Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

2nd reading
Thursday 1st May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, so much to say, so little time to say it. I welcome this Bill and many of its measures, but there is plenty of scope for further strengthening and improvement. I am also very much looking forward to hearing the two maiden speeches.

Although my main interest is in Part 1, I want to emphasise the interrelated nature of the two parts of the Bill. In order to attend, attain and thrive at school, a child needs to feel safe, secure and well supported and have good mental health and emotional well-being. Despite having the word “well-being” in its title, in my view, the Bill currently lacks measures that will improve the mental health and well-being of children. It is of real concern that, according to the latest PISA data, England’s young people have the lowest level of well-being in Europe. Evidence increasingly shows the link between school absences and poor mental health. There is also growing recognition of a gap in mental health support for children and young people who need a greater level of support than is currently available in school mental health teams, but do not require or are not eligible for specialist treatment from CAMHS. I intend to press to rectify this gap, based on my current Private Member’s Bill requiring a suitably qualified mental health professional in all schools, primary and secondary. Linked to this, I strongly support the introduction of a national well-being measurement programme for children throughout England, and I pay tribute to both Be Well and Pro Bono Economics for all their work in this area.

Data on children’s well-being and mental health is currently fragmented across the NHS, schools and local authorities. We should take the opportunity to introduce a national well-being measurement to focus efforts and provide a measurable standard from which we can mark progress. This will give all children a voice on the issues that matter to their well-being, allow regular tracking of national progress, support detailed cross-agency service planning at local level and provide new evidence on what works for improving well-being. It will also provide a framework to understand and enhance the Bill’s impact. Without this, we will never move forward.

There is more to do to strengthen the voice of the child throughout this Bill and ensure that their wishes and feelings are known and fed into decisions about them. As the noble Lord, Lord Bichard, reminded us, serious case reviews have repeatedly shown that a lack of information-sharing, duplicate record-keeping and conflicting information systems have resulted in missed opportunities to identify children and protect them from serious harm. The worst cases hit the headlines, and have been harrowing and heartbreaking. Having a unique consistent identifier for individual children will allow professionals working with them to share information easily and prevent them falling through the gaps, so I welcome its inclusion in Clause 4, but will the Minister commit to the full implementation of a single unique identifier by the next election? If so, can she confirm the use of the NHS number?

Early intervention plays a vital role in providing support to children and young people and giving them the help they need to thrive before problems escalate and families reach crisis point. I intend to bring forward some amendments in this area.

I end by asking the Minister what assessment the department has made of the impact of reductions in early intervention funding on rising demand for child protection services and care placements. There were so many other areas I wanted to talk about, particularly children in care, excessive profiteering, the national offer for carers’ leave, et cetera, et cetera. Time precludes me doing so, but I will certainly be returning to these issues in Committee.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 9th June 2025 Lords Chamber

This proposal has support from over 25 sector organisations, including the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, the NSPCC, Barnardo’s, the Children’s Commissioner for England and the British Association of Social Workers. It is time to protect children from assault and battery. I beg to move.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 173 in my name, and I thank my noble friend Lady Walmsley for adding her name to it. I am extremely supportive of Amendments 67 and 505, which were very powerfully introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay.

My amendment seeks to require the Government to prepare and publish a national neglect strategy to galvanise a sustained focus on neglect. For far too long, neglect has been absent from or underplayed in our conversations about supporting children and families. The role it can play is critical in reducing the number of children in care, which will be central to many of our discussions on this part of the Bill. The scale of neglect is significant and its impact on children far-reaching. Neglect is the most common form of maltreatment reported as the initial category of abuse on child protection plans. It was also the main reason for adults reaching out last year to the NSPCC helpline; indeed, new research from the NSPCC underlining this point will be published this week.

Neglect has some of the most profound negative and long-term effects on a child’s behaviour, educational achievement, emotional well-being and physical development. It impacts every area of a child’s life. Unaddressed, it prevents children developing their full potential and puts them at serious risk of harm. That it is the very antithesis of well-being, which is what Part 1 of the Bill is all about. However, unlike other forms of maltreatment, there is no national strategy for neglect, and existing practice guidance rarely refers to neglect-specific approaches and models. The NSPCC has reported that professionals have concerns about the lack of a national focus on neglect and how this has left many children without the right support at a time when family pressures are at an all-time high.

Requiring the Government to prepare and publish a national neglect strategy, as my amendment would, would make sure that we provide greater protections and support for children and families, better understand and address common drivers of neglect, such as poverty and insecure housing, standardise the use of evidence-based neglect tools to identify and respond to neglect and improve information sharing across agencies. Taken together, that package could be very powerful.

While neglect is prevalent in child referrals and assessments, a lack of action being taken to address it has become the norm. Indeed, so commonplace is neglect that it can be easy for professionals to either stop noticing it or become desensitised to its potential severity. Neglect is a complex harm, and it requires a great deal of professional skill to understand and assess its impact. I know that many professionals feel they are simply underprepared and underresourced to do so, and there are limited specialised professionals or interventions for them to draw on.

Indeed, research last year found that 83% of professionals in healthcare, the police, children’s social care and education believed that there was not enough service available to provide support for children experiencing neglect. Equipping professionals to identify concerns about neglect early, enabling parents to reach out for support in a non-stigmatising way and ensuring there are available sources to respond effectively to neglect are all vital to reducing the devastating impact it can have on children and—this is absolutely critical—to reducing the number of children going into care, which is currently at an all-time high.

With neglect being such a prominent category of abuse and often the earliest sign of mistreatment, surely it should, and indeed must, form the cornerstone of early intervention, which I think we all agree is so important. If we are serious about supporting families and helping children as early as possible, as I know we are, preventing and tackling neglect must become a central plank of our policy response. The need for a national neglect strategy needs to be given very careful consideration. I hope it is possible to do so during the passage of the Bill and I very much look to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very pleased to add my name to Amendment 67, so ably introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff.

For me, this is very much a question of children’s rights. As the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, said, Article 19 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child makes it clear that children must be free from violence and that Governments must do all they can to protect them from violence, using all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures. This amendment would ensure that the whole of the UK, not just Scotland and Wales, complies with the UN convention. Moreover, if we are taking children’s well-being seriously, we cannot continue to allow them to be subjected to physical assault. They are the only group, as the noble Baroness said, who are not legally protected from it.

Ministers say they are open-minded but want to see the review of evidence from Wales and from a range of voices. But, as already noted, we have ample evidence, from numerous countries, both of the negative impact of physical punishment on children’s well-being and the positive impact of its prohibition in terms of it having the desired effect of reducing the use of physical punishment. If she has not seen it, I would refer my noble friend the Minister to a recent article in Children and Youth Services Review which brings together much of that evidence.

As has already been noted, the evidence is sufficient for all the Children’s Commissioners, including from Wales, to be calling for reform. Indeed, they call the current law “outdated and morally repugnant” and reject the argument that it would lead to the criminalisation of parents. Polling shows consistent support among the general public for reform and new polling shows a majority of safeguarding professionals in support of change. Over half of social workers and teachers said the current law makes their work of safeguarding children more difficult.

I fear that the “waiting for Wales” argument is becoming a legislative form of “Waiting for Godot”. How long will we have to wait for another Bill that would provide such a perfect opportunity for reform? The Children’s Commissioners and a range of health and social care organisations are calling for urgent action now. Surely, we should be listening to them and stop prevaricating.

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[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 167 in my name is very much about early intervention, which has been a key theme of this group. I support Amendment 68 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett.

I also want to say how important Amendment 169 in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, and others is. I remember, in a previous life when I was chair of Cafcass, visiting various Pause projects. I was so impressed with the work they were doing and how it was preventing young mothers who had already had one or more children taken away from them and put in care from repeating that. I remember hearing the story of a mother whose eight children had all been taken into care. It was only when they were part of a Pause project that this terrible cycle stopped repeating itself. I am enormously supportive of that amendment.

My amendment is fairly important, if not as exciting as some of the others, because it would basically require local authorities to report annually on early intervention services for children and families in their area and report back to the Secretary of State. Frankly, we have already heard the context. We know that early intervention services are crucial for the healthy development of babies, children and young people, in particular giving them and their families access to the help they need before problems escalate and families reach crisis point.

We have heard the figures, so I am not going to repeat them. Local authorities have faced severe financial challenges. They have not been able to deliver nearly as many of those early intervention services as I am sure they would like, because their money has, frankly, been taken up with crisis and child protection services that they are under a statutory duty to provide.

We have heard about what has happened over the last decade and the reducing numbers of children’s centres, family hubs, family support services, youth services et cetera, so I am not going to repeat that, but I will just say that I felt the impact of this was starkly and clearly set out in Josh MacAlister’s independent review of children’s social care back in 2022. That review made such a powerful case for a stronger focus on early intervention and on giving families the help they need before problems get out of hand. I was lucky enough to hear Josh MacAlister talk about his review last week, in the context of additional help for children in care and care leavers. Who knows? We may even hear something—I live in hope—about additional money for early intervention in the spending review. Let us wait and see.

Both the economic case and the moral case for investment in early intervention are incredibly clear, so I am not going to set them out again. From all the discussions that I have been part of in this Chamber over the years on children’s social care, I know that ensuring that children and young people get the right support at the right time is widely supported across the political divide—I do not think it is a contentious issue politically—so I really hope we hear some welcome news in the spending review.

The nub of my amendment is that I contend that too little is known about the services currently available in the field of early intervention. The amendment is really designed to promote data collection on these services to create greater awareness of what is available. It would help the Secretary of State to respond to the needs of local authorities, ensuring that sufficient services were being provided across England, as well as better information on the numbers of families who were accessing them and demographic information about the children receiving support. It would measure how effectively the services were working. Put simply, to understand how we can better support children and target funding to help the most vulnerable, we need to know more about what the current picture really looks like. My amendment would simply be a first step in helping us to ensure that children and young people did not fall through the cracks of ineffective service provision and that they got the right support at the right time.

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We need to support this sector of caring. It is probably the best way that we can deal with what some might call the problems of and some might even call a crisis in the care system. I hope that Members will look carefully at all the amendments and how they can enhance what we currently have.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, briefly, I lend my support to these amendments, particularly Amendments 103, 104 and 146 in the name of my noble friend Lord Storey. As we have heard, it has been a very interesting group about the role that kinship care is playing. Okay, the number is somewhere between 100,000 and 142,000 or 153,000: it is an awful lot of children who, because they are in kinship care, are not going into the care system, with all the costs that we know that can bring with it. As the noble Baroness, Lady Sanderson, said in her very interesting and insightful contribution, kinship carers are often doing this at great sacrifice to themselves. Very often—most times—they are doing it out of love, but they are stepping up at a time of crisis to provide that love and care to children who would otherwise be in the care system.

I just want to underline the point that the period when the child moves in can be incredibly difficult and require a lot of support. Often the kinship carer, who would not have planned to have taken on parental responsibilities for one or more children, would have to spend time attending meetings with children’s services, be involved in court proceedings, maybe find a nursery, make arrangements with the children’s school, the GP or whatever. The list just goes on. They are all things that tend to need to be done during the day, during working hours, and they all take time and money, which is why I feel that a kinship care allowance and extending the pupil premium is so important and, most particularly, an entitlement for an individual to be absent from work on care leave at the moment when those arrangements are being set up is critical.

When I was looking at the very helpful briefing that I have been sent, I was reminded that a right to paid employment leave for kinship carers was recommended by the cross-party Parliamentary Taskforce on Kinship Care, the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care, which we have heard about this afternoon, and indeed by the House of Lords Select Committee doing post-legislative scrutiny on the Children and Families Act, which I actually chaired. I remember that we came forward with that recommendation, and I think it is incredibly important that we take this opportunity to do something about it.

[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

I start by saying how touched I am, and I really want to welcome the comments that have been made about kinship care in the Chamber this evening. It is such an important area, and I think we all have to put our hand on our heart and say that it is a set of relationships that has not been given its due recognition. The noble Lord, Lord Russell, talked about areas of good practice. I think we could all add areas where we know that places are getting it right. The noble Baronesses, Lady Sanderson and Lady O’Neill, talked about the general background and trying to imagine the situation when you know that a family member is getting into difficulties. As they quite rightly say, this becomes a moment of crisis when the risk to the children we are talking about is at its absolute highest.

The recognition of the importance of focusing on the outcomes for children and young people is to be welcomed and needs to be at the forefront of everything that we do. From a local authority perspective, we know that too many children are going into care. As we have heard tonight, this can have a detrimental effect on their prospects and outcomes over a long period. It also has an enormous impact on the budgets of councils, in particular where money could be invested into setting up more support networks in this area.

We are talking about supporting children to stay within their family and friend network, where that is safe and right for them. This is a priority for this Government. There is a general recognition that the support that kinship families have received to date has not been sufficient. We are working hard to address this. It is quite extraordinary that, until now, there has been no legal definition of kinship care. Changing that is something that we can all come together to welcome. As we have heard, access to information for the families involved can be a postcode lottery. Clause 5 is a significant step towards ensuring greater parity in information on the support that is available to kinship carers by requiring local authorities to publish a kinship offer.

