Kinship Care Strategy

Debate between Alistair Strathern and Liz Twist

Wednesday 6th March 2024 Westminster Hall

[Alistair Strathern (Mid Bedfordshire) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the kinship care strategy.

I could not be happier or more privileged to move this motion. There are so many campaigns that I am lucky enough to work with as an MP, but since well before I was elected one group has been a constant source of inspiration for me. From the number of colleagues in Westminster Hall today, it looks like I am far from alone in being touched by the story of kinship carers across the country.

From the very start of my by-election campaign, which colleagues may remember was rather longer than expected, kinship carers were meeting with me to set out their concerns locally, and none more so than Carol and Amanda. They sat me down and talked to me about the battles they face, and how through their love and commitment to the young people in their care they had been able to fight and ensure that they could do everything to give their young charges the best possible start in life. I could not help but be inspired by those stories and their determination, and feel the need to do right by them to ensure that they have everything they need to take care of the young people they look after.

Carol and Amanda’s love and commitment was matched only by their tenacity. I found that out four days after being sworn in as an MP when, at my first constituency surgery, first through the door yet again were Carol and Amanda, asking me what I had done so far for kinship carers and how I would be championing the cause going forward. The truth is that I could not be happier to be held to account on this important issue, because it matters so much. Although I am afraid I have not quite been able to get Carol and Amanda their meeting with the Prime Minister yet—not through lack of trying—I hope that today marks the start of a continuing commitment from me to champion the issue of kinship care in Parliament and to ensure that we make progress in some of the important areas they have highlighted to me.

In the run-up to the debate, I have been truly moved by the number of kinship carers who have taken the time to write to me; I know that colleagues across the Chamber have been too. Indeed, Kinship told me that in the last week alone nearly 300 kinship carers from right across the country have written in to share their own personal, difficult and important testimonies. The fact that they have done so underlines why we are all here today.

At its heart, kinship care is all about supporting a young person who may have been through a really traumatic and difficult moment in life—far more traumatic and difficult than many of us would ever have to go through ourselves. Making sure that that young person and the people in their wider family unit have everything they need should be a matter of great importance to all of us. They step up to take on caring responsibilities at a really important time—a time of real trauma and need.

It could be a situation like that of Karen, who emailed me to tell me about the moment she had to take care of her grandson, when he arrived at the start of lockdown with only the clothes on his back after his father had cut off all communication. Angela wrote to tell me about the challenges she faced in carrying out her caring responsibilities to her grandson while his parents were battling through addiction. Those stories are all unique and important, but they share one fundamental truth: at a time of need, kinship carers across the country step up to provide love and care for a young family member at a really difficult time. They take on responsibilities, often at incredibly short notice, that they have not planned or saved for.

I fear that in the time available, and to ensure that as many colleagues as possible can speak, I will not possibly be able to do justice to the wide range of emails and stories that I have received. I hope, however, to be able to underline the passion and the urgency of their love and care, and highlight some of the clear areas where we can all work together to go further, faster for kinship carers in this country.

As a former councillor with responsibility for children’s social care, I got to see at first hand the moving and important work done by kinship carers to take on caring responsibilities and ensure that their young person could stay with a sense of place, with family and with familiar faces through difficult moments. It was as clear to me then as it is now that, where possible, kinship care provides an amazing and powerful way of ensuring that the traumatic moments in some young people’s lives have as little impact as possible on their development. It ensures that a young person’s true interests, and their need to stay with family and with a sense of identity and place, can be protected and supported.

It is no wonder that the independent review of children’s social care found that where young people across the country had been placed with kinship carers the outcomes were often far better. Those outcomes alone should be more than enough to justify the support that kinship carers need and are asking for. But if they are not enough to spur action, we should be clear: failing to support and maintain every viable kinship care relationship means propping up a broken and expensive care system that currently is all too often letting children down.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. The north-east, where my constituency is, has the highest proportion of kinship care households in England, and many of my constituents have been in touch with me about the difficulties they face. Many children raised in kinship care have experienced loss and trauma; does my hon. Friend agree that we need to do more to support those children and provide spaces for them to socialise with peers?

[Alistair Strathern]

Absolutely. I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. She highlighted a really important point, on which I would be keen to hear from the Minister in his response, about how we can all work together to make sure that support is put in place and that opportunities are provided for young people right across the country.

To return to what I was saying, in looking through the outcomes the independent review of children’s social care rightly found that despite the amazing work and commitment of kinship carers, we need to do far more as a country, and we need our Government to do far more to ensure that wherever kinship carers are taking on responsibilities, and wherever possible kinship placement exists, everything is done to support, nourish and champion those situations.

The children’s social care review set out a number of areas in which we could be going further. It was welcome to see some of the review’s recommendations being taken forward in the Government’s own strategy, announced in December last year. I thank the Minister for that, and look forward hopefully to hearing more about the Government’s action on those recommendations, and on further areas. Sadly, as welcome as some of the measures were, I have spoken to kinship carers and advocacy groups and it feels like they fell far short of the comprehensive support and recognition that those groups need to ensure that many significant recommendations from the review can finally be enacted in full.

I am sure there are lots of aspects that colleagues across the Chamber will want to focus on, so I will touch on just three, the first of which is the need for a clear and consistent local authority offer. One thing that came through loud and clear in the testimony is the postcode lottery that kinship carers currently face throughout the country in terms of the support on offer from their local authority. Amanda in my consistency faces a real battle. She potentially faces a cliff edge in support when she moves between local authorities and is rightly concerned about what that might mean for her and her granddaughter.

Shockingly, researchers found that over a third of local authorities do not even have a local family and friends care policy in place—something that legislation already requires. I am keen to hear more from the Minister about how the existing requirements are enforced and how the Government will commit to making sure that we have strong requirements on local authorities, including considering whether an active, outward-facing local offer, on a par with that for care leavers, might be helpful to compel some of the support we would like to see on this issue across the country.

The second aspect is the need for fairness when it comes to care and parental leave. Kinship carers take on just the same responsibilities as other carers and parents, often at much shorter notice, but do not currently benefit from the same entitlement to parental care leave as others. As Clare, a passionate kinship carer, said powerfully at a recent meeting of the all-party parliamentary group on kinship care, this cannot be right, and it has a real impact on kinship carers and the child they support at a crucial moment. I am keen to hear more from the Minister about why a right to statutory pay and leave on a par with adoption pay and leave was not committed to in the national kinship care strategy, and about what barriers the Department for Business and Trade might face to working with the Department for Education on making sure that that measure can finally be introduced.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly to many kinship carers in the room today, is the issue of financial support. When it comes to financial support, the commitment to pilots is a welcome step forward, but at the same time for many kinship carers that feels like yet another delay that may mean support is never in place to reach them and their young person.