Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Pinnock

Tuesday 18th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, has been called away and has asked me to move Amendment 33, which I am pleased to do, because I shall speak also to Amendment 35 in my name in the group.

Clause 29 refers, some would say euphemistically, to “different ways of working”, and others have spoken of the need for “innovation”, both of which are essentially code for exempting local authorities from some requirements hitherto imposed by children’s social care legislation. We hold strongly to the view that child protection and wider social care should not be run by an organisation seeking to make a profit. That is why we joined Liberal Democrat and Cross-Bench Peers, as well as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, in Committee, demonstrating the breadth of support for that requirement to appear in the Bill.

The Minister has consistently been asked to explain what problem Clause 29 is designed to address. I have to say that from our point of view he has been unable to do so. At the briefing on this part of the Bill held last week, the Children’s Minister was also unable to come up with a convincing answer. A representative from three London boroughs highlighted one aspect of their joint operations, but it did not seem to be in an area in which they were constrained from operating as things stand. Indeed, those London boroughs were in a list of local authorities that I read out in Committee, all of which have been able to innovate within existing legislation.

However, I do not want to pre-empt the argument that we will advance when we come to consider Amendment 54, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Nash, on our second day of Report on 8 November, so I will say no more about the detail of that just now.

In Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, acknowledged that an amendment seeking to give extra force to an existing regulatory ban on profit-making in children’s services by enshrining it in primary legislation did not sit easily in a group of clauses headed “Care and adoption proceedings in England and Wales” but, he added, neither did any fear that the Government might use Section 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 2008, which enables the social care functions of a local authority to be discharged by a body corporate, to defy that ban. Such a fear was articulated by the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, as well as many other organisations delivering children’s services, which, in its response to a 2014 consultation on draft regulations concerning a significant extension to children’s services that could be outsourced, strongly rejected any profit motive in their provision. The association wrote:

“Decisions taken about a child’s life should only ever be based on what is”,

best for,

“the child as assessed by skilled and qualified social workers and the courts system. These decisions cannot, and must not, be subordinate to the pursuit of financial profit”.

The Government’s response at the time included the insertion of a prohibition on profit-making into the final regulation of those services that could be outsourced, and the Minister assured noble Lords at Second Reading that the Government had no intention of lifting that ban. However, many in your Lordships’ House, not to mention the plethora of organisations which have contacted noble Lords since the Bill was published, feel a distinct sense of unease that his assurance sits awkwardly with Clauses 29 to 33, which allow local authorities to opt out of some of the provisions in existing regulation and legislation.

In his recent review, Sir Martin Narey questioned profit-making, despite the fact that the Government repeated their assurance on the ban in their submission to him. As events in July demonstrate, Ministers come and go, often unexpectedly, and government policy changes abruptly as a result. I need only mention the words “grammar schools” as proof of that. There have been too many government U-turns in recent history for any noble Lord to feel entirely comfortable that all will be well with the ban on profit-making service deliverers in future.

The simplest way to assure practitioners and noble Lords who feel the same way as I do on the issue would be for the Minister to confirm that the Government will reconsider their refusal to enshrine their regulatory function in the Bill. I would therefore be grateful if he would agree to take the matter away for further consideration and come back to me before Third Reading. I should say that when I say “me”, I mean the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham.

Amendment 35 has been resubmitted and is of the type that has a habit of surfacing regularly, because it seeks to get the Government to collect and collate information, publish a report and submit it—and, by extension, themselves—to Parliament to be held to account. It could be said that that is fairly basic democracy, but rarely do the Government agree. They usually cite some bureaucratic reason for being unable to comply. On this occasion, it is primarily an attempt to ensure that local authorities, rather than the Government, are held to account. If the Government are not minded to accept this amendment, then perhaps the Minister will inform noble Lords how he intends local authorities to be benchmarked. How are they to be measured in terms of how they deliver services to children in and leaving care? If there are no known outcomes, how is progress to be measured?

The Government have conceded that children’s services in some areas are not delivering the best possible outcomes for vulnerable children. Society as a whole has a responsibility to do better for these groups of children. If the Prime Minister was serious about wanting to create a country that works for everyone, these are exactly the type of young people whom she needs to focus on, because they are those who all too often get left behind. Ministers have identified improving outcomes as a priority and this is the driver for the DfE innovation programme and for the controversial innovation clauses, which as I said will be debated next month. However, the only way to measure whether innovation is working is to have an outcomes framework with annual reporting obligations. That would enable comparisons as to how different local authorities were performing and test whether different models for delivering social services are, or perhaps more importantly, are not working. It would also allow good practice to be identified and—crucially—to be shared.