Amendment 69B, tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, and supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott, seeks to ensure that information on support for kinship families, and not just children and carers, is included in the duty to publish a kinship local offer. I reassure the noble Earl that there is mention in the Bill of a review. New Section 22H(7), to be inserted by Clause 5, states that local authorities “must review” and keep up to date their kinship information. We agree that a whole-family approach is absolutely vital, but amending Clause 5 as proposed is not necessary. The list of information about services that can be included in a kinship local offer under Clause 5 is non-exhaustive. This has been done for a reason, and it already includes services relating to relationships which will assist kinship families more broadly.

The kinship care statutory guidance states that local authorities should empower families by prioritising family-led solutions, working collaboratively with family networks to support parents or carers to make and sustain positive changes, leading, we hope, to de-escalation of need or no further involvement with statutory services. Local authorities should engage with family networks, from early help and at every point through the children’s social care system, as set out in Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023.

There are other policies dedicated to families in need of support, which we have heard about already this evening, such as the family help programme, which aims to improve children’s outcomes and respond to needs and the circumstances of the family as early as possible to enable children to thrive and families to remain together. With a stress on family help, multi-agency child protection family group decision-making reforms are being rolled out across England through the Families First Partnership programme, with over £500 million of direct funding for preventive support for children and families.

Amendment 70, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, is on the categories of information listed under Clause 5. We agree that it is important that a kinship local offer should encompass information about the full range of support that is available in the local area. However, amending Clause 5 as proposed is not necessary, for the reasons that I have outlined. Clause 1 already sets out that family group decision-making will be offered, so to add it here would be unnecessary. As I have mentioned before, the listed categories of information about services for the kinship local offer are non-exhaustive and broad, meaning that local authorities can respond to their local strengths and local circumstances, and bring in services available in their area.

The kinship care statutory guidance sets out the expectation that a kinship local offer should set out the legal support that may be available to kinship carers and potential kinship carers, including the eligibility and extent of that support. This involves local relationships—the power of place—and health providers working with local authorities, bringing together all the possible solutions to a particular situation. As the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, has suggested, practical emotional support is absolutely key. We know that there is more work to be done. We need to look at the areas that are doing it well, learn from their experience, and make sure that it is taken up and expanded in every local authority area around the country.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 12th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Watson, having attached my name to all the amendments in this group that include extending Staying Put support for young people up to the age of 25. The noble Lord has already made the case very well, so I will not repeat all the stats and the recommendations that we had from the MacAlister report et cetera, but it is worth reflecting on how hard it is today for young people to be independent at the age of 21. The Office for National Statistics report last year showed that, across our society, the average age at which a child moves out of their family home is 24. Surely the state should also be providing the kind of care that children are getting in families.

I also have a genuine question that I have not been able to establish the answer to. These amendments and the Government’s plans cover both children in foster care and those in institutional arrangements. My understanding is that about 40% of 17 year-olds are staying in unregulated or independent accommodation, and it would appear that at the moment they are falling through the cracks and not being covered by either these amendments or what is happening here, so I would like to ask the Minister whether that is indeed the case and whether the Government have plans to act on that.

It is perhaps worth setting out the kind of story of what is happening now, which I doubt anyone in this Chamber would disagree is unacceptable. Last year the Big Issue reported on the case of a young man called Duncan, who was in care with a foster family that he had been with since age 11. He came home from college one day and found that all his bags had been packed up. It was a week after he turned 18. The foster carers were happy for him to stay, but social services simply said that was not an option and could not happen, and packed his bags up. Think about how utterly damaging that would be. Duncan was then put into supported accommodation. At 3 am the next morning, someone was knocking on his door looking for somebody else. There was drug dealing happening all around him. He had a bottle flung in his face by someone who was trying to throw it to someone else in that supported accommodation. That is what the state, as a corporate parent, is doing to a child at the age of 18. There are some places where some people are able to stay, but surely that should be the absolute standard provision. We need the parity in the Staying Close and Staying Put schemes, which is what these amendments would achieve.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I rise very briefly to lend my support to the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Watson, regarding extending the Staying Put scheme to the age of 25. My Amendment 130 does exactly the same thing but for some reason is in the next group. I will say a few words about it when we get to the next group, but I just want to underline my support. I think it is a very important issue.

[Baroness Benjamin (LD)]

My Lords, I support the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester’s Amendment 164 to introduce a national offer for child care leavers. This is strongly recommended by Barnardo’s because this amendment would end the postcode lottery of support for care leavers and help remove barriers to opportunity. Each year around 13,000 young people leave care without the support they need, and the outcomes of these young people remain much lower than those of their peers. That is why we at Barnardo’s—and I declare an interest as vice-president—believe that there should be a new minimum standard of support for care leavers: a national offer regardless of where they live. It should include measures recommended by Barnardo’s, which I hope the Government and the Minister will agree to.

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Moved by

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

95: Clause 8, page 13, line 7, at end insert—
“(2A) In subsection (2), after paragraph (f) insert—“(g) financial literacy and financial support.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would introduce a requirement on local authorities to publish information about the services they provide to support care leavers to develop financial literacy and to better understand their financial entitlements as part of their Local Offer for Care Leavers.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 95 and 130 in my name, and in doing so I draw attention to my interest in the register as a member of the Financial Inclusion Commission. I think the amendments in this group are very important. They look in broad terms at the support that is available to care leavers—an issue which we all understand is incredibly important. I am supportive of pretty much all the amendments in this group, in particular Amendment 99 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, which is about a national offer to care leavers and how that relates to local offers. No doubt we will come back to that.

I had the privilege of attending an all-party group meeting recently where we spoke to a large number of care leavers. I think the noble Lord, Lord Watson, was there as well. I was very impressed with the presentations that these care leavers gave. One of them made the key point that they would like to see a national offer for all care leavers to ensure consistency. I asked them to send me some more details about what exactly it would entail, because this is a critical issue.

My Amendment 95 is a bit more specific. It would require local authorities to provide more clarity on the services they provide to care leavers to help them develop their financial literacy and thus access their financial entitlements. As we have heard, young people leaving care are much more likely to leave home at an earlier age than other young people and be forced to live independently, often before they are ready. That means managing bills, a tenancy and other financial responsibilities, and juggling that with education or starting employment, often without having any financial safety net to fall back on, which so many parents provide for their children. I know it is stating the obvious, but there is no bank of mum and dad for this group of youngsters to fall back on.

Too often, care leavers are not aware of the financial entitlements and supports available to them from the local authority, such as council tax discounts, higher education bursaries or, more broadly, welfare benefits. This lack of information can lead to them facing unnecessary financial hardship or falling into rent arrears or debt. We all know that, once you start falling into debt, it is a vicious cycle and so hard to get out. All of this has a huge impact on their well-being and security. Care-experienced young people often report that they feel unequipped, unprepared and unsupported to manage the financial responsibilities that come from living independently from such a young age, primarily owing to the lack of support or opportunity to develop the skills and knowledge they need on such basic things as budgeting, money management and broader financial understanding.

That is why the amendment, which would introduce a requirement on local authorities to publish information about the services they provide to support care leavers to develop their financial literacy as part of their local offer for care leavers—we can come back later to whether that should be part of a national offer—is vital and could make such a difference to their life chances. Such a change would create more transparency for care-experienced young people about the financial support available to them and would help to address one of the main challenges they face when moving into independent living.

Amendment 130, as I said in the previous group, is basically about extending Staying Put to the age of 25. We have already had that discussion; I never quite understand some of the mysteries of grouping, so quite why we are having it in a separate group as well I do not know. The noble Lord, Lord Watson, set out the case very well. I shall just add that, as we heard in some of our earlier debates, young people leaving care often face a disproportionate risk of experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity. Care-experienced young people are nine times more likely to experience homelessness than other young people, and statutory homelessness rates for care leavers have increased by over 50% in the past five years, which underlines why I think extending Staying Put to the age of 25 is so important. As we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Watson, on the previous group, it involves a pretty small number of care leavers. The costs of doing this would be fairly modest and I hope, from what we have heard in the spending review yesterday and today, that some space is opening up. So, really, I am asking Ministers whether they will think again.

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

My Lords, I apologise for my earlier early intervention. Noble Lords know how passionate I am about early intervention and it got the better of me.

Amendments 97 and 99 are in the name of my noble friend Lord Farmer, who cannot be here today. My support for my noble friend in his amendments is grounded in a desire, which I am sure all noble Lords share, to see high national standards of support, not just pockets of excellent practice in some local authorities. Having said that, the requirement in the Children and Social Work Act 2017 for local authorities to publish their own offer for care leavers, which this would amend, is an important one. But it needs to be built on. A higher standard at a national level would not prevent innovative and exemplary councils doing even better, but it would force any that were lagging behind to improve. I suspect that those who are dedicated to their local care leavers’ cause and are working hard on the ground would welcome high national standards, as those would help them argue successfully for the enhanced leadership and financial support required to lift their offering.

Another reason why the local offer is an important part of primary legislation is that it includes services relating to relationships—a primary need for children coming into care, while they are in care and when they exit. My noble friend Lord Farmer, the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, and Lord Mackay, now sadly retired, tabled an amendment to the Children and Social Work Act 2017 that was eventually accepted by the Government, which included the important word “relationships”.

On Amendment 97, the Bill presents an important and timely opportunity to embed relationships more deeply into councils’ arrangements to support and assist care leavers in their transition to adulthood and independent living. We should do all we can to enable care leavers to maintain, strengthen and build family and social relationships. Family group decision-making provisions in the Bill need to be built on. Having gone to all the effort to bring together families and friends who are committed to a child potentially leaving their parents’ care, we cannot allow those relationships to fall through the cracks in their care pathway.

The Family Rights Group, which forged Māori-born family group conferencing into a British model over many years by working with families and children with relevant experience, has similarly refined the lifelong links model, which started as the family finding model in Orange County, California. Lifelong links ensure that children in care have a lasting support network of relatives and others who care about them. A trained co-ordinator works with the child or young person to identify and safely reconnect with important people in their lives, such as relatives they may have lost contact with, former foster carers, teachers or sports coaches. With family group decision-making becoming standard practice, many such people will, or should, have been involved in that process. Keeping these contacts going is a sensible and straightforward next step. The lifelong links approach has demonstrated significant benefits, including more positive and healthy connections in the child’s life and better mental health, instead of isolation and depression, or worse.

Knowing that they matter as an individual to people who are not the professionals paid to look after them gives a child a much better sense of identity. The practical wisdom and guidance that family and friends give often makes the care leaver far more emotionally stable, with a knock-on effect on their ability to hold down accommodation and training or education courses. This reduces the risk of homelessness and of a child trying to make their way without a goal or purpose. Without the motivation that positive relationships provide, it can be very hard to persevere. If you do not matter to anyone, it is easy to wonder what the point of bothering is.

The lifelong links model is currently available in over 40 local authorities across the UK, with 22 receiving Department for Education funding. Lifelong links is not named in this amendment, but, given all of the investment the Government have already made in evidence-building, it should be included in regulations and guidance as an offer to all children in care and care leavers.

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[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, that was a really disappointing response to Amendment 98. We started with a response to Amendment 78 which was excellent, a continuing annual dialogue by someone who was really involved in what is going on. When we get to this amendment, I am not offered a review at all, it is just the menu: no content of what has been done, how it has been done and what the excitements and disappointments of the year have been. I very much hope that the noble Baroness, when she reviews this day and looks in general, will say, “Actually, my first answer was the better one”, and that that sort of relationship between a local authority and its duties and the public produces a much better response than just a local authority setting out what its offer is and making no comment whatever on how its performance has been, and offering no interaction to the public in general as to how that is going on. I will talk to my noble friend on the Front Bench about coming back to this on Report. It was a more general look at how local authorities should relate to their public about what has happened this year and what they hope to do next year.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her comprehensive response. She used a word that I also thought of: it has been a very rich debate; it has been very wide ranging, with real passion, expertise and knowledge of the subject matter.

We all agree there is a strong moral imperative that we do all we possibly can to support care leavers as they make their transition into independent lives. I welcome and recognise the number of measures in the Bill that do that, but the whole tenor of this debate is that there is scope for strengthening. So many specific planks have been identified: health, housing, financial education, family relationships, et cetera. There is much to reflect on.

I was encouraged to hear that there is such a top-level, cross-government board looking at this, including Cabinet Ministers. That is really positive. Could this debate be drawn to its attention, so that it can see what we have said and the suggestions we have made? On the offer that should be available to all care leavers, it was helpful to have the distinction between some sort of national offer that is, essentially, the minimum standard that should be available everywhere and the local offer, where it is actually delivered. That will vary, but there is a set of standards below which it really should not fall. That is something we could think about further.

Rather than getting back into other issues or any disappointment about responses, I have a suggestion: would it be possible for interested Lords who have spoken in this debate to have a meeting with the Minister before Report, so that we could look together at where it is realistic to do the strengthening, which came across very strongly in this debate? On that basis, I withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 95 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

101: After Clause 9, insert the following new Clause—
“Promoting relationships for looked after childrenIn section 22(3A) of the Children Act 1989, at end insert “and a duty to promote the child’s family and social relationships in ways which are consistent with the child’s welfare.””

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

My Lords, I am afraid it is me again. I will speak to Amendments 101 and 102. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, for adding his name to Amendment 101 and, of course, to my noble friend Lord Storey. I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, cannot be in his place, because these amendments are both about relationships, which I know he feels passionately about.

