Children and Families Bill

Debate between Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede and Baroness Tyler of Enfield

Monday 21st October 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

I understand the intention behind the amendment, particularly in terms of promoting the best interests of the child and the child’s welfare, but I also feel that the signal it would send would not be the right one at this stage. I have heard the president talking about this, and I think that at the moment his mantra is, “It can be done, it will be done, it must be done”. It is all about turning around the culture from one of delay to one of urgency, with all parties involved in this—that is, the judiciary, local authorities, CAFCASS and others—doing all that they can to ensure that these cases are dealt with as quickly as they can be and in a way that is commensurate with the best interests of the child.

I was very much reinforced in this recently. I attended the National Children and Adults Services Conference in Harrogate on Friday. It was a very good three-day event with a number of Ministers and others speaking. I went to a specialist workshop all about completing care proceedings in 26 weeks. Several academics, particularly from the University of East Anglia, presented some initial findings from the research that they have been doing into the impact of the new public law outline to try to move to a 26-week time limit, and particularly the impact of what is called the tri-borough project with Kensington and Chelsea, Westminster and Hammersmith and Fulham. I have been to visit that project myself and the results, frankly, are extremely impressive: already 50% of cases are being resolved in less than 26 weeks.

Even with the knowledge that we were going to have this clause in the Bill or at least debate it, national case duration averages were already coming down from what was something like 49 weeks to about 37 weeks, and they are on a downward trajectory. While I fully understand the case that is being made for those very exceptional cases where the extensions will be needed, there is sufficient flexibility in the Bill as drafted for that. I would be concerned about anything that diluted this very important message about trying to move away from delay in the family court system.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I am not briefed by the NSPCC but I have a brief from the Magistrates’ Association, which makes it clear that it also supports the 26-week time limit but also agrees that there should be specific extensions for eight weeks where people can apply to the court. It would probably be most helpful if I raised the questions that the Magistrates’ Association has raised in the brief that it sent me. Before I do so, though, I want to make the point that the examples of exceptions that my noble friend Lady Jones gave are very far from theoretical, because two of those examples I personally dealt with in the past month. They were very real examples of something that I understood very clearly.

The first of the questions that the Magistrates’ Association raised in its brief to me is really a concern that an application for an eight-week extension should resist that extension being a contested hearing, and obviously the decision of the court should be final. If there is to be a contested hearing on an eight-week extension, though, it should be as short and focused as possible. The second point that the Magistrates’ Association made was that it is not clear, from the association’s understanding, that there is any limit to the maximum number of successive extensions. The association’s final point is to ask whether there is any right of appeal if a lower court—although perhaps “lower court” is not the right expression—decides not to grant an extension. Is there any right of appeal to a higher jurisdiction?