The most important aspect of the outcomes highlighted in Amendment 35 is that they are about children’s well-being and life chances. This must be at the heart of any innovation, however that is described and no matter the context in which it is operated. It is essential that we make sure that changes are not made solely or even mainly for the sake of efficiency savings, which is tempting at a time of increasing demand and decreasing resource. I beg to move.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, it seems to me fairly demeaning that the state cannot collectively care for vulnerable children without resorting to a profit motive. In all the private meetings we have had with Ministers in regard to the Bill, we have been reassured that there is no background intention on the part of the Government to enable services to be outsourced to give a profit motive. That would require a change in legislation. The period of changes that we are now undergoing needs guarantees and I point to a report that I believe was in the Guardian newspaper a couple of days ago, which refers to Sandwell Council having been ordered to contract out its children’s services. It will mean,

“that services, including child protection investigations, making applications to the courts to have children removed from their families and the management of children in need plans will be outsourced to an independent organisation, and accountability will only be back to the council through a contract”.

I thought we would have learned enough from the academisation of schools to know that contracts do not necessarily provide sufficient accountability, either for financial management or—certainly not—for providing services in the best interests of children. We are talking about the most vulnerable children. As far as I can find out, no other country allows this sort of intrusion by a private company into the lives of vulnerable families, and decisions about the welfare and protection of children to be taken by private companies which are not directly accountable to the state, either to the Government, or in this case to local authorities. It raises a fundamental principle. As we have discussed at great length throughout the Bill, we are all very concerned to provide the best possible protection and care for vulnerable children. However, we are possibly undermining that by allowing and enabling the outsourcing of children’s services for a profit motive, which by its very nature may result in children not being first and foremost in the mind of the company undertaking the work.

For those reasons, we totally support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. We hope that the Minister will be able to give a categorical assurance that the outsourcing of children’s services for profit will not take place, and that, failing that, he will include such an assurance as an amendment at Third Reading.

Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Pinnock

Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Tuesday 18th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

My Lords, I and other noble Lords attempted in Committee to persuade the Minister that the list of corporate partners in the Bill should be widened. We were unsuccessful then, so today we have tried a slightly different approach with an amendment that speaks only of,

“such other persons or bodies as may be defined in regulations”,

with the proviso that such regulations must be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.

Corporate parenting is one of the most important roles of a local authority, and elected councillors take that responsibility extremely seriously. Corporate parenting means the full and active involvement of the formal and local partnerships needed between local authority departments and services and associated agencies which are responsible for working together to meet the needs of looked-after children and young people as well as care leavers. Recognising that the different component parts each have a contribution to make is critical to the success of corporate parenting. A major challenge in operating effective corporate parenting is to manage its contradictory nature, balancing the need for continuity with the changes necessarily involved, whether through political control, staff changes within the local authority or other partners, or the emergence of new policies, perhaps even new legislation. The aim must remain static: to help provide each individual child or young person with a sense of stability in their life.

Any duties to co-operate must, of course, be reciprocal, with local government, health partners and the police all working together to protect and support looked-after children in their area. All corporate partners need to fully understand and accept their responsibilities as corporate parents, and governance arrangements will be in place to make sure that work within councils and their partner organisations is child-centred and focused on achieving the overarching outcome. The overarching outcome of corporate parenting should be for young people who have experienced the care system to go on to be successful learners in whatever career path they choose, to become confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors whose life outcomes mirror those of their peers as far as possible. The ultimate aim must be that there is no discernible difference between the outcomes of children and young people who have been looked after and those who have not. That, I accept, is a lofty aim, but it is surely one that no one who has the interests of our most vulnerable children at heart can turn away from. I hope that, in that sense, the Minister will look upon Amendments 6 and 7 and give a positive response.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I draw the House’s attention to my interests as a councillor in the Borough of Kirklees and therefore a corporate parent, with whom the buck finally lands. We had a considerable debate in Committee, as the noble Lord, Lord Watson, said, because there was a lot of concern about having clarity of definition about corporate parenting principles. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, talked about the report of the noble Lord, Lord Laming, In Care, Out of Trouble, drawing attention to, “Less clarity leading to more inconsistencies”. That is precisely why, at this stage, there is an endeavour to find greater clarity in the corporate parenting principles laid out in the Bill as it stands.