In short, Amendment 101 is about promoting relationships with children in care. That is central to their well-being and therefore at the heart of the Bill. The amendment would strengthen the duty on local authorities to support the well-being of children in the care system by promoting the child’s family and social relationships alongside their educational achievement. Both are critical and interlinked.

We all need people to turn to in our lives for support, encouragement and love, particularly when times get tough. Research for the care inquiry by voluntary organisations concluded that the greatest failure of the care and child welfare system is that it too often breaks, rather than builds, relationships with children in and leaving care. Children often have to move to live far away from home, which means they have to change schools, leave behind family members, friends, neighbours and other important relationships. This is also relevant to Clause 11, which we will come to later, about children who have been deprived of their liberty. I will come back to that in a later grouping.

The absence of positive relationships in children’s lives increases the likelihood that they experience longer-term difficulties such as poor mental health—we have already heard about that—a tougher time at school, unemployment and homelessness. When young people leave care, their professional support network too often just disappears, and they do not have family or friends to turn to.

Charities such as the Family Rights Group have developed programmes of support to address this, such as lifelong links. I was going to talk about that, but the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott, did so in an earlier group, so I am pleased to say I do not need to. The crucial point I want to make is that these relationships should not be broken in the first place and that local authorities should be supporting children in care to maintain positive relationships with those who are most important to them.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Baroness Smith of Malvern) (Lab)]

My Lords, in speaking to the amendments in this group, I recognise that there is an enormous consensus in this debate about the significance of family and social relationships for looked-after children, for children in care and for all of us. This is why we feel so strongly that these are relationships we need to protect as far as possible for the children who are looked after by the state. It must be key, as several noble Lords have said, that we are able to maintain those strong relationships.

Perhaps at this point I should give a shout-out to my two sisters, who, after my mum, are the longest relationships by far that I have had in my life. As other noble Lords have said, when the going gets tough, it is your siblings who provide you with the support necessary—if you are as lucky as I am with mine—to get through those times.

We have a responsibility to help those children whose lives have been even more difficult to be able, wherever possible, to maintain those relationships. When a child is in care, as other noble Lords have said, the local authority must allow reasonable contact with the child’s parents, if it is consistent with the child’s welfare. These amendments seek to place equal duties on local authorities to allow reasonable contact with siblings of children in care. They also seek to strengthen wider family and social relationships for looked-after children.

We very much agree that it is important for a looked-after child’s welfare to, wherever possible, have and maintain positive relationships with their parents, siblings, wider family and friends. The importance placed on these relationships is echoed at all levels of a child’s care journey and is supported through current arrangements and statutory processes. We have heard in more than one debate today about the excellent work that has been done, for example, by lifelong links, which is supported in 22 local authorities by funding from the Government, and which is operating more widely than that. The noble Lord, Lord Storey, is right that, when it comes to relationships, we need to focus on quality as much as quantity and on the sustainability of those relationships.

For local authorities, there are existing duties in the Children Act 1989 to endeavour to promote contact between looked-after children and their relatives. This includes siblings, friends and other connected people, unless it is not reasonably practical or consistent with their welfare—the Children Act is clear about that. Good social work practice would ensure that there was a strong understanding of the people who are important in a child’s life, the nature of the relationships and an ability to be able to plan for how those relationships can be sustained.

Equally, when determining an appropriate placement for a child, local authorities must, as far as reasonably practical, ensure that the child can live with their sibling, if that sibling is also looked after. The importance of this is laid out in the care planning regulations. For those involved in care planning, regulations already make it clear that arrangements to promote and maintain contact with siblings must be included in a child’s care plan. This prioritises consistency, stability and lifelong loving relationships with those who are important to children and young people.

If a child is concerned about the level of contact that they have with their sibling or other family members, they should be encouraged to speak to a trusted person about this, be that their social worker, their independent reviewing officer—who has a responsibility to ensure that the plans being made for the child or young person are appropriate, including those that involve maintaining relationships—or an advocate. Under current legislation, in extreme circumstances children in care can apply to the court for contact with any named person, which could include a sibling, and siblings can seek permission from the court to apply for a contact order. Furthermore, as I think we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Meston, the court should consider contact in making a care plan for that child.

For foster carers and, for example, staff caring for children in children’s homes, there is statutory guidance and regulations to promote positive relationships between a child and their family and friends. More broadly, a very strong theme in the Bill is our working to promote strong family networks in all areas of children’s social care—for example, through the measures on family group decision-making, which we discussed right at the beginning of Committee. That might be an appropriate way to address the issue that the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, raised about bereaved children. The noble Baroness is right that, in those cases, it is particularly important that, at the point at which they are bereaved, children would be able to maintain contact with those who they have left in their lives.

I hope I have recognised the important arguments behind both these amendments, and that I have provided some reassurance to noble Lords that existing laws, regulations and guidance already strongly value, and have an expectation around, the importance of sibling relationships and other relationships, while ensuring children’s welfare. I suspect that this is a place where the law, regulations and standards are already in place. What we need to do is focus on the significance of this and on the good practice of social work needed to enable it to happen. Social workers around the country will be focusing on it, and I hope us having had this debate will make it more likely that it will be brought to the fore in people’s thinking. I hope, therefore, that the noble Baroness will feel reassured enough to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her very empathetic response. Following her example, I guess I ought to give a shout-out to my brother. We have been through some quite difficult times together, and that is what leads to that enduring relationship.

I thank all noble Lords who participated in this debate. It has been one of those debates that shows this House at its very best, and that we can deal with issues to do with love and emotions. I am grateful for the Minister’s response. My reaction is as follows: it may well be that this is currently written into existing legislation and guidance, but I know from all the care leavers I used to speak to on a regular basis that, far too often, it simply does not have much impact on the ground—and I think this was a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Meston. One of my objectives in putting this amendment forward was to have something in the Bill that makes it absolutely obvious that sibling contact is a right. It would be really encouraging for children in care to know that it was there.

Between now and Report, it would be helpful to have further discussions about the extent to which the problem is that this is just not clear enough in law, and so we need to put something in—which, again, as was said, would not have any cost implications—or whether it is more to do with social work practice on the ground. I am a great believer in both/and, so I think we may well be returning to this on Report. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 101 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

The Government need to act now and use this opportunity in the Bill to resolve the crisis in foster care by creating and implementing a dedicated foster care strategy which focuses on improving the recruitment of foster carers, including those who wish to work for IFAs.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, briefly, I lend my support to Amendment 143, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, to which I have added my name. This amendment, on the need for a foster care strategy, was, if I may say so, powerfully brought to life by the noble Lord, Lord Bird, and I thank him for that. The noble Lord, Lord Young, put it very well when he talked about the gap that exists, saying that we had strategies for other aspects of children’s social care but not for fostering. It is a gap that it would be useful to fill, in the same way that the amendment I brought last time suggested a strategy for neglect.

As we have heard, urgent action is needed to address the recruitment and retention crisis in foster care. Nationwide, it has been calculated that we have a shortfall of some 6,000 foster carers across the UK, with 5,000 more needed in England. Certainly, more foster carers are continuing to leave than are joining up. Various surveys have shown that the three key reasons for this have been inadequate financial remuneration, lack of support from their fostering service and a lack of respect for their role. I think that last one is really sad. I did notice in the 2024 State of the Nations’ Foster Care report that the number of foster carers who said they would recommend fostering to others has decreased. Indeed, fewer than half of foster carers said that they would recommend fostering to others who may be considering it. It is for those reasons that we need a national strategy to lay out how fostering will be more sustainable in the long term, not least to meet the needs of some of the children who the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, was talking about.

I also support Amendment 105, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Watson, which would be an important part of raising the whole status of fostering.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, the context for my Amendments 134 and 178 is, as we have heard in this short debate, that we face a very severe shortage of foster carers. As other noble Lords have said, this Bill feels like a huge missed opportunity to try to address this problem. Honestly, I do not really understand why the Government have not chosen to do more to address it—but perhaps the amendments in this group will offer the way.

The noble Lord, Lord Watson, and the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, mentioned that there is currently a shortage of 5,000 foster carers in England; that is 33 foster carers per local authority. It just does not feel like an insuperable problem to find 33 homes across the country in each local authority—though, absolutely rightly, my noble friend Lady Spielman spoke of the very high prevalence of complex needs in children who go into foster care.

This speaks to the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham and others about a strategy, which would also address the recommendation in the MacAlister review that we need more flexible models of fostering. As we have heard, of just over 160,000 families who expressed an interest in becoming foster carers in 2020-21, only just over 2,000 were approved—a conversion rate of 1.3%. I understand that many applicants apply to multiple agencies and so get counted twice. There may be timing issues for potential carers, and there are structural challenges, including pay and the need for training, and difficulties in the application process, as we have heard. This is the most significant area for the roughly 83,000 children in care. Over 56,000 of them are in foster care, half of them with independent agencies and half in local authority foster care. That is a very big and important number, and it feels fundamental to address it.

It sits at the heart of what we might call the children’s homes problem of cost and profits, which we will debate in subsequent groups. If we had more foster carers, the pressure would come off children’s homes, prices would adjust and we would be in a much better situation, particularly, as the noble Lord, Lord Bird, put so convincingly, because the wraparound of foster care—the fact that there is a family and relationships—leads to vastly better outcomes for the child. For all those reasons, this is an important group, and I hope that Amendment 143 is one that the Minister takes very seriously.

My amendments are much simpler. Amendment 134 would give more flexibility to allow young children over the age of three to share a room. My intention is that this would apply to primary-aged children, although re-reading my amendment I think that my drafting skills have come through yet again. Having talked to directors of children’s services in London and other areas with high housing costs, I know that the number of potential foster carers with several spare rooms is very limited. I am aware that some organisations in the sector see this as a safeguarding risk, but I argue that we are already trusting the foster carer to care for a very vulnerable child. Within that, we should trust their judgment about the sleeping arrangements of the children in their home. Sadly, safeguarding risks are not confined to what happens in a child’s bedroom. This amendment could potentially add several hundred more places, at little or no cost, in areas with the greatest pressure to place children locally, and would avoid children being placed very far from home—as we have heard about several times today—their roots and their communities.

This is not the only way to expand capacity. Another would be to invest in initiatives such as the Greater Manchester Room Makers scheme and roll it out more widely. It provides funding for foster carers to renovate existing rooms or build extensions to allow them to care for more children.

My Amendment 178 seeks to clarify the delegated authority that foster carers have for the children in their care. This was tabled in the other place by the honourable Member for North Herefordshire and received a positive response from the Minister. I seek further confirmation from the Minister here that the Government still intend to consult on this point. Perhaps she could update the House on the likely timeline for the consultation and for the secondary legislation to be amended.

Thinking more broadly, and returning to Amendment 143, it would help the House if the Minister could share other ideas the Government are working on to improve recruitment and retention. I spoke recently to the organisation Now Foster, which is developing “weekenders”—that might not be the right term—which offer regular weekend placements for children who might be either in kinship or foster care, giving much needed rest and space to both parties, and a consistency and stability for the child or young person that can extend beyond the age of 18. Crucially, it also gives foster carers a chance for a more modest but still substantial commitment, rather than taking in a child full time with everything that entails. This idea—again, this came up in the MacAlister review—of having different options and different models of fostering is long overdue for more work.

My noble friend Lord Young of Cookham talked about the importance of a support network for foster carers. I visited an amazing group of foster carers—some brand new and about to receive their first child, some who had been fostering for over 20 years—who are part of an employee co-operative, Capstone Foster Care, in Peasedown St John in Somerset. Again and again they spoke eloquently about the impact of that network on their ability to foster and to offer love and care to very vulnerable children.

They also talked—this ties in with the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Watson—about the need for a really positive recruitment campaign. Most people hear about fostering only when there is a case of severe neglect or worse. But across the House we have heard examples of many noble Lords who have either been foster carers or who recognise the extraordinary and life-changing work that foster carers do. We need that message to get outside this Chamber and out to people who might consider this and see it as a respected and important profession. We need more innovation in this area to unlock the potential in our communities to provide this kind of support for children who need it, and to improve retention.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 17th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Cash (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 116B, 117B, 117C and 117D in this group, which are tabled in my name. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Longfield, and to the noble Lords who have already spoken. I agree wholeheartedly with what has been said so far.

The intention behind these amendments is to address the issues of attachment, disruption and trauma, which can ensue from housing children too far from home—noble Lords who have already spoken have addressed this. We know that we can minimise the damage and effects of being housed too far away by proximity. I have therefore tabled amendments in a probing manner to invite the Minister to reflect on whether there is some way in which these concerns, as expressed in Committee today, could be accommodated in this legislation.

Amendment 116B essentially proposes a duty to collect sufficiency data. It would address the basic idea that you cannot plan what you do not measure. We know from the MacAlister review and from many other organisations which support RCCs—as, indeed I do—that there are concerns about current provision already, and that we need to make sure there is strategic visibility, so that RCCs working together know how many foster carers, residential beds and emergency places are truly needed and where investment is most urgent. In the independent review commissioned by the last Government, the now Labour MP Josh MacAlister was very clear that data should drive the planning. I urge the Government Benches to consider that viewpoint. This amendment would give legislative force to his recommendation. It would allow readily available data to be collected so that we could target spending wisely, empower the local leaders who are responsible for assigning the places and avoid waste.

