Lord Storey
Main Page: Lord Storey (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)(6 days, 5 hours ago)
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Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, who has great experience from her previous role in engaging with this. I reassure your Lordships’ House that local authorities are already actively engaged in this area. On the safeguarding statistics related to home education, of the 111,700 children in home education, 1% were children in need, while less than 0.5% were recorded as having a child protection plan or being a looked-after child. This compares with 3% of children in need, 0.4% having a child protection plan and 0.7% being looked-after children among the wider child population. We have the statistics, but, obviously, all local authorities have an onus to make sure that children are safe.
Lord Storey (LD)
My Lords, the MP for Woking, where this young girl Sara lived, was, interestingly, on the child protection register himself. He said:
“Sara’s life cannot be brought back, but we owe it to her—and every vulnerable child—to ensure her suffering was not in vain. Change must happen, and I will not rest until it does”.
Sadly, for many children, it will not be a happy Christmas this year. It is not just the issue of home education but of children in care: children in unregistered care homes and schools and those put in care homes miles away from their family and community. I am interested in what the Minister said about round-table discussions, and I hope and am sure that these issues will be picked up in the Bill that is due to come before us.
Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
I thank the noble Lord for his question and for the work that he has done in this area. We look forward to working with your Lordships across the House to make sure that the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill delivers. This is not party political. This is genuinely about how we keep children safe from harm. While I have the opportunity, not only are there many children who will not be having the Christmas—or the Hanukkah, for that matter—that we wish for everybody but there will be public servants who will be giving up time with their own families and will endeavour to keep others safe. We thank them for their service at this time of year, too.