I also suggest that we ought to support greater clarity because of the changing role of local authorities, given the financial pressures on them. It is also the right thing to do because it makes corporate parenting more effective. There has to be work across other public sector partners; those referred to in the amendment laid before us are the police and the health service. The reason for doing that is to ensure that those two bodies in particular have it as a priority in their planning and actions that they take note of the importance of corporate parenting when they meet young people who are in need of care, and who are sometimes—more often than we would like—brought to the attention of the law.

The third reason why we support the amendment proposed is because, in the principles as laid out, and as described by the Minister in Committee, everyone who is employed by a local authority is responsible as a corporate parent. My fear is that, if everybody is responsible, no one is. That is why I have argued consistently that we need to be clear about where the final responsibility lies.

We need to expand the definition of corporate parenting responsibilities to include other key public sector organisations, but also to have clarity within local authorities on where the final responsibility lies. In the words of the noble Lord, Lord Warner, it is always helpful to refresh requirements in earlier legislation because it brings it to the attention of professionals that this is a matter on which legislators place great importance. With those words, I support wholeheartedly Amendments 6 and 7.

Schools

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Pinnock

Monday 12th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. The former Labour Prime Minister and former Member of your Lordships’ House, Lord Wilson of Rievaulx, once opined that a week was a long time in politics. Well, rather a lot has happened in the past week in politics, particularly in the area of education, beginning with the leak, accidental or otherwise, of government plans for an expansion of grammar schools. Since then, we have had a Statement from the Secretary of State saying that there was really nothing to say, followed a mere 24 hours later by a detailed Statement from the Prime Minister, which begs the question as to whether the two actually speak to one another. Now we have a 36-page consultation document outlining radical plans for an expansion of grammar schools, a relaxation of restrictions on faith schools, plus new demands on universities and independent schools. At this rate, we can expect a Bill tomorrow and the completion of legislation by the time Parliament rises on Thursday.

It is only natural that the Prime Minister wants to make her mark early, but the proposals contained in the consultation document are little more than a hastily put-together hotch-potch of wishful thinking. These plans will neither help to bring about an inclusive education system nor promote social mobility; in fact, they will do quite the opposite. It is all very well to reference “ordinary working-class people”—ignoring the fact that the biggest proportion of the population now regards itself as middle class, ordinary or not—but to say that these people will become the Prime Minister’s priority is simply not credible when so many schools are underfunded, there is a teacher shortage and parents are to be denied any say in the manner in which their children’s education is to be forced into the straitjacket of academies.

That begs the first question for the Minister: where do the plans announced today leave the hitherto mantra of the great drive towards academisation? Judging by her remarks on Friday, it is a question that the former Secretary of State would also like to have answered. Secondly, from where do the Government believe that they gained a mandate for such a radical change to the education landscape, breaking a consensus that has existed for 40 years? The fact is that they have none, and no legitimacy to introduce these retrograde proposals. If it is the Government’s intention to form this into legislation and attempt to get it through Parliament, can the Minister indicate the timescale that that might involve?

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement but regret to say that it appears no more than a dog-whistle response by the Conservatives to the current state of the nation. How much easier it is to throw up the idea of more grammar schools than to concentrate on the real difficulties facing many working people across the country. There can be no other explanation for this situation. Earlier this year, we spent much time in this House debating and then enacting the Education and Adoption Act, which aimed to improve the quality of education in our schools through the academies route. Some of us did not support entirely the aims of that Bill, but certainly we could understand why the Government were pursuing that. Presumably, all that is now jettisoned so that we can have grammar schools brought back.

One thing on which we can agree on this side is that all children need, deserve and have a right to the opportunity of a good school. Given the figures that the Minister repeated this afternoon of more than 1 million children not having education in a good school, it seems to be a failure of this Government not to have addressed that earlier.

I will focus my comments on the proposals for introducing more grammar schools. One reason given is that it gives parents more choice. I cannot see, where schools are in the position to do the choosing, that parents have any choice. That is the whole problem of selection by test or examination: the school does the choosing. There is no way that we on this side can support that.