Amendment 117C just builds on the previous proposal requiring the RCCs to publish an annual sufficiency report. It is a basic governance issue of transparency and accountability, which would allow the local authorities, providers, Parliament and, most importantly, children and their families, to know whether the system is, in fact, working. Placement decisions, as we know because there has been a lot of coverage of it, are currently shaped by what is available at the time. Many of us in this House have concerns about supply being driven by various commercial providers. The amendment would help to reverse some of that by making the data transparent at a ready time. It would also ensure that the RCCs are open and responsive to their stakeholders, the local authorities, and to Ofsted, ensuring that young people and foster carers were accommodated rather than the commercial providers. This public report would really just amount to good governance.

Amendment 117C involves the use of the sufficiency data to inform the commissioning and it follows on from the previous provisions. I have said already that I support the amendments proposed by fellow noble Lords, and these proposals invite the Government to consider in what way the best accommodation of this data collection takes place. This amendment would ensure that placement commissioning was rooted in real need, not market convenience. It would help RCCs to invest early in local provision and reduce the reliance—which worries all of us—on expensive private options, which have been driving children to be accommodated out of their local areas, with all the concerns that the noble Lord, Lord Meston, has raised in relation to that. The amendment also aligns with the ambition of all parties in this House for relational and stable care for children, rather than a race to the bottom in pricing or availability.

Amendment 117D would put the focus on the outcomes for children. I emphasise this amendment because it ties in with the stated objectives of this Bill, whose title includes “Children’s Wellbeing”. It cannot be right that RCCs will be introduced without the requirement to collate data showing whether or not they are working for the very children that they are intended to provide for. It connects two critical questions: did we have enough places, and did we make a difference? As noble Lords know, the children’s care system is too often evaluated on the inputs—how many beds, how many carers—but what really matters, what is really going to make a difference, is whether those children are safe, settled and supported to thrive, hopefully in proximity to their own families or kinship that may be available to them. The amendment would allow the RCCs to link their planning with real-world results, helping the Government and local leaders to learn what works so that there can be continuous improvement.

I believe the amendments are proportionate and sensible measures that meet the stated purpose of the Bill, and I beg the Government’s support.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 117 in my name, and I thank my noble friend Lady Walmsley, the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and the noble Lord, Lord Russell, for adding their names to it.

This is an important group. Many times in discussions on the Bill, and more generally, we have talked about the dangers of children being placed far away from home. That is why this is such a critical group. I strongly support everything that has been said so far and the amendments that have been tabled specifically with regard to trying to prevent children from being placed far from home when there are any other viable alternatives.

The intention of my amendment is quite simple: it is to ensure that those making decisions affecting children and young people seek and take into account their wishes and feelings. I shall say a couple of words of general context. I welcome the Government’s ambition to be a child-centred Government, and I support the important steps taken in the Bill to strengthen systems that intend to do that and to keep children safe, but there is more that the Bill could do to be truly child centred. At the moment, it needs to do more to embed real consideration of children’s wishes and feelings—hence my amendment, which was discussed on an earlier occasion, about children’s wishes and feelings being respected in relation to family group decision-making.

In 1991, the UK ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. In so doing, we recognised that children have a distinct set of rights that uniquely value all that it means to be a child. In short, it recognises that children are expert in their own lives. As we know, in cases of abuse and neglect, giving children the opportunity to express their views is a critical factor and lever in building trust and keeping children safe.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Agnew of Oulton (Con)]

My Lords, there are around 35 state boarding schools in the country, but there are also a number of private boarding schools that are ready to provide support, which is why I mentioned the Royal SpringBoard scholarships and bursaries that are available. I completely accept the noble Lord’s point—that people need to be kept, wherever possible, near their homes—but we need flexibility. We must not make the perfect the enemy of the good. If there is a good boarding school place that is reasonably accessible to the child’s home, but more importantly to the foster carer or kinship carer, then that is what matters. But I take onboard what the noble Lord said.

In her summing-up of Amendment 82, the Minister spoke about stability of setting, and she was very right. The Norfolk study showed that there was a very strong correlation between improvements in those children’s well-being and the length of tenure. The study showed that three years of continuity made a tremendous difference. I hope the Minister will consider this amendment.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, before speaking to my Amendment 129, to which the noble Lord, Lord Russell, and my noble friend Lord Storey have added their names, I first add my very strong support for Amendment 144 by the noble Lord, Lord Watson. I am sorry that I did not manage to add my name to it; it deals with such an important issue.

I was shocked to read a report by the Children’s Commissioner, which said that last September, there were 775 children in unregistered homes, including children under the age of 10, children who had spent over two years in those homes and children in entirely inappropriate unregistered settings such as caravans. Staggeringly, the average cost was over £1,500 a day, with an estimated total annual cost to local authorities of over £400 million. As the Children’s Commissioner said, and I very much agree with her, the use of these homes is a national scandal. Vulnerable children are being failed. We would not allow it for our own children, and we simply should not allow it for those for whom the state is corporate parent. Therefore, I very strongly support phasing out unregistered accommodation.

My Amendment 129 is closely linked to the discussion we had on the first group about children being placed far from home. It would amend

“the sufficiency duty to prevent children being moved far away from home”

when that is not in their best interests. We heard a lot of the arguments in the previous group, and I will pull out a few specifics.

In recent years, there has been a marked and shocking rise in the number of children in care who are moved far away from their support networks and communities. Last year, more than a fifth of all children in care were living more than 20 miles away from home. That might not sound far but, frankly, that is a long way from family and local support networks. In addition, more than 3,000 children were living more than 100 miles from home—that is 4% of all children in care—and more than 800 children under the care of English local authorities were living in Scotland and Wales. Although I accept that there may be legitimate reasons why children in care are moved far from home—safeguarding, preventing them being exploited or harmed, or their being moved to wider family networks—far too often it is simply because of a lack of appropriate local options.

As highlighted by the charity Become in its Gone Too Far campaign, being moved far from their family, friends and schools can have a significant and long-term adverse impact on children’s relationships, mental health, well-being, sense of identity et cetera—the sort of things we discussed in our last session on relationships.

Clearly, local authorities across the country have faced a number of challenges recently—that is why we have just had the discussion about regional care co-operatives —particularly in ensuring that there are the right number and type of homes in their local area to meet the needs of children under their care. The current sufficiency duty is not fit for purpose, and there is a lack of accountability and oversight regarding the extent to which sufficiency is being fulfilled.

That is the reason for tabling this important amendment, which seeks to strengthen the sufficiency duty by requiring local authorities to plan, commission and deliver provision and to take “all reasonable steps” to ensure that children in care remain living within or near to the local authority. The amendment builds on recent reforms by the Welsh Government, and we would very much benefit from taking it forward.

[Lord Farmer (Con)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 119 tabled by my noble friend Lord Agnew, to which I have added my name. He spoke very persuasively for it.

I did read the Minister’s response to the debate last Thursday on Amendment 82, which would similarly have made it compulsory for children in kinship care to be offered such a place. I agree with her answer in pretty much all respects. She recognised the positive impact that boarding schools can have, but they should not be the default for all children living in kinship care. She cited the importance of stability in education and friendships to well-being and educational outcomes. Moving schools would, of course, be potentially highly detrimental.

I ask the Minister: could she work with me and my noble friend Lord Agnew to word this legislation to remove any sense of default? My aim is simply to make this option available to all, as this is currently not the case. The arguments and evidence—for making the boarding school option available to both children in kinship care and children in local authority care—overlap significantly in these amendments. My noble friend Lady Berridge eloquently made the case for Amendment 82 when I was unable to be here, so I will not repeat it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Farmer (Con)]

My Lords, it is an honour to follow the noble Lord, Lord Meston, whose wisdom and experience of the court processes in this area are, I am sure, very valuable to the Committee.

I will speak to Amendment 133 in my name. I have also added my name to that of my noble friend Lady Barran on Amendment 120. Amendment 133 states:

“Information required to be published by a local authority includes information about the authority’s arrangements for enabling children subject to deprivation of liberty orders to maintain, strengthen and build family and social relationships”.


This Bill picks up much of the intent of Josh MacAlister’s Independent Review of Children’s Social Care, but one of its key emphases, the importance of relationships, could feature more prominently throughout. Josh’s review drew on an experts by experience board informing his recommendations: young people and adults who had been through the care system. They said in the foreword that this review was their chance

“to reshape the system by placing relationships front and centre”.

I was on the design group on that review, and this emphasis came through again and again in evidence—hence the first paragraph of the report, which states:

“What we need is a system that … puts lifelong loving relationships at the heart of the care system”.


It calls for a reset that

“starts with recognising that it is loving relationships that hold the solutions for children and families overcoming adversity”.

On an earlier group of amendments focusing on care leavers, my noble friend Lady Stedman-Scott said we need to make sure that the loving, committed relationships that come to the fore in the family group decision-making process do not fall through the cracks in a child’s care pathway as they walk along it. If the local authority intentionally helps a child or young person to maintain them from day one, these relationships will not only be there when the child leaves but have the potential to transform the whole experience of being in care.

My noble friend Lady Stedman-Scott talks very effectively about the lifelong links model imported from California and thoroughly adapted and tested by the Department for Education for British children, families and friends. Lifelong links ensures that children have a lasting support network of relatives and others who care about them throughout their time in the care system. In my work with the Ministry of Justice, I have recommended it for children in the youth custody and wider youth justice system, with whom children deprived of their liberty are an overlapping cohort.

We can underestimate the strength of the pull towards blood connections. Without the corporate parent’s gentle hand on the tiller in this area, many young people in or leaving care go looking on the internet and social media for family members, and not all of them will be beneficial relationships. While I would like lifelong links to be included in regulations and guidance as an offer to all children in care, care leavers and those deprived of their liberty, as the Minister said, this programme is being evaluated. Whatever its future, local authorities should be required to be intentional and systematic about relationships. Children in care, especially when they are in trouble in care, desperately need to feel that they belong somewhere.

Mark Riddell MBE, the Government’s national adviser for care leavers—at least, I think he still is; he certainly has been for some time—tells how his turnaround moment came when he was about 14 years old in the Scottish care system and had just trashed the children’s home where he lived after several failed placements. He had been called to the manager’s office, so he packed his black bag, expecting to be moved on again. The first thing the manager said to him was, “What’s that bag for?”. Mark said, “It’s all my stuff; you’re going to kick me out”. The manager told him, “We can sort out the damage, but you’re not leaving: this is your home”. Knowing that he belonged somewhere and that people were committed to him, regardless of his behaviour, finally settled him down, and he is now a voice for government.

Young people deprived of their liberty need a profound sense of belonging. Relationships with dedicated and compassionate staff are essential, but they also need to know that they have not been abandoned by their families, friends and other trusted adults. They belong in a relational web. We must not let this be torn apart by the already very traumatic experience of being deprived of their liberty.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I will make a couple of points and ask a question. Like others, I have found this both a very humbling and a very disturbing group, which, in the words of the noble Lord, Lord Meston, has shone a light on a little-understood area and highlighted some disturbing details. It is an area that I now realise I knew far too little about and that has not received anything like the transparency that it should.

The two points I want to make are on Amendment 127 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, about placing a duty on local authorities to provide therapeutic treatment for children who are subject to a deprivation of liberty order. It reminds me of all the detailed scrutiny that I and other noble Lords gave to the Mental Health Bill during its passage in the first few months of the year.

One of the things that was particularly in my mind was that that Bill included four core principles for making decisions about detaining people under the Mental Health Act, and one of those was that it would be of “therapeutic benefit”. I think it was the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, who told us that for quite a few of the children who would be subject to these deprivation of liberty orders, it would be because of their severe mental health problems. It struck me that there are parallels between the two Bills; and in the same way that we have said in the Mental Health Bill that detention must be of therapeutic benefit, Amendment 127, which is about providing therapeutic treatment for children subject to a deprivation of liberty order, is particularly important.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 17th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sanderson of Welton (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 134A, in my name, which is in one sense a fairly limited amendment compared to some of the other proposals in this group. I understand all that, because what we are trying to deal with in this group is one of the most controversial realities in children’s social care—the reliance on private provision, and in particular the role of private equity firms.

More than 80% of children’s homes are run by for-profit companies—a rise of more than 20% since 2010. A large proportion are owned by private equity groups carrying large debts and creating instability in a sector meant to protect the most vulnerable. It was the concerns about the market that the Minister has mentioned that led to the CMA launching its market study, completed in 2022. It identified a shortage of suitable children’s homes in the right places, as well as high costs. It says that, with local authorities paying excessive fees to private providers,

“the largest private providers of placements are making materially higher profits, and charging materially higher prices, than we would expect if this market were functioning effectively”.

As we have discussed in the previous group, we have seen a rise in the number of children placed in unregulated homes as the pressure to find placements has intensified.

As noble Lords might expect, in the Explanatory Notes for this Bill, and as the Minister has stated, one of the aims is to improve local authorities’ ability to shape the children’s social care placement market and to tackle profiteering. There are a number of measures to address this in the Bill: there are new powers for Ofsted to find unregulated homes across multiple settings in the parent undertaking—although, as we have heard, this may not go far enough; and the Secretary of State will have the power to cap the profit that providers can make. However, as is made clear in the Explanatory Notes, this is a power that would be used only if the other market interventions outlined in Keeping Children Safe, Helping Families Thrive do not sufficiently improve the functioning of the market. Yet, as with the previous amendment that I mentioned, some of the measures mentioned in this Green Paper have not been brought forward in this Bill.

