we need some sort of driving project.

However, I sincerely believe that we need that single point of entry. Everyone has said how difficult it is for families to negotiate the different kinds of tribunal. I remind noble Lords that these families are struggling with children with severe disabilities. One thing they do not have is time. If you have a disabled child, it takes three times as long, if not more, to do anything, so you are immediately short of time. These negotiations then cut into what time you have. You are also short on emotional energy. If you have been through any sort of tribunal—I have been through a few in my time in a number of different positions—you know the emotional energy that it takes. Disabled children drain emotional energy, much as you love them.

The other thing is that the information you need for the different points of entry is extremely complex. Many families are poor, have not had educational advantage and do not always have the help of someone to take them through the information to enable them to understand it. Were the Government to achieve one different kind of tribunal, perhaps an independent tribunal, it would be more efficient and more economic, because there would be fewer people involved and less time used up.

I have to say that no Government have achieved that yet. No Government have managed to bring health, social care and education systems together. It would be a real triumph were this Government able simply to take a project through to consider the issues and complexities involved and what would be possible to make life so much easier for families who are already struggling emotionally and with their time in trying to care lovingly for a disabled child.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Howarth of Breckland

Monday 4th November 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

I apologise for intervening. Having been a director of social services and having had to set those priorities, I understand completely what the Minister has said, but what I do not understand here is that if all these things are already set out in statute and are “may” duties, not “must” duties, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes, pointed out, why can we not pull them all together in this Bill? It would make it a fine Bill rather than a good Bill. Nothing is being added if the Minister is saying that the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act and the children legislation already have these things. Are the local authorities not going to have to set their priorities anyway?

The other point I want to make is that we will have education and health but not social care; social care will again be relegated as the poor relation. I have not seen how the pathfinders have looked at this, but if they have considered them all as one, that would be a good indicator of the way forward.

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

Before the Minister responds, perhaps I may also give him the opportunity to deal with a point. He seems to be making a distinction between social care, special educational needs and healthcare. He said that there is a general duty in the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act because social care needs, and therefore duties, are essentially limitless. That is why local authorities must be protected so that they can decide their priorities in the context of their resources. However, surely the same argument could be made about healthcare. Health needs and their care are essentially limitless, so the health service has to decide on its priorities in relation to its resources. Yet here the health service “must” provide the services set out in the plan while the same does not apply to social care. I do not see the distinction, certainly not between social care and healthcare in regard to the point about being essentially limitless.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Howarth of Breckland

Monday 21st October 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

My Lords, I want to make just a couple of remarks. First, I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick, for the note that he has sent to us and for his very clear exposition today of a very complicated issue.

There is an issue here. In my own previous academic experience I did a considerable amount of government-funded research into child abuse, and child sexual abuse in particular. Apart from any other kinds of cases, we found a very significant although small number of men who quite deliberately target families and go round seeking one woman after another. In each case, there is harm to the child but it cannot necessarily be definitively proved which individual committed the harm. For a small number of children this is a problem.

It is quite difficult for those of us who are not lawyers and who have not followed the detail of the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court and are not steeped in all this language and the issues to evaluate precisely—I cannot do so—whether there is an issue here and, if so, how the Government should act. It seems that there may be an issue here. I would be grateful if the Minister could say whether he thinks there is a problem and that it is the problem that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, has identified. Is there a potential problem now where some children could be left in situations of risk when perhaps previously there might have been an intervention to protect them? If so, what is the best course of action for the Government to take?

I can perhaps understand the Government’s reluctance to intervene in or be seen to meddle with Supreme Court adjudications. None the less, if there is an issue here, clearly it is within the Government’s power to rectify or revert to the original intention of the Children Act, whether by Amendment 64 or by some other course of action. I certainly feel, as I suspect do other Members of the Committee, that it would be very helpful to have the Minister’s clarification on whether there is an issue here and, if so, what is the best remedy.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

My Lords, I am not a practising lawyer either but I was a social worker of long standing. I want to say very briefly that the social work organisations are extremely concerned about this situation, and we should have that on the record.

The concern is that in the past, social workers would have been able to move cases forward through the courts easily because of the previous judgments, but now they cannot move to the welfare principle quickly enough, which means that often they cannot gain access to the home where the perpetrator is living. The issue is actually being able to ensure that children can be protected by social care staff or voluntary workers, if that is where the work is, being able to gain access to a home quickly and simply through a court order such as that proposed in the amendment.

Education Bill

Debate between Baroness Hughes of Stretford and Baroness Howarth of Breckland

Monday 4th July 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford]

I agree wholeheartedly with the noble Lord’s point, which reflects that of my noble friend Lady Massey. These issues should be discussed more openly in the round through personal, social and health education and other discussions that take place in schools. If such bullying happens to them, pupils will then feel safer and more confident in declaring what has happened to them.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

My Lords, I briefly add a point about this being a Forth Bridge issue. It is perpetual and we must work at it all the time. I am interested in what the Government’s strategy for tackling bullying in schools is. The previous Government certainly had a strategy, which I assume the current Government will carry on and build on.

When I was involved with Childline, bullying was the most significant issue for children. I understand that this is still the case now that the NSPCC runs Childline. It came above safeguarding, relationships and issues to do with friends. It had an emotional impact on children. I know this because I spoke personally to hundreds of them over the telephone about their view of themselves, particularly young children from ethnic-minority communities, for whom this was a very confusing issue. More recently, we know that homophobic bullying has become much more rife, with names being called in the playground. Therefore, I recognise that collecting statistics may not be the Government’s way of taking this forward but I should like to hear more about what they are doing strategically. This is not something that needs a plan for today or yesterday; it has to happen all the time.

I remember advising the head of a school in the south of England where a young man had taken his own life. He said, “But we don’t have bullying in this school”. I said that the healthy position was to recognise that every school has bullying, but to have a strategy to deal with it that involves its pupils. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say about the strategic position.