The second argument in support of bringing back a failed education policy from the 1950s and 1960s is that it will help children from deprived areas. At the same time it is argued that we currently have selection by house price. Apparently, this new proposal is to help children in working-class families. However, such families do not have a problem with selection by house price because most of them are in rented accommodation or in poor parts of the country where house prices are not an issue.

Thirdly, I have always thought that we ought to base our education policy on evidence. All the research over all the years, and currently, points to the fact that selection at 11 fails hundreds—thousands—of children. For the 80% of children who go into the non-grammar schools, but even for many of those who attend grammar schools, the statistics and evidence show that they do not necessarily thrive. I do not see how the Government propose to make the case for grammar schools based on evidence. I would have more faith in what they were doing if, instead of saying that they wanted to promote more selection, they said that they were actually going to promote more secondary modern schools, because that is precisely what they are doing. They are going to write off the 80% who are not going to get through the 11-plus—or whatever new test they have devised—and at 11 those children will feel that they are failures. No one who cares about children will be able to support such a divisive approach.

In conclusion, I am astonished that the Government have come forward with this proposal and we on this side will vigorously oppose it.

Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Pinnock

Monday 11th July 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

None the less—I understand the laughter from other noble Lords—there are interesting developments on my side of the fence, too. The Committee will forgive me for not commenting on that.

What the Minister said in his letter was reassuring. None the less, the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, would ensure an automatic review of child deaths, which obviously is a serious matter that I do not mean to treat lightly at all. Those are the two amendments that I wanted to specify, but all the amendments listed would strengthen the section of the Bill. For that reason, as stated earlier, we are pleased to support them.

As noble Lords will know, my noble friend Lord Hunt is a signatory to the proposal to oppose the question that Clauses 12 and 13 stand part of the Bill, and it is to this that I now wish to speak. We have concerns about the manner in which the functions of the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel are to be established. Clause 12(1) states that the Secretary of State shall have power delegated to her to decide what the functions of the panel shall be. The functions are not set out in any detail; the Secretary of State is to be given the right to decide how the functions are to operate. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee stated in its report on the Bill:

“The arrangements made by the Secretary of State will determine more precisely how those functions are to be exercised, and will accordingly play a significant role in shaping what the Panel is required to do and how it is required to do it”.

The committee goes on to say that as a result, it believes that the arrangements made by the Secretary of State should be contained in a statutory instrument subject to the affirmative procedure. So do we, which is why we believe Clause 12 must be strengthened.

We also have objections to the guidance issued by the Secretary of State to the panel, as outlined in new Section 16B(8) in Clause 12. Again, our concerns are shared by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which commented that as the guidance clearly must operate hand in glove with the arrangements being made by the Secretary of State in relation to the panel, the guidance, too, should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny, this time by negative resolution.

The same could be said in respect of Clause 13 and the definition of “regulated setting”, relating to the death of a child. “Regulated setting” is not defined in the Bill, which the DPRRC regards as a major failing. The committee says:

“The definition of ‘regulated setting’ is fundamental to determining the scope of a local authority’s duty to provide information about cases”,

within this section of the Bill. That gives the Secretary of State unlimited discretion to determine what falls within the definition, and the committee goes on to say that the delegated power conferred by Section 16C(3) of the Children Act 2004 is inappropriate in providing for the definition of “regulated setting” to be set out in regulation.

More seriously—not least, I suspect, for the Department for Education—the committee proceeds effectively to rubbish the department’s claim that:

“This is a narrow power which will only provide for a list of regulated settings, not raising matters of substance which the House will need to debate”.

The Delegated Powers Committee does not just describe that power as a wide one; it concludes that it is a Henry VIII power, which means that it should be subject to affirmative procedure.

The number of delegated powers contained in the Bill was the subject of some dispute, shall we say, between noble Lords and Ministers at Second Reading. Doubtless we could schedule a separate debate in Committee to resolve just how many there are but, with the exception of the Ministers, every noble Lord who has taken part in debates on the Bill will agree that however many there are, there are too many.

The definition of a Henry VIII clause is of course one that seeks to amend primary legislation by secondary legislation. I cannot resist quoting the comments of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, who spoke strongly against such clauses when he was Lord Chief Justice. He stated:

“You can be sure that when these Henry VIII clauses are introduced they will always be said to be necessary. William Pitt warned us how to treat such a plea with disdain. Necessity is the justification for every infringement of human liberty: it is the argument of tyrants, the creed of slaves”.