One notable exception is the proposal to improve the data that individual local authorities hold on the prices paid for private placements, and to improve the sharing of that data—hence this amendment, which would require local authorities to publish annually the prices that they pay for private placements in children’s homes. This would

“ensure that local authorities are supported to better understand, shape and commission placements that suit the needs of children in their area and bring transparency to the cost of placements”.

That last bit is a direct quote from the Government’s own policy statement, so I am rather hoping that the Minister might agree with me.

If I may, I would like to give an example of why this data is important and how the current system works in the interests of the larger providers while threatening the viability of the smaller operations. I have a friend who runs a children’s home. He has one property; he runs it well and, as a result, has children who often stay with him for a number of years. Every year, he has to fill out a spreadsheet to justify any price uplift to the local authority for existing placements. He is told that this information is supposed to ensure that uplifts are transparent and fair across the board—but it is not transparent, as it is not shared with him, nor is it fair. Typically, his uplifts have run at about 2%, although one year it was only 0.2% However, if you are in a home with regularly changing children, it is possible to set the price for placements each time. As a result, and only through a chance conversation, he discovered that he was being paid £1,500 per week less than one of the large private providers in his area offering the same one-to-one support for a child with very similar needs.

The net result of all of this is that my friend continually struggles to keep his head above water, despite being a responsible provider running the type of home which we are all agreed we need more of. If he was able to see the data on payments made to other providers in the area, it would help him negotiate more equitably with the local authority, which in turn would shore up his perennially fragile position. There are benefits on the other side, too, for the local authority. As in the words of one practitioner, “If we were all more transparent then there would be less chance that private providers can pick us off one by one, re prices”.

The Government have said that they will engage with the sector to bring about greater cost and price transparency, but, as we know, local authorities are not great at sharing data. Would the Minister consider mandating the publishing of this data as part of this Bill? I understand—it has been mentioned previously—that Governments are rightly cautious about the number of requirements that they place on local authorities, but given the level of distortion in the market and the urgent need for more suitable homes, there is a solid case to be made in this instance.

I suspect that in her response the Minister will point me to the regional care co-operatives, which will of course lead to greater data transparency. However, what it does not do is to solve the problem for the smaller providers. As with other measures in this Bill, it is another late-stage intervention, so it is a step to be taken, such as imposing fines, when things have already gone wrong. What seems to have got lost along the way are some of those positive preventive measures that originated from the Government’s own policy paper; they have just fallen by the wayside. To be honest, I am slightly puzzled as to why that is the case, but perhaps the Minister can shed some light on the matter, or perhaps, dare I suggest, she might consider reinstating them into this Bill.

I turn to some of the other amendments in this group. My amendment does not go as far as Amendment 174, from the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, which seeks to remove private companies from the market as has happened in Wales. I think that our mutual agreement thing may have fallen down now, because I do not think that it is feasible or desirable to ban private provision; that would only increase the capacity shortfall, and we need responsible private investment. I do not think that we should disincentivise private providers from investing in new capacity or do anything to further destabilise the market. That is why I understand the concerns of my noble friend Lady Barran about the proposed profit cap, which the CMA thinks would be unworkable. It is also why I support her Amendment 142A, which would exclude individuals from financial penalties.

While I have purposely limited my amendment to children’s homes, the same principle of data sharing to create a fairer market certainly applies to fostering agencies, where there is a similar problem. While private investors operate less in the space of supported accommodation, it is not unheard of, so I understand the reasoning behind Amendments 140 and 142, which would include supported accommodation a little more in the Bill.

Finally, on Amendment 141, from the noble Lord, Lord Addington, I am afraid that this is not my area of expertise, but I look forward to hearing his reasoning behind it. I beg to move.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 140, in my name, and I thank my noble friend Lord Storey for adding his. It would extend the scope of Clause 14 to cover independent providers of supported accommodation. This is a really important group of amendments: the whole area of financial oversight and profit caps is incredibly important, and I suspect we are not all going to have exactly the same views on it.

To put things into context, I welcome the raft of measures in the Bill to strengthen regulation and oversight of the care system, particularly the new provider oversight measures, Ofsted’s new power to fine providers of unregistered children’s homes, the financial oversight mechanism, and the profit cap. I firmly believe that these measures are welcome steps in the right direction in addressing some of the structural problems facing the care system and the sort of issues we have talked about so often in this Chamber: excessively high profit levels and rising care costs, at a time when local authorities are under huge financial pressure; the power imbalance between local authority commissioners and the largest private providers; the risk of sudden market exits due to high debt burdens from private equity-backed providers; and the growth in unregistered children’s homes, which we have already rightly focused on. That is a pretty toxic mix, and we really have to take the opportunity the Bill provides to do something about it.

That is the big picture, but turning briefly to my amendment, as we have already heard, in the last six years there has been a very significant rise in the number of children in care aged 16 and 17 who are living in supported accommodation. It is important to be clear what we mean by supported accommodation. It is for young people, 16 and 17 year-olds, who may have already started to make some sort of transition to more independent living but who still require a fair degree of support. Many supported accommodation settings, such as children’s homes and foster homes, are run by private companies, many of which are very large. Local authorities currently have no way of knowing the debt level being carried by these large private companies and whether there is any risk of the company or provider failing financially—which, of course, could have drastic implications for the children living in these settings. So, given the significant and growing number of children living in supported accommodation, it is important that the new financial oversight measures in Clause 14 are extended to independent providers of supported accommodation as well as providers of children’s homes and fostering agencies. My amendment would achieve this, and in so doing would provide a consistent approach across the different care settings and a safeguard for local authorities, so they can identify and mitigate the risk of providers suddenly closing multiple supported accommodation settings.

Finally, nine times out of 10, the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and I agree on pretty much everything. We often support each other’s amendments and speak in the same debates, but I do not quite share her position on removing the profit motive altogether from children’s social care. Far more needs to be done to regulate it, but there is a place for the private sector in the children’s social care market; it just has to be properly regulated.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler—whether I agree with her or not. I note the phrase that she used, “toxic mix”.

I think there has been broad agreement around the Chamber, including on the Government Benches, that we have a huge problem. The Minister said on one of the earlier groups that the market has prevent local authorities meeting their duties. Here, I would stress the phrase “the market”. What I am postulating is that “the market” is not the appropriate way to ensure that we have the right care in the right places with the right services—and that is a statement of a Green Party philosophical position. We do not believe that profit should be made from any form of care.

In this case, that is also very clear from what people have been saying. The Minister also said on one of the earlier groups that the current market has driven us to this, and the noble Lord, Lord Russell, said that the market is clearly not working. So, yes, it is my ideological position, but I have an overwhelming argument here for saying that the market is just the wrong model for providing this sort of care for vulnerable young people and children.

My Amendment 174 proposes a new clause that would prohibit the delivery of children’s social care services by for-profit companies. It has two very simple provisions, the first being that any new institutions created under the Bill should be not for profit. It says that within five years of the Bill being passed, what is now for profit would be converted. As the noble Baroness, Lady Sanderson, rightly said, this follows the model of what has already happened in Wales. I acknowledge that Wales is smaller than England, but none the less Wales has shown the way. It is worth looking at why Wales went that way.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 2nd September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, having listened to the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, he has totally persuaded me that Amendment 254B should be adopted, and I hope the Minister will respond sympathetically to it.

Amendment 257A in my name would require the statutory local registers of children not in school to include whether a child is a young carer, and whether a young carer’s needs assessment has been carried out. It is a revised version of Amendment 251 in my name and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, and the noble Lords, Lord Russell and Lord Storey. The wording is identical, but by amending new Section 436C(2) rather than new Section 436C(1) it makes it easier for local authorities to comply, because new Section 436C(1) is compulsory with no exceptions, whereas new Section 436C(2) refers to information that the local authority has or might reasonably obtain.

I thank the Minister’s officials for the constructive discussions that they had with the Carers Trust and local carer services on this issue. They led to this new amendment, which I hope improves its chances of acceptance. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, and the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, for indicating their support for this revised amendment. The amendment is closely related to Amendment 209, which we discussed on 3 July. That would require local authorities to ensure that they have offered a young carer’s needs assessment if they are notified of a pupil who is being withdrawn from school. Amendment 257A, which we debate now, complements that by including such information on the register.

I will not repeat the arguments for improving the protection for young carers, but I mention very briefly the case of Salma, who is caring for her mother, who has physical and mental health issues, and her father, who has physical health issues. She was taken out of school after being subject to bullying. The parents stated that they were home-schooling her while always working towards getting her back into specialist provision. After Salma returned to that specialist provision, she admitted that no home-schooling had taken place and she had been caring around the clock. She had missed one and a half years of school before she was given a permanent placement in that specialist provision. So, repeating what I have said before, I am not saying that a young carer should never be home-educated—I have listened to the powerful arguments from my noble friends and from the noble Lord, Lord Crisp—but we need safeguards for the reasons I have just given so that children do not slip off the radar, to use a phrase that the Minister used in an earlier debate.

Related to the previous amendment and this one are delays in carrying out a young carer’s assessment. I raised this in July and the Minister wrote to me on 9 July—I am grateful for that. She told me that the Care Quality Commission is currently assessing how well local authorities perform their relevant duties under the Care Act 2014 and that every local authority will have been assessed by next March. She also strongly urges all local authorities to sign up to the No Wrong Doors for Young Carers initiative. Following the CQC report, I hope that the Government will take strong action against local authorities that are underperforming.

Turning specifically to the amendment, the addition of young carers to the school census is helping to increase the visibility and understanding of young carers within schools and of the impact that caring can have on educational opportunities. For example, we now know that young carers in our schools are missing over a month of their education each year. So including young carers on this register will help ensure that local authorities can comply with their statutory duties under the Children Act 1989, which requires them to take reasonable steps to identify young carers who might be in need of support. By including young carers on the education not in school register, local authorities will be better able to work with families and local young carers services to ensure that caring responsibilities do not mean that the child misses out on education.

Finally, to put it in perspective, there are around 15,000 children who are caring for an alarming 50 hours each week, including over 3,000 children aged between 5 and 9. A further 21,000 children are caring for 20 to 49 hours a week. This has a huge impact on their health and their future life chances. Young carers taking on significant caring responsibilities are 86% less likely than their peers without caring responsibilities to obtain a university degree and 46% less likely to be in employment. Currently, it takes far too long for these young carers to get the support they need—on average three years, with some going more than 10 years without support. That is why this amendment seeks to ensure that this group of children is at the front of our thinking when we are talking about children not in school.

The clause, if amended, would mean that young carer status would be included on the register only if the local authority knows that the child is a young carer or could reasonably obtain such information. But, given that the majority of young carers are not identified, will the Minister say what steps the Government are taking to ensure that local authorities are complying with their duty to identify young carers outside education?

This simple amendment is an important small step to help ensure that all young carers are able to have the same educational opportunities as their peers, whether they are educated in school or elsewhere.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I rise briefly in support of the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham. I added my name to his original amendment. I am afraid I was a bit slow off the mark in adding it to his revised amendment, to which the noble Lord has just spoken. I strongly support it. The noble Lord has set out the case for it extremely well.

I want to emphasise a couple of points. I have always had concerns about young carers being withdrawn from school for home-education. I am concerned that they do not get the necessary breaks from caring responsibilities. We all know how important respite care is for all carers, particularly young ones. Young carers can find themselves taking on ever-increasing levels of caring responsibility. Some of the case studies I have been looking at may well be at the extreme end of the spectrum, but they were talking about young carers who were looking after mum and dad with multiple physical and mental health needs, as well as looking after two or three younger siblings. I really do not know how on earth they can take on that caring responsibility and still ensure that they are educated.

I was also very struck by the statistics mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Young. He said that over 15,000 children were caring for 50 hours or more per week. This is not compatible with a child receiving the degree of education that we would all want them to have for their own life chances.

I am also concerned that they will be missing out on the support that can be provided for young carers just because they are not in school. I know that some schools are very good at running groups for young carers, such as peer support, mental health support and additional academic support. It is critical that young carers can still access this kind of support if they need it and are being educated at home.

My main concern is the inappropriate or excessive levels of care that these young people are being asked to take on, because of the feeling of isolation and the emotional impact it has on them. This amendment is essential to protect them. The word the noble Lord, Lord Young, used was “safeguards”. We need strong safeguards if we are to be satisfied that young carers with significant caring responsibilities at home are also being home-educated.

