Mental Health Services

Baroness Stedman-Scott Excerpts

Wednesday 25th February 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, for securing this debate; I am especially pleased that he has specifically referred to young people with experience of being in the care system. I declare an interest in that I am the chief executive of Tomorrow’s People and a fellow of the Centre for Social Justice.

I want to start by saying more generally that broken relationships lie at the heart of so many people’s mental health difficulties. Research suggests family breakdown and early separation are risk factors for the onset of severe mental illness, including psychosis, in populations where there is a greater prevalence of these factors. Moreover, even in seemingly intact families, inadequate and neglectful parenting often contributes greatly to various emotional and behavioural problems, such as panic disorders, ADHD, post-traumatic stress disorder and reactive attachment disorder. With around two-thirds of children coming into care having done so due to abuse or neglect, looked-after children have often been at the sharpest end of these adversities. Unsurprisingly, the emotional and behavioural health of half of looked-after children is borderline or a cause for concern.

What is perhaps even more troubling is that, according to a recent survey carried out by the Centre for Social Justice for its report Finding their Feet, half of care leavers still found coping with mental health problems “difficult” or “very difficult” at the point of exiting the care system. Things also seem to worsen during early adulthood: one study found that self-reported mental health problems doubled in the 12 to 15 months after leaving care and three-quarters struggled with loneliness. Social isolation is a well known risk factor for mental illness, including depression. This points to something seriously wrong with transitions from care. The Centre for Social Justice concluded that the care system very often fails to help young people build the relationships they need; the social isolation that often ensues can serve to compound the trauma of difficult early life experiences.

This need not be the case. For instance, much more could be done to ensure that children do not lose touch with siblings in care, which often means that a potentially valuable, lifelong relationship is lost; they lose what little bit of family they had. A shocking 71% of looked-after children with a sibling in care are separated from a brother or sister. Social workers say that they feel their training does not adequately prepare them for deciding when to place siblings together in care, but also that their options are narrowed by a lack of available foster placements for sibling groups.

Ensuring that broader networks of support are built up and maintained as young people are in the process of leaving care is vital. I particularly point to the recommendation of the Centre for Social Justice, supported by the British Association of Adoption and Fostering, to introduce the practice developed in the USA of “family finding and engagement”. In this model, professionals seek at least 40 individuals with some kind of connection to a young person. Casting the net so wide means there are almost always some reliable adults—perhaps a great aunt, or a former teacher or youth worker—able to make unconditional commitments to support children in care into the future.

The model that we have adopted of giving young people a coach in school to make sure that they do not leave school without a job or a training place could easily be adapted for young people in care. Having a coach—somebody personal to them helping them make the journey from care and the transition to adulthood—would really help young people. Moving into their lives in years 8 and 9, the coaches could help them become work-ready and able to fulfil their potential by instilling them with confidence, self-belief and self-discipline. Some 89% of children in care in the Orange County Family Finding Project made lifelong connections; both President Bush and President Obama ordered this approach to be a nationwide requirement. Let us do the same.