That may be just a little strong for this Bill but the message is quite clear. There are more egregious examples elsewhere in the Bill of the abuse of parliamentary procedures through secondary legislation—but, for the reason I have outlined, we believe that the definition of “regulated setting” has to be on the face of the Bill.

As was stated in Committee last week, there are concerns over the establishment of the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel, partly because of the fear that it could be used to blame, or perhaps even scapegoat, social workers if a high-profile local case is referred to the new national panel without full knowledge of the local elements of the case. That is why the greatest attention must be given to defining the arrangements and functions of the panel as clearly as possible and, where they cannot be placed on the face of the Bill, to ensuring that there is adequate parliamentary scrutiny of those aspects of the Bill. For these reasons, we do not believe that Clauses 12 and 13 should stand part of the Bill.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I support everything that previous speakers have said about both the amendments and in opposition to Clauses 12 and 13. During our last day in Committee, I made the case that in principle the proposal for the national safeguarding panel failed because it did not take sufficient account of local accountability, local knowledge and local professionals who have a duty to safeguard children in their area. The Wood report, from which a lot of the changes proposed by the Government come, is clear on some of these issues. One factor that it picks out in its analysis of local safeguarding children’s boards is that a review by the Local Government Association found,

“dissonance among the partners between the accountability and the authority of an LSCB”.

The report goes on to say that,

“the duty to cooperate has not been sufficient in ensuring the coherent and unified voice necessary to ensure multi-agency arrangements are consistently effective”.

So from the Wood report we hear that local accountability is one issue that has been raised. The LSCBs are not sufficiently accountable locally, and that has, in part, led to their lack of effectiveness.

The proposals in these clauses move power and accountability, in the most serious cases, from the local to the national level and put it in the hands of the Secretary of State. I think that that places too much power at the national level and not enough locally, and it is also in danger of politicising the whole process, reflecting what the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, said, with which I totally agree. The lack of elected representation on the current safeguarding boards has resulted in them being ineffective. Currently, the boards consist of professionals and there is no full representation of non-professionals—that is, elected representatives—who are also corporate parents. It seems to me that a lack of challenge from non-professionals, who are corporate parents, has contributed to this lack of effectiveness of the safeguarding boards.

I will make a further comment, which is reflected in the Wood report, about the membership of the local boards and the duty to co-operate. The Government’s proposals in later amendments would remove the requirement for some of the professional organisations to be members of the local panels. One of those, the probation service, has in my council area—I draw the Committee’s attention to my entry in the register of interests as a local councillor in the Borough of Kirklees—since the fundamental changes to the service not attended the local safeguarding children boards. The later government amendments remove that requirement. It is a big mistake not to require the probation service to attend to discuss safeguarding children.

Clause 12, which lays out the functions of the new national panel, falls far short of what is required. Let us consider what has happened with serious case reviews over the past 30 years—probably and sadly—from the Climbié and Baby P reports to the many, many others that we can all draw to memory. They have all issued recommendations to which everybody has agreed but which no one has implemented effectively. Everyone says, “These are good; we must do that”, but they are not implemented.

The big failure in Clause 13, which is why I will oppose it standing part, is that nowhere does it say how learning will be effectively implemented. We can all learn, and social workers across the country will have read the 48—I think—recommendations in the Baby P report, but implementing them is the difficult bit. The Wood report refers to that and makes a powerful case for thinking in much greater detail not about the learning—the learning has been done—but the implementation. In all these cases, similar recommendations are made about the need to co-operate and the lack of collaboration and communication. We have yet to crack how to put that into effect.

If we are serious about child protection and safeguarding children, one element which must feature is how the recommendations are to be put into effect, monitored and reviewed. If we do not do that, we will never move forward. That is my fundamental reason for supporting the proposition that Clauses 12 and 13 should not stand part of the Bill.

Children and Social Work Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Watson of Invergowrie and Baroness Pinnock

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

My Lords, Amendments 101 and 102 are in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Hunt. The Bill establishes a national Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel. Concerns have been raised about a potential diminution of local accountability and about the panel being rather too closely linked to the Secretary of State, which could undermine the independence of the reviews undertaken and limit the ability to suggest meaningful change at national level.