[Baroness Whitaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 250 in my name and those of the noble Lord, Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, whose support I greatly value. This amendment would oblige schools to ask for and record why the child is to receive home-education. This is not done at present and the Department for Education lists the reasons as “unknown” in 42% of cases. The current census estimates that 111,700 children are being home-educated, a 20% rise since last year—hardly an endorsement of what has been going on in some schools. The reasons must be collected to get a better understanding of why children abandon the advantages of school and where feasible, deal with them. We know there are many reasons, some of which, like the bullying which so many Gypsy, Traveller and Roma children endure, must be more effectively and specifically tackled; among those reasons, regrettably, is the desire of some schools to ensure their exam pass rates reach a certain level, thus neglecting the children who most need their education to work. I hope my noble friend the Minister can accept this amendment.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

462: After Clause 62, insert the following new Clause—
“Duty of school governing bodies regarding mental health provision(1) Subject to subsection (3), the governing body of a maintained or academy school in England has a duty to make arrangements for provision in the school of a dedicated education mental health practitioner.(2) In subsection (1) “education mental health practitioner” means a person with a graduate-level or postgraduate-level qualification of that name earned through a course commissioned by NHS England.(3) Where a school has 100 or fewer pupils, the duty under subsection (1) may be satisfied through collaborative provision between several schools.(4) The Secretary of State must provide, or make arrangements for the provision of, appropriate financial and other support to school governing bodies for the purposes of facilitating the fulfilling of the duty in subsection (1).”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment requires the governing body of a maintained or academy school in England to make arrangements for provision in the school of a dedicated education mental health practitioner.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 462 is in my name. I thank my noble friend Lord Storey and the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, for adding their names.

This is a very important group. It is about the mental health and well-being of children, something that is, or indeed should be, central to the Bill. It is the name on the tin. My amendment would ensure a dedicated mental health practitioner in all schools qualified to a level—and this is the critical point—that they can deal safely with the problems that are more complex than those currently dealt with by early-intervention CBT—cognitive behavioural therapy—support, which is currently delivered by existing mental health support teams.

To be clear, I welcome and applaud the Government’s commitment in the spending review to expanding mental health support teams to all schools and colleges in England. These teams work with children, parents and wider school staff to promote good mental health and, funded through the health system, provide effective prevention and early-intervention support for children with a range of mild to moderate mental health needs, including things such as low mood and anxiety. They are doing important work.

These teams are staffed by education mental health practitioners. The terminology can be a bit confusing here, but it is a relatively new role within the children and young people’s mental health workforce system. As these mental health support teams expand, these practitioners in training are recruited for a work-based placement, while they complete a diploma or postgraduate qualification over a period of one academic year. During this time, practitioners are trained to deliver low-intensity cognitive behavioural therapy to children or, in some cases, to parents, to allow them to directly support their children.

While this approach has been effective for children with lower-level needs, CBT is not appropriate for all. Evidence has shown that some groups of children are less likely to benefit from these interventions; this includes those with special educational needs, younger children, and children experiencing moderate to more complex mental health needs.

The problem is—and this is specifically what my amendment is designed to address—that these children with more complex needs still do not meet the very high threshold for child and adolescent mental health services, because their needs are deemed to be not severe enough. In short, they are currently falling through a gap in support, and it is often referred to as the “missing middle”.

In the last 12 months, CAMHS has closed 28% of referrals without offering any support. This results in mental health support teams in schools often being asked to hold cases that they are not trained to work with safely, leaving children at risk. These children include those who are at risk of or have indeed self-harmed, those who have experienced trauma, bereavement or loss, and those who have thoughts of suicide. These things are real; these children are not making those things up. These children are often clearly visible to the professionals within schools and the health service through repeat presentation at health services. Often, they are struggling, not attending school or unable to engage with learning.

It is worth noting that respected voluntary sector providers, such as Barnardo’s and Place2Be, have recommended that, as part of the Government’s rollout of mental health support teams,

“the model is expanded to include provision of funded … school-based counselling”.

They say it would fill this missing middle

“to ensure that all children in mental distress can access timely support”.

A dedicated mental health professional qualified at the right level, such as a school-based counsellor, would normally hold a degree in counselling or psychotherapy. That would improve outcomes for children whose needs are not currently being met and—this is critical—should help to reduce pressure on CAMHS in a cost-effective way. These professionals are trained to deliver a range of different therapeutic skills and approaches that allow them to understand the unique needs of each child. One size does not fit all; I am sure we can all agree on that.

Evidence from other UK nations demonstrates how embedding school counsellors can indeed reduce pressure on CAMHS. In Wales, where school counselling services are statutorily funded, only 1.7% of those accessing counselling need to be referred on to specialist CAMHS. Existing mental health support team staff and school-based counsellors have different routes of training, different qualifications and different skill sets. They each fill a different mental health need and working together could offer more support to more children than is currently the case.

In conclusion, my amendment proposes that the skill mix of the mental health support team workforce should be expanded to ensure that all children have access to an appropriately qualified mental health practitioner as part of the rollout. I very much look forward to hearing the Minister’s response on this.

Finally, I want to express my strong support for Amendment 472 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord O’Donnell, to which my name is also attached, and to Amendment 479 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Watson. I will make a just a few very quick points on Amendment 472. This is a Bill about children’s well-being but, frankly, with very few direct references to the broader issue of well-being and, certainly, without any provisions for measuring well-being. This amendment would provide for a single, optional online well-being survey, delivered annually in schools and with centralised support made available to schools that wished to take up the option.

That is a modest but important ask. School data from the surveys would not be published or used to penalise schools in any way, or be part of the formal accountability systems. In case of any misunderstanding, this would not be a stick with which to beat schools. The survey would be optional. Schools would not be mandated to participate. It would be up to them, as indeed it would be for parents, carers and pupils, to opt out should they choose. However, we know from a recent YouGov poll that 75% of parents agree that, to improve young people’s well-being, we need to measure it. Critically, the data collected would allow the whole system to respond, including children’s services, education, health and the voluntary sector, at both national and local level.

I end by pointing out what I think we all know: happy and healthy children are most likely to be present at school, to engage in learning and to achieve to their full potential. Surely that is what we all want. We have a real chance here to progress that aim. I beg to move.

[Lord O'Donnell (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak on behalf of Amendment 472, which is in my name and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, who has spoken very well, and the noble Lords, Lord Layard and Lord Moynihan. This is a modest proposal, but it is probably the most important one. I have sat through all the hours of this debate and I would say to all noble Lords who have spoken that, if this does not go through, they will not succeed.

The reason I say that is that I have not spent over two decades in the Treasury without knowing that you need evidence: you need to prove what works. Your Lordships have talked various things. The noble Baroness, Lady Spielman, mentioned various interventions and wanting to know whether the costs and benefits were worthwhile; that is absolutely right. She mentioned NICE. The key thing about NICE is that it works out whether a given medicine is worthwhile by doing a cost-benefit analysis based on QALYs—quality adjusted life years. We now have more sophisticated measures known as WELLBYs—well-being years.

To understand whether a thing makes sense, we need to do the assessment and for that we need data. Your Lordships have all made suggestions: we want more physical exercise; we want less bullying; and we want to think about what things in SEND work. As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, said, we need some common definitions. We need a common definition of well-being that we can use; the department can give us that. Then we can work on the basis of exactly how important and how effective all these things are.

If we think about how this debate started, we all talked about our favourite brand of school: free schools, academies, you name it. How do we assess which one is better? Well, either implicitly or, in some cases, very explicitly, it was a matter of exam results or Ofsted rankings. Nobody talked about these schools’ impact on well-being, for the very good reason that we do not know. We do not have data. The only data we have is the world’s most embarrassing data of all, which nobody has mentioned yet: the PISA data. The PISA data shows us that, out of all of Europe, our young people have the lowest well-being. Of the 38 countries in the OECD, where do we come? In 37th place. My favourite football team, Manchester United, is not even that bad in the league.

--- Later in debate ---

I hope that, after this wide-ranging debate and with that response, noble Lords will feel able to withdraw or not press their amendments.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response to this, as she said, wide-ranging—you could even say “interesting”, in a certain sense—debate. I simply reflect that, in terms of the tone of the debate that we have had, there was a time not so long ago—perhaps a few years ago—when, if you were talking about children’s mental health and well-being in this Chamber, there would have been a certain sort of debate. There would probably have been a general consensus about the problem and what we were trying to achieve, and there would probably have been some disagreement over the best way of getting there.

I have to say: that is no longer the case. As with so many things in this current world, this whole issue seems to have become highly polarised and contested in a way that I find pretty unhelpful, but we are where we are. We can all quote our favourite bit of evidence or research report that backs up our own worldview but, frankly, unless you are looking at these things in the round, that rarely takes you much further forward.

I was pleased to hear the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, talk about the need to look carefully at the root causes of mental health issues. That was a very helpful perspective; personally, pretending that a problem does not exist rarely helps to address it.

I do not recognise that schools have turned into some sort of industrial complex of mental health with an excess of mental health professionals. All I can say is that the schools I have visited are not like that; they tell me what an issue mental health is and how they want extra help and support. That is all I am going to say in general terms.

I will respond to a couple of the points on the amendments. On my amendment, I was moderately encouraged to hear the Minister talk about the pilots, looking at the enhanced levels of support from mental health support teams. That is exactly what I was trying to get at in my amendment about the missing middle, as I put it. It is about the skills mix. There is a legitimate question to look at there. I hope that that we can return to that point on Report because, according to the people I have talked to—practitioners on the front line—it is important.

There was such a strong consensus. Well, it was not a consensus, but many people in the Chamber could see clearly the case that was being mounted for a national well-being survey—a voluntary survey. No one would be forced to do it. None of it would form any part of the accountability system of schools, but it would be something that those schools could have and use.

Having and being able to use that data will be fundamental if we are to increase the well-being of children and young people in schools. As far as I am concerned, there is no running away from the PISA data that tells us that the UK’s young people have the lowest well-being in Europe and the second worst in the OECD. That is what PISA tells us. We need to do something about it. To do something about it, we need to be collecting that data.

I am sure we will want to think about this again, and about putting it across—the costs would be very modest indeed—in a way that will be acceptable to the Minister and to this Government. Until we have that, we will not be able to address the fundamental problem of children who have poor well-being, are unhappy with perhaps poor mental health, do not learn well, do not achieve, and do not live the fulfilling lives that we all want them to live. However, at this point, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 462 withdrawn.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 19th January 2026 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

35: Clause 7, page 12, line 32, at end insert—
“(vi) financial support and financial literacy.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment adds financial support and financial literacy as services relevant children must be provided access to, as part of “staying close support”.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 35 in my name, and I thank my noble friends Lord Storey and Lord Mohammed and the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, for adding their names to it. It seeks to extend the remit of Staying Close to include support in helping care-experienced young people to access services that provide financial support and literacy. I want to say immediately that I was delighted to see the Government’s amendments introduced on Report that will amend the information that local authorities must include within their care leavers’ local offer to cover financial support and services that provide financial literacy. This builds very much on our discussions in Committee, and I am grateful to the Minister for bringing forward those government amendments. This change will provide greater transparency and will help young people to understand their rights and entitlements better, as well as encouraging local authorities to think about the support they provide to equip care leavers to manage their finances effectively.

In our previous discussions on this topic, we highlighted how young people leaving care are much more likely to be living independently from a young age than other young people with greater financial responsibilities and often without a safety net—the bank of mum and dad that so many parents provide certainly is not there for them to fall back on. These factors, combined with young care leavers often feeling unequipped, unprepared and unsupported to manage the financial responsibilities that come with living independently from a young age, can put care-experienced young people at risk of facing unnecessary financial hardship and insecurity, falling often into rent arrears or debt, all of which can have a long-term impact on their well-being and security.

By seeking to expand the remit of Staying Close, my Amendment 35 would have plugged this gap even further, ensuring that young people who are leaving care are supported. I feel that this change would have real benefit, but the fact that the Government have brought forward these two amendments is an example of how constructive the debate was in Committee on this legislation. I thank the Government for that and for being open to amendments such as my Amendment 35, which would do a lot to improve the lives of care-experienced young people. Perhaps when the Minister responds, to provide absolute clarity, she will be able to confirm that government Amendments 39 and 40 will have the same effect as my Amendment 35, which, obviously, now I will not be pushing to a vote.

[The Lord Bishop of Manchester]

My Lords, I am very grateful that these amendments have been proposed. They may not go as far as my Private Member’s Bill did a few months ago in terms of seeking a better financial deal for care leavers, but Amendment 40 takes us some considerable way towards that. At least it will make local authorities be honest about what they are and are not doing. My only regret is that it will not completely get rid of the postcode lottery that besets so many young care leavers, particularly if they move from one authority to another. But I am grateful for the amendments the Government have tabled, and I hope that they will be swiftly passed.

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[Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Blake of Leeds) (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords and Baronesses for their positive comments today; they are a measure of the fact that all of us in this Chamber want to put the needs of the most vulnerable people in our society at the centre of the Bill. I think the Government have clearly put across that we are strongly committed to improving support for care leavers, both through the measures in the Bill on Staying Close, local offer and corporate parenting and through our other programmes of work, such as the care leaver covenant and the care leavers interministerial board, all of which seek to ensure that young people leaving care have stable homes, access to health services and support to build lifelong loving relationships and are engaged in education, employment and training.

We want to support those in care and preparing to leave care before they reach adulthood, and to ensure that they have the same support as all young people. They will of course benefit from the wider changes that we are making for all young people in this space; we have had some fantastic discussions about the need for financial literacy for all young people in different places over the last few months.

I emphasise that in November the independent curriculum assessment review published its report, along with the Government’s response. As part of the review, we are taking forward recommendations that will help to deliver a high-quality curriculum for every young person. One key recommendation is to embed applied knowledge throughout the curriculum, including financial literacy. We have given a clear commitment in our response to the review to strengthen financial education through both the maths and the citizenship curriculum so that all young people and children have the skills they will need in adulthood. These commitments will benefit those children in care and preparing leave care.

