Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Baroness Tyler of Enfield

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, I am pleased to support these amendments, to which I added my name. My noble friend mentioned that the Joint Committee on Human Rights has supported her amendment, and as a member of that committee I wanted to say a bit about what it said in its report on the Care Bill, which was published this week.

The committee expressed its dissatisfaction with the Government’s response to it on this issue, and recommended that the Government bring forward an amendment, either to this Bill or to the Care Bill, to give parent carers of disabled children an equivalent right to a needs assessment for support. The committee acknowledged the existing provisions, but stated that,

“they do not equate to a clear and single duty in law which requires a local authority to carry out a needs assessment of parent carers of disabled children and to meet the eligible needs of such parent carers”.

My noble friend gave an example of the effect this can have on parent carers, who do such a hard job already. Their job is made that much harder by the lack of clarity about the law and what they are entitled to.

The Joint Committee on Human Rights quoted from what the Minister said in Grand Committee:

“We are clear that any change to the Children Act 1989 to assess the needs of parent carers separately would change fundamentally the principles of the Act and risk the needs of the children becoming second to those of their parent. Recent serious case reviews for Daniel Pelka and Keanu Williams have shown starkly what can happen when the needs of parents are put ahead of those of the child. Our approach to legislation and statutory guidance is that the needs of the individual child are paramount”.—[Official Report, 20/11/13; col. GC 479.]

The committee said:

“While we are clear that the best interests of the child are a primary consideration in all actions concerning children, we do not consider the references to cases of child abuse and neglect to be appropriate in the context of discussing the rights of parent carers of disabled children to a needs assessment for support”.

I have to say that I was shocked when the Minister said that in Grand Committee. The JCHR went on to say:

“Children’s rights are not in conflict with parents’ rights in this regard. Indeed, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child recognises that a child is not isolated from his or her family”.

Speaking about the UN convention, a UNICEF global study of independent human rights institutions for children spelled this out:

“An important aspect of the convention is that it does not consider the child as an isolated individual. Instead, it situates the child as a member of a family and community, recognizing his or her need for support to develop and thrive. Action to realize the rights of children can thus be envisaged as taking place within and through a triangular set of relations involving the state, parents (and/or guardians) and child”.

These amendments embody the spirit of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and I very much hope that the Minister will be able either to accept them or to bring forward alternative amendments on Third Reading.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

My Lords, the hour is late, so I will speak briefly in support of these amendments. I pay tribute to the tireless work of the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley.

As has been said, through other parts of the Bill, the new right to assessment and support that have been introduced for young carers is wonderful. It was also my privilege to look at the detailed scrutiny of the Care Bill. Again, the new right to assessment and support for adult carers is a landmark piece of legislation of which we can all be proud. As has been set out, the one group that falls between the stools are parent carers—generally parents who look after disabled children.

I, too, had the privilege last week of attending the meeting with the Minister. It was a very poignant meeting at which we heard three parent carers explain what life was like for them. One, I particularly remember, was looking after not one but three disabled children. She explained how she simply never had a minute for herself. She said that she was grateful for the support that she got in respite care for her children, but that she would be lucky to have the time to pop into the supermarket on the way home before having to go and collect the children or do something for one of her other children.

My final point concerns why I think that well-being is so important. What is often forgotten is the impact on the personal and family relationships of parents who look after disabled children. I felt that this was underlined very well in an excellent report in 2011 from Contact a Family. This showed the mental health problems that parent carers were having, including anxiety, depression and breakdown. They had to see their GP because they felt that their well-being was so poor, and they often had medication or had to see a counsellor. There was also an impact on their marriage, often with a breakdown in the relationship.

For all those reasons—I would love to say more but there simply is not time—I strongly hope that the Minister will be able to say something sympathetic in response to these amendments.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Baroness Tyler of Enfield

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Grand Committee

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 266AA would introduce regulations to enable shared parental leave to be taken on a part-time basis, if desired, rather than in blocks of at least a week. I am grateful to Working Families for its assistance with this amendment, which has the support of a long list of organisations, and to the noble Viscount for meeting me and Adrienne Burgess of the Fatherhood Institute recently.

The amendment attempts to hold the Government to their original proposal in the Modern Workplaces consultation: that parents would be able to take the new form of leave in,

“smaller chunks or on a part-time basis”,

if their employer agreed. This was warmly welcomed by both family organisations and employers, yet the Bill reverts to a minimum period of a week at a time. There are many arguments in favour of part-time leave, which is a feature of many parental leave schemes elsewhere in Europe. It would help low-income parents who may not be able to afford full-week periods of leave for any length of time. The TUC points out this week that inadequate financial support for new parents impacts disproportionately on low-income families. Indeed, more flexible leave that could be used to complement part-time work was proposed in a Joseph Rowntree Foundation report on tackling in-work poverty published just last week.