We hope that these issues can be appropriately dealt with, but in general we welcome the introduction of the panel and the Government’s decision to adopt some of the recommendations in the Wood review on local safeguarding children boards and serious case reviews. At their best, serious case reviews offer an opportunity to review current practice, alter systems that are ineffective and provide insight into some of the problems that face the wide range of professionals responsible for the safety of vulnerable children. A system that adds weight to the process and encourages the development of expertise in this area is therefore welcome.

Part of our concern with the Bill as a whole relates to the large extent to which it relies on secondary legislation. The establishment of the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel does not even have that fig-leaf, because the Bill allows the Secretary of State to make any arrangements she thinks fit when establishing the panel. We believe that is not good enough. The panel will consider serious child safeguarding cases and form an important part of the landscape in the months and years ahead. It is an important part of the Bill, and therefore requires oversight. The arrangements for establishing the panel should be for affirmative regulations, offering your Lordships’ House the opportunity to consider the draft regulations and express its opinion.

As for Amendment 102, the appointment of the chair of the panel will be important, particularly in the first instance. There is no reason why the Secretary of State should not have enough confidence in the person whom she decides to appoint to that position for him or her to face a pre-appointment hearing with the Education Select Committee. The committee contains considerable experience, and a public hearing will provide the wider sector the opportunity to get an understanding of the potential strengths of the Secretary of State’s candidate. I beg to move.

[Baroness Pinnock]

My Lords, I will respond to what the noble Lord, Lord Watson, has said. I totally agree with him that the proposals in the Bill are so important that they ought to be subject to the statutory instrument procedure that he defined. In particular, the chair of this safeguarding review panel should be appointed after a public hearing with the Education Select Committee has taken place. The noble Lord has our support.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Pinnock]

My Lords, I think there was some confusion over which of us was going to speak. The noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, who gave notice of her intention to oppose the Question that Clause 11 should stand part, is not present, so with the Minister’s permission I will speak to that element in the group.

There is a fundamental concern about the proposal in Clause 11. It does not have anything to do with the establishment of a national safeguarding review panel, which is appropriate, but what it contains and the way it is defined in the Bill are of concern because apparently it will remove local responsibility and accountability for the most serious of child abuse and harm incidents. The current situation is that local safeguarding children boards follow statutory guidance for conducting a serious case review. The LSCB itself is chaired by an independent expert and includes representatives from local NHS organisations, the local authority, probation, housing, the voluntary sector and so on.

Following a serious case of harm to a child, the LSCB must notify the national panel of independent experts and Ofsted. It will then appoint one or more reviewers to lead the serious case review. The lead reviewer must be independent of the LSCB and any other organisations which are involved in the case. The LSCB should also submit the names of the reviewers to the national panel of independent experts. The key factors in the existing process are that the chair is independent and formally agreed to by a national panel of independent experts and that, crucially, representations can be made in the same geographical area by individuals who were involved with the child and the family and thus have an understanding of the local context.

None of this is to deny the positive contribution that potentially can be made by establishing a national panel to improve national learning from these serious case reviews. What is unfortunate is that local knowledge and understanding may be lost and, worse still, that a national panel would take away local responsibility from those who are charged with safeguarding children. A national hearing can seem remote. It will lose the local context and therefore the nuances of understanding in these most complex of situations. It would be most helpful if the Minister would be willing to set up a meeting for those of us who are concerned about the implications of these proposals so that we can discuss these matters. It is not because we oppose them, but because we are concerned about how they will be implemented.

I shall refer again to the review document which I think was published yesterday. Paragraph 118 on page 55 refers to Alan Wood on the role and functions of the local safeguarding children boards. He wants to set up a stronger statutory framework that will introduce greater accountability for the three key agencies involved in safeguarding children; namely local authorities, local police and the local health service. That is why I was willing to oppose the question that Clause 11 should stand part so that these issues can be explored further before we make a decision to move to a national safeguarding review panel for the most important and serious cases, thus eliminating local involvement, responsibility and accountability. I think that that is very important if we are to make progress in preventing, if possible, some of these serious incidents. But certainly we should get national learning from the local example.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie]

The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, has raised some important points and the name of my noble friend Lord Hunt is also on the clause stand part debate. We do not propose to do that just now; we think the broad principles can be transferred to the debate that we shall have on Monday on the next section or group. We shall say no more at this stage.