Amendment 35, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler of Enfield, seeks to ensure that Staying Close support includes support to access services relating to financial support and literacy. Having said what I did about the review in general, I acknowledge that care leavers have particular and additional needs in this area. I fully endorse the noble Baroness’s intent with this amendment, recognising the importance of care leavers being properly informed of the financial support available to them as they transition to independence.

We have listened to concerns from both Houses about ensuring that care leavers receive the support they need from local authorities, particularly with financial management, and helping care leavers to develop the skills and knowledge that they require in this area. That is why we have tabled two government amendments to Clause 8. Amendment 39, in the name of my noble friend Lady Smith, adds services relating to financial literacy to the list of services in Section 2 of the Children and Social Work Act 2017, meaning that local authorities will have to publish information about those services as part of their local offer for care leavers. Amendment 40, also in the name of my noble friend Lady Smith, amends Clause 8 to require each local authority to include information about the arrangements that it has in place for providing financial support to care leavers in its local offer. In bringing forward these amendments, I acknowledge the continued advocacy for care leavers to receive assistance with financial literacy and financial support that the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler of Enfield, has provided in this area, and I thank her for that.

Most care leavers already receive a pathway plan before leaving care that should cover their financial capability, money management skills and strategies to develop these abilities. Adding these government amendments will ensure that care leavers are better aware of the services available to them, and it will increase local authorities’ accountability in supporting care leavers to receive the support they need. That further underscores how the Government have listened to the voices of children and young people because, as we have heard and as everyone engaged in this area acknowledges, when we listen to care leavers’ requests for support, the message that comes across loud and clear is that they want more support in understanding their finances. For that reason, we consider Clause 8 the most effective place for the amendment, ensuring a robust and consistent level of support for every care leaver, not only those accessing Staying Close.

Importantly, including the amendments in Clause 8 does not remove or dilute the support for care leavers receiving Staying Close. Financial literacy remains a key factor in helping young people to find and, importantly, keep accommodation and will continue to be considered as part of the overall assessment of their ability to maintain a tenancy. This will be reflected in the initial programme guidance we will be sharing with local authorities before April this year as the national rollout of the programme begins. This has been developed in collaboration with local authorities, stakeholders and people with care experience and will be updated after evaluation of local authority practice and ahead of the publication of final statutory guidance. I hope that this answers the questions that the noble Baroness asked in moving her amendment, that noble Lords are reassured, and that the noble Baroness feels able to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for that helpful and comprehensive response. The fact that the government amendments will go into Clause 8 and my amendment was to Clause 7 does not matter to me. What matters is that those government amendments will be there and that the care-experienced young people will now have access to the financial support and financial literacy that they need. I thank the Government again for their extremely constructive and helpful response. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 35 withdrawn.

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Equally, I ask my noble friend to have her officials undertake the review of Staying Put funding set out in Amendment 37, so as to determine its adequacy to meet the aims of such an important arrangement. That would not affect the Bill per se, so why not undertake such a review?

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, this is an important group of amendments and I am extremely sympathetic to the case that the noble Lord, Lord Watson, has just put forward for his amendments.

Amendment 59, in my name, seeks to enable care-experienced young people to remain living with their former foster carers under what are called the Staying Put arrangements to the age of 25. I thank the noble Lords, Lord Watson and Lord Farmer, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, for adding their names. Staying Put arrangements currently provide an important opportunity for young people to remain with their former foster carers until the age of 21, if they wish to and their foster carer agrees. Evaluation of the programme demonstrates that continuing to live with foster carers beyond the age of 18 can benefit care-experienced young people in a range of ways, including providing a more positive and planned transition from care to independence, a stronger support network and relationships, increased stability, stronger health and well-being, and a reduced risk of homelessness, as well as greater likelihood of remaining in full-time education.

While it is welcome that the introduction of the Staying Close support, through Clause 7, will apply to young people whose final placement was in foster care, this does not enable them to continue living with their former foster families. Many young people and foster carers across the country would like the children they are fostering to stay with them past the age of 21, but cannot at the moment because there is currently no provision in law for this or funding to support it.

Extending Staying Put arrangements to the age of 25, which is what my amendment is about, would provide more continuity for young people leaving foster care in their transition to independent living at a time that is right for them. We all know that strict age points do not work for everyone—everyone is different. It would provide a more stable home, family environment and support network for them as they start adulthood after what has been a difficult start in life. It would align Staying Put with other care leaver entitlements, such as Staying Close, which runs to age 25. I urge the Government to support this amendment.

I have also added my name to Amendment 95, in the name of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester. This proposed new clause would require the Secretary of State to publish a document called the national care offer, which would set out minimum standards of information that local authorities must publish in relation to Section 2 of the Children and Social Work Act 2017. I am going to leave the right reverend Prelate to set out the case—I do not want to steal his thunder. I simply want to say that this is a great opportunity, in my view, for the national and the local care offers to be strengthened. I very much hope that that opportunity will be taken.

[The Lord Bishop of Manchester]

My Lords, I am grateful for the amendments in this group. We are continuing, as the Bill makes progress, to strengthen the offer that is made to care leavers. In the previous group, we discussed matters that, assuming they are voted on in a little while, will improve conditions and improve what local authorities have to publish.

My Amendment 95, which I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler of Enfield, for signing, would simply extend that to make sure that care leavers have a clear understanding of what their local authority is willing to offer and what it is not, particularly given that so many care leavers at age 18 or 19 end up leaving. Some, I am delighted to say, go to university and end up in a different town in perhaps a different part of the country entirely; others, for whatever reason, may decide it is appropriate to move and perhaps go back to be closer to friends from former times.

It is therefore not just the people who are already in a particular local authority who need to really know what the care leaver offer is; it is young people who might be considering moving to that area. As became clear in discussion of my own Bill a few months ago, that is often where people fall through the gap: they move for good and solid reason from one part of the country to another, and in that new part of the country they find that the services they expected are not there because that local authority either chooses not to provide them to anybody or, as is sometimes the case, chooses to provide them only to young people who have been in its care through the previous years.

I hope that we can get some support for Amendment 95. Understanding procedure—I am slowly learning this place, after about six years in—I know we probably will not get to a vote on this tonight, so maybe the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, and I can agree between now and Wednesday whether this matter should be put to a Division or not.

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Moved by

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

43: After Clause 9, insert the following new Clause—
“Promoting relationships for looked after childrenIn section 22(3A) of the Children Act 1989 (duty of local authority in relation to looked-after children), at end insert “and a duty to promote the child’s family and social relationships in ways which are consistent with the child’s welfare.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment adds promotion of a child’s family and social relationships to the safeguarding duties of a local authority.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, this is an important group of amendments regarding family relationships and the appropriate placement of children in care. I have four amendments in my name in this group and will move through them as quickly as I can.

Amendments 43 and 49 are linked. They are about promoting children in care’s family relationships and particularly improving sibling contact, an issue that we discussed at some length in Committee. We know and previously debated that children in care are too often separated from siblings when in the care system. Unfortunately, we have also heard that, for too many children in care, they are not supported to have either consistent, appropriate or high-quality contact with their siblings when they are separated so that they can maintain these most vital relationships and stay connected.

The evidence shows that there is real variability in the type and frequency of contact between siblings. It can be affected by things such as workforce issues, instability and geographical factors—including where children are moved to. As we discussed in Committee, there is a real disconnect between policy and practice here. Amendment 43 seeks, in general terms, to strengthen the duties on local authorities to promote children’s family and social relationships, including with siblings. This would make a real difference to overall family relationships and to a sense of identity for these children.

Amendment 49 seeks to close a specific loophole in the current regulations. Paragraph 3(1) of Schedule 1 of the Care Planning, Placement and Case Review (England) Regulations 2010 includes provision for arrangements to promote contact between siblings who are in care but who are not placed together to be set out in children’s care plans. The key point and the purpose of this amendment, however, is that this does not cover the promotion of contact between a child who is in care and a sibling who is not in care. While there is currently limited data about how many children in care have siblings outside of the care system, the charity Become has reported examples from children and young people who have felt unsupported to adequately maintain relationships with siblings who are not in care, particularly when they are living miles away.

This amendment seeks to close this loophole by requiring a child’s care plan to include arrangements for promoting contact with all their siblings, whether they are in care or not, as far as that is consistent with the child’s welfare. For children in care, their relationship with siblings can be the most important relationships that they have, with lifelong consequences. Too often, these relationships are being strained or damaged by a system that just does not support these relationships effectively. This needs to change. These amendments seek to strengthen the policy framework, close a loophole and influence practice to better protect these fundamental relationships.

Amendment 61 seeks to amend the sufficiency duty to prevent children in care being moved far from home when that is not in their best interest. This amendment seeks to amend the sufficiency duty in a number of ways. First, it would place a stronger requirement on local authorities to take “all reasonable steps” to provide children with appropriate local accommodation. It would place a more explicit requirement on local authorities to plan, deliver or commission on a range of accommodation to meet children’s needs locally. It would also require local authorities to plan to keep children near to the local authority if they are unable to be kept within their own local area.

In recent years, local authorities have faced real challenges in delivering sufficient places close to home and in ensuring that they have enough of the right type of homes and carers in the right places at the right time to meet children’s needs and keep them close to the relationships, places and support networks that matter so much to them. Increasingly, for too many children this has meant being moved far away from the people and the places that they love. Last year, 22% of all children in care in England were living more than 20 miles away from their home communities and support networks. This number has increased by over 40% over the last decade. There are also too many children living hundreds of miles away from home. Become’s “Gone Too Far” campaign has highlighted the devastating long-term impact that living far from home can have on children’s relationships and well-being.

Relationships, which is what these two amendments are all about—where children in care live and who with—are pivotal to children’s outcomes and experiences. There needs to be greater accountability and oversight about the extent to which this sufficiency is being delivered to drive real system change, starting with a stronger sufficiency duty, and to keep more children living close to home. I very much hope that the Government will look sympathetically on this amendment.

I thank the noble Lords, Lord Russell and Lord Hampton, for adding their names to my Amendment 62, which is essentially about the mental health needs of children in care. They often experience dramatically higher levels of mental ill-health than their peers, yet their mental health needs are often underidentified and poorly supported. While current regulations require health assessments to include mental health, they do not require the involvement of health practitioners with mental health expertise. As a result, assessments are often inconsistent and frequently fail to identify need early enough to offer the sort of evidence-based professional responses to address mental health needs and prevent deterioration of a child’s mental health.

My amendment addresses this gap by seeking to ensure that mental health is assessed by a qualified mental health practitioner as a core part of the initial and ongoing health assessment for children in care. This builds on the work of the Education Committee, which has done very important work in this area in its inquiry. It reported that specific considerations around mental health were frequently absent or treated very superficially in health assessments. It is a limited change but an important change. It is asking that mental health is not simply included in the initial health assessment, but that mental health expertise is involved in carrying it out. Because of the importance of mental health to children in care, because of the high prevalence that they have and because of the difficulties that they have in accessing the right sort of mental health support and treatment, I very much hope that the Minister will look sympathetically at this amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

This has been a wide-ranging debate and I hope I have provided sufficient reassurance to enable the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her comprehensive and helpful response to a large number of amendments. I listened very carefully indeed to what she had to say on family relationships and sibling contact, an issue that is very dear to my heart. I welcome that she talked about sharing best practice on sibling contact, which will certainly be helpful, but I must admit I was disappointed that she was not able to go further, particularly on my Amendment 49. I give notice that, when it is reached, I am minded to seek the opinion of the House. Finally, I thank her for her response on Amendment 62, in particular her commitment to make changes to statutory guidance on mental health and to consult with the APPG for Children. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw Amendment 43.

Amendment 43 withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

49: After Clause 9, insert the following new Clause—
“Promoting contact between siblings who are not living togetherIn paragraph 3(1) of Schedule 1 to the Care Planning, Placement and Case Review (England) Regulations 2010 (S.I. 2010/959) (care plans), for the words from “for” to “together” substitute “whom they are not living with”.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment extends requirements to promote contact between a child in care and siblings who are not living with them, including those not in care, so far as this is consistent with the child’s welfare.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, as I indicated during the debate on this vital issue of sibling contact, including siblings both in care and not in care, I wish to test the opinion of the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I will briefly focus on Amendment 53, on the right to education. I want to bring in the voice of one child who spoke to the Children’s Commissioner in her report on this issue. Talking about the lack of education they were receiving, this child said:

“I don’t think it’s fair that they’re making us miss out on our education because they don’t know where to put us”.


That child understands the situation they are in, and it is just unacceptable. All but two of the children whom the Children’s Commissioner spoke to said they were receiving less education when subjected to deprivation of liberty than they received in their otherwise often very chaotic circumstances. We have to make sure that these children continue with an education.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, this is a very important and sensitive area of law, and valid issues and concerns are raised in the amendments spoken to so ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Barran. I also pay tribute, as she did, to the work of the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory in this area. I know the Government have been working hard to see what can be done and to give various assurances. I hope the Minister can provide further assurances today so that we can all be satisfied that they are taking this issue very seriously and have a clear plan to tackle it.

[Lord Hampton (CB)]

I have added my name to Amendment 53. It is vital that children who are deprived of liberty can access quality education. Otherwise, we really are depriving them of hope and a future. I too quote the Children’s Commissioner:

“For the very small number of children where controls on their freedom are necessary in order to keep them or others safe, we must make sure they have not only excellent, individualised care, but also full protection under the law … we have a moral obligation to ensure that children at risk of harm are not simply contained and kept out of the community, but are seen, heard, and given the care and support they need to thrive”.