It would allow for a smooth transition back to work, which could make it easier to settle children into childcare. It could encourage fathers, who might be reluctant to take a full-time block of leave, to take parental leave. In doing so, it could help usher in the change of culture of redefining early parenting as a joint responsibility that the Government keep talking about and that many of us want to see. I shall expand on this when I move Amendment 266B. It could provide parents with flexibility and could make it easier for employers. It is worth noting that, in a recent survey by the Family and Childcare Trust, flexible working was parents’ top priority for improving the quality of family life. This is just one aspect of flexible working, but it is an important one.

The Government have said that they are sympathetic to the idea but are concerned at the administrative complexity involved. They have suggested an extension of keeping-in-touch days as an alternative solution. While such an extension is welcome, it is not a substitute for part-time leave. Parents do not have to be paid for attending keeping-in-touch days, which are designed for a different purpose.

If the Government are genuinely open to the idea of part-time leave, surely it would make sense to make provision for it to be introduced at a later date by secondary legislation, once it has found a way through the administrative hurdles. I therefore hope that the Minister will be willing to take this away and give it further consideration. I cannot believe that where there is a political will there is no legislative and administrative way. If the Minister is not prepared to consider taking such regulation-making powers, I can only assume that there is no political will to inject this important element of flexibility into the parental leave scheme, despite the fact that flexibility lies at the heart of the scheme’s policy objectives as set out in the impact statement. I beg to move.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

My Lords, to explain why I am sympathetic to this amendment, while I am supportive of what the Government are seeking to do through shared parental leave, which is absolutely right, the amendment raises two particularly important points. One is the position of parents on low incomes who will find it difficult to afford long periods of leave, particularly if they are working at less than the minimum wage. We know that the number of people working at, or even below, the minimum wage is significant.

Secondly, the amendment would allow that smooth transition back into work which may help children settle into childcare. From the work that I have done in other contexts around childcare, it is clear that it helps some children to be eased into childcare on a part-time basis, rather than going for a whole week’s worth. For those two reasons, I am particularly sympathetic and attracted to the amendment, although I cannot pretend to have been involved in all the detailed thinking around it.

Welfare Reform Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Baroness Tyler of Enfield

Monday 28th November 2011 Grand Committee

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 113B. In so doing, I declare an interest. I am currently the chief executive of Relate, which provides a wide range of services to separating families. I am also part of an advisory group of people from the voluntary sector which advises DWP Ministers on what a network of integrated support services might look like. From that point of view, it is important that that is clearly stated on the record.

I want briefly to support the case that has been put forward by my noble friend Lord Kirkwood as to why it is important that we incentivise non-resident parents to engage in the gateway process, as well as parents with care. There are two points I want to make. First, the gateway and the application charge—and I know that we will come to the charge in a later grouping—bite at the moment on parents with care wishing to use the statutory child maintenance system. The aim of this is to incentivise them to try to negotiate a voluntary agreement with the other parent instead. I support that. It is right and proper, where it is practical, that incentives to do so are built in. But there is no equivalent mechanism pushing the non-resident parent actively to engage in the process of trying to reach a mutually agreeable arrangement. As the legislation is currently constructed, it is only after a parent with care has paid an application fee of £100 and a statutory calculation has been made that any incentive will be given to the non-resident parent to reach a private agreement. That is basically very unfair.

My second point is a more positive one: the gateway stage is an opportunity for meaningful conversation between both parents. It aims to explore the scope for reaching collaborative arrangements, to assess what help either or both parents might need in order to arrive at such arrangements and to signpost and refer one or both parents—and, indeed, the children involved—to suitable provision and the help that exists for separating parents and families. Non-resident parents who are responsible for paying child maintenance should, I feel, be especially involved in this process.

I conclude by saying a couple of things that come very much from my experience at Relate. It is very important to children that both parents after separation continue to be involved as co-parents of those children. The relationship between the adults may be completely and utterly at an end, and indeed new relationships may well have been formed; but for that child, the active involvement—of course, where safe—of both parents is absolutely critical, emotionally, in practical ways, financially and in a range of other ways. It is critical that these new arrangements, however they are finally constructed, put the maximum possible incentive on both parents to see how they can discharge their responsibilities to be effective co-parents after separation—a responsibility which I think that most of us think is for life.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I, too, shall speak in support of Amendment 113B, although what I have to say is also relevant to Amendment 113DA in the next group. I, too, thank Gingerbread for its help.

I want to concentrate on how Clause 131 in particular, coupled with the wider government proposals to charge parents for use of the statutory child maintenance scheme, will disproportionately impact on women who, according to the Government’s own analysis, make up around 97 per cent of parents with care who are eligible for child maintenance. It seems very surprising that, at a time when the Government are worrying about the erosion of their support among women, particularly so-called C2 women, they should be proceeding with a policy on child maintenance which will unfairly impact on this group.

The Government say that the new gateway and the proposed charges are intended to drive behavioural change—yet again—yet in the brief circulated last week, the DWP acknowledges that a significant proportion of parents will not be able to collaborate and that there are circumstances where there will be no reasonable steps that they could take. Therefore, echoing a question I asked last week in relation to the benefit cap, what behavioural change are they trying to achieve in such cases? Is it really fair to subject this group to charges, particularly in the name of behavioural change?