She continues later:

“Where a deprivation of liberty is authorised, the conditions should include a plan for meeting the child’s specific needs through intensive intervention and work aimed at helping them to be safe in the long-term. This plan should be co-produced by health and social care if appropriate, and could include mental health support, mood and behaviour management, work on addressing risks of exploitation, educational support, and any other specialist therapeutic intervention that is required”.


Once again, adding one word to the Bill could change many futures.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 21st January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Meston (CB)]

My Lords, I strongly support Amendments 99 and 101, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Barran. These are designed to tackle the sad and difficult problem of successive removals of children and babies from their parents, in particular from their mothers.

When a child is removed permanently under a court order, typically, a number of things can happen, and, indeed, not happen. The court which made the care order and consequent order for placement for adoption will have no further involvement. The local authority which brought the case may well have little or no further engagement with the birth family, who will receive no more attention and support, at least until there is another pregnancy, by which time it can be too late to address the underlying problems.

The mother, probably traumatised, may react to the first removal of a child with a bad decision to have another child, in the hope, rather than the expectation, that things will turn out better next time round, which is unlikely to occur. The mother and the father, if identified, will have become mistrustful of the local authority social workers and feel stigmatised and unwilling to seek or accept help. The mother may become hard to reach and may not reveal the next pregnancy until the last minute. Her underlying problems, by then, will not have been addressed; indeed, they may have become compounded.

Unless there has been some significant and unexpected change, the local authority will have no alternative but to start new care proceedings for the new child, usually with the same bad outcome as before. Speaking as someone who has had to deal with these cases, I know that those representing the mother and the court will struggle to find any real improvement or anything else to distinguish the case from that of the previous child. These are truly the most wretched cases for any court to deal with.

The charitable organisation Pause has considerable expertise in this area and has evolved a model of preventive support to break the cycle of repeated pregnancies and recurrent removals. The Nuffield Family Justice Observatory and others have had valuable input into this problem and highlighted the statistics. One in five care proceedings are repeat proceedings. The repeat proceedings are more likely to involve babies, and almost half of all newborn babies subject to care proceedings are born to mothers who have had a previous child removed. Indeed, it is quite likely that the mother herself will have been in the care system not so long before. The additional financial cost to local authorities for care proceedings and consequential adoption proceedings, and the support required to pay for foster care and adopters, is enormous. The human cost, obviously, is unresolved misery and grief.

Amendment 99 would require local authorities to provide post-removal support where there is a risk of further removal, based on the Pause model of specialist focused and intensive support. Some local authorities do this work, but it should be universal. It has been suggested that, for every £1 spent, £4.50 would be saved in the next four years. However, some local authorities—understandably, given their constraints—are reluctant to look beyond this year’s budget. The Pause model does make a difference, and primary legislation can now make a real difference. That is the basis for Amendment 99.

Amendment 101 would provide for data collection, which would be a valuable aid to local and central government. Ironically, if Amendment 101 was agreed and Amendment 99 did not succeed, it would simply serve to highlight in the data which would be collected the support that should have been provided through Amendment 99. That opportunity should not be missed.

In Committee, the Minister was sympathetic and suggested that one way forward might be by way of family group conferencing, which is part of the structure of the Bill. Quite frankly, that would not be of particular value in these circumstances. The first set of proceedings probably would not have got to where they were if there had been a supportive family in the background, and it would, by then, be too late to prevent what had already become a further pregnancy. Therefore, I do not think that is the answer.

I have tried to avoid repeating points that were made in Committee. I simply quote the late Nicholas Crichton, a pioneering district judge:

“A family justice system that removes the fourth, fifth or sixth child from families without doing anything about the reasons for removal is a failing system”.


I commend Amendments 99 and 101 to the House.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to lend my support to all three of these amendments. I was very pleased to add my name to Amendments 99 and 101 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Barran.

Listening to the debate today, I think this group is dealing with some of the most heartbreaking events that children and families ever face. It has really been very harrowing just to listen to the circumstances that some of these families have found themselves in. I was profoundly moved by the way the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, introduced her amendment. It is a really important amendment, and I very much hope that the Government will be able to look sympathetically at it.

I will just say a few words in addition to what the noble Lord, Lord Meston, has said, particularly about Amendment 99. As we heard from the noble Lord, almost half of newborns in care proceedings are born to mothers who have already been through proceedings with another child, so far too many children are entering care from parents who have already had at least one child removed from their care.

As we have heard, without support—and that is what this amendment is all about: the support that we want to see local authorities offering after a child is removed—parents, particularly mothers, are often left struggling to cope with all the existing difficulties that led to the child removal in the first place, while facing the additional trauma, grief and stigma of losing a previous child. This leads to further child removals too many times. It is simply a heartbreaking, vicious cycle.

But with the right support, parents can stabilise, overcome that trauma and make lasting change. The reason I feel so passionately about this is that in my time as chair of Cafcass, I was privileged to visit various Pause projects, to talk to the people who were providing the support and to talk to the mothers about the difference that having that support had made and why they now felt they could turn their lives around so that they would not find themselves in a position like that of a mother I was talking to—I think I said this in Committee, so forgive me if I am repeating myself—who had had eight children removed and now it was about the ninth child. We just cannot allow these situations to perpetuate. It is not something that a decent and humane society can do.

At the moment only about half of local authority areas are providing any support at all. This amendment is so critical to ensure that support is available and that this incalculable human suffering that we have heard about can be alleviated. I very much look forward to hearing from the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, and the Minister, and I really hope we can make progress here.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, I echo other noble Lords and thank the noble Baroness, Lady Grey- Thompson, for her very powerful and moving speech. Sadly, like other noble Lords, I know families who have been touched in similar ways. Both personally and professionally, I hope that the Government listen to the noble Baroness’s advice.

My Amendments 99 and 101 have support from more than 20 children’s charities and the Children’s Commissioner, and I am very grateful to the co-signatories to my amendment. In Committee the response from the Minister focused on early help and family support that the Government will require local areas to deliver as a way of meeting the needs of these women. But as the noble Lord, Lord Meston, said, although the funding is obviously very warmly welcomed, it does not address the issues for families who have children removed into care, because once a child is removed from a parent’s care, services and support follow the child.

There is no requirement or expectation that the support needs formally identified for the woman during the care proceedings process will be provided after the removal of a child. Without support to change their circumstances, parents are vulnerable to repeat the same traumatic cycle that led to their first, second or—as the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, said—eighth child being removed. I think the late Nick Crichton removed a 14th child from the same woman, which led to the work that has been referred to today. We know that almost half of newborns in care proceedings are born to families who have been through proceedings at least once.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 28th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hampton (CB)]

My Lords, I added my name to Amendments 121A and 131A. There is a real problem of mistrust with elective home education against traditional education. I acknowledge my noble friend Lord Crisp, and am delighted to be on his working party to try to do something about it.

I was in the same meeting as the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, and my noble friend Lord Russell where we talked to the DfE. It was rather wonderful, because instead of talking about technicalities, one of the people there started talking about cricket, which I am much happier with than Section 31s and things. He accused us of setting the field for a bad ball—so we were being extremes. Obviously, I came back with no setting the field for a bad ball but putting some sweepers out as well just in case. The whole point of legislation is to avoid the disasters, the out of the ordinary, the Sara Sharifs. We were also told that a possible future home visit might deter parents from seeking help with a Section 31. Again, I cannot see why. These amendments are incredibly sensible and thoughtful, and their spirit would help those avoidable disasters, which, tragically, may well happen.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I have also added my name to Amendment 121A in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Barran. This is a very important set of amendments. I welcome the fact that many of them are about strengthening safeguarding. That is really important.

I listened very carefully to the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, because he had, as ever, some very important points to make. I do not agree with everything he said, but I agree that the time is ripe have a broader debate about a wider set of issues around the whole issue of home education that go outside the scope of this Bill. I hope it will be possible to do that. I also agreed with the noble Lord about the need for any safeguarding action to be proportionate, but it is my view that the targeting of action—as it is in Amendment 121A, so that

“local authorities must consent to the withdrawal of a child from school”

if they are involved in either child protection plans or are a child in need as classified under Section 17 of that Act—is proportionate in trying to provide additional support for vulnerable children and making sure that they do not fall through the cracks.

We have heard too many times, over the years, these heartbreaking cases of children who have fallen through the cracks—the most recent one, of course, was the harrowing and terrible case of Sara Sharif—because of a lack of visibility. This amendment would ensure that greater visibility is given to these children, which is why I added my name to it. I know people have different views on this, but that is my reason for believing that it is a proportionate amendment.

[Lord Meston (CB)]

My Lords, I support Clause 31 and government Amendment 120. I also support Amendment 121A, which would extend the scope of what Clause 31 seeks to achieve, which is to prevent concealment of the real reasons for attempts to withdraw children from school, in particular by parents or a parent with something to hide. The clause provides that the consent of the local authority is required if there is a Section 47 inquiry under way or there has been such an inquiry. Amendment 121A would extend the scope of the need for the local authority’s consent, which I support. However, if we are talking about cracks, I suggest that it could go further. The need for consent should also be triggered if the family court, in private law proceedings, has directed a report and investigation under Section 37 of the Children Act or has directed a local authority to report under Section 7. Experience shows, and certainly my experience is, that it is often in private law proceedings that alarm bells first ring. That is the first opportunity to investigate what really might be happening in the family home.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 3rd February 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

My Lords, in speaking to my Amendment 243A, I declare my interests as the director of the Free Speech Union and a member of the Knowledge Schools Trust.

The amendment would stop safeguarding policies and procedures in schools being misused for political purposes, a prime example being the recent cancellation of a talk by the Labour MP Damien Egan at a secondary school in his Bristol constituency, on the grounds that allowing a vice-chair of the Labour Friends of Israel to speak posed a safeguarding risk to children. The Bristol branch of the National Education Union said on its Facebook page, after Mr Egan was no-platformed:

“We celebrate this cancellation as a win for safeguarding”.


In another Facebook post, the Bristol branch of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign also described Mr Egan’s ban as a win for safeguarding.

At the Free Speech Union, we have come across numerous examples of school safeguarding policies being weaponised by political activists to silence their opponents, whether visiting speakers or members of staff. For instance, the Free Speech Union recently took on the case of a teacher in Henley who was referred to the local authority designated officer—LADO, the official in charge of investigating safeguarding concerns—because he showed his A-level politics class some Trump campaign videos from the 2024 presidential election. The teacher was accused of causing his A-level students, aged 17 and 18, “emotional harm”. In one document, local officials in charge of child protection suggested that the showing of the Trump campaign videos could amount to a “hate crime”. Incidentally, he also showed the students in his A-level politics class some of Kamala Harris’s campaign videos, but those did not raise any safeguarding concerns.

In another Free Speech Union case, a teacher at a primary school in Tower Hamlets was sacked and referred to his local child protection board after telling off some Muslim boys for washing their feet in the sinks in the boys’ lavatories. I could go on.

Safeguarding policies and procedures were put in place to protect children from abusive parents and sexual predators, yet the weaponisation of these policies by political activists risks local authority designated officers and local safeguarding boards not taking genuine concerns seriously. That in turn endangers children’s safety. It is hard to think of a more cynical form of political activism—but, of course it has the desired effect. What MP who is sympathetic to Israel in its war with Hamas will risk arranging a visit to a school in his or her constituency knowing, ahead of time, that they could end up being no-platformed and branded a safeguarding risk to children?

Amendment 243A would put a stop to this mischief. It says:

“When making safeguarding assessments or investigating safeguarding complaints in relation to teachers, visitors or volunteers in schools and other educational settings, no account may be taken of the political views expressed or presented by the subject of that safeguarding assessment or complaint, provided those views are not … unworthy of respect in a democratic society … in conflict with the fundamental rights of others, or … affiliated with any political party, group or organisation which is proscribed for the purposes of the Terrorism Act 2000”.


We urgently need to stop this cynical weaponisation of policies and procedures that were put in place to protect children from predators and abusers, not unfashionable political opinions.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I rise very briefly to signal my support for Amendment 243E, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Layard. I added my name in Committee, and I am very sorry that, sadly, I missed the deadline for adding it on Report. The noble Lord, Lord Macpherson, set out very clearly the purpose of this amendment and I do not want to repeat that. I just think it is very telling indeed that three times as many people apply for apprenticeships than the numbers who obtain them, and that is just because the places are not available. Just think how different that is from the university route, where nearly all applicants find a place. For me, it is fundamentally an issue of equity and parity of treatment for all young people.

We have seen the number of under-19s starting apprenticeships fall by more than a third since the apprenticeship levy was introduced. This amendment, as has been said, has been very carefully recrafted by the noble Lords, Lord Layard and Lord Macpherson, into something which I hope very much goes with the grain of what the Government are trying to achieve. I therefore very much hope that we will hear something positive from the Minister on it.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to my other amendment in this group, Amendment 243B, but I will just add a few words on Amendment 243E, following on from my noble friend Lady Tyler’s comments. We are in danger of abandoning an entire generation of young people who do not follow the traditional university route. While apprenticeship places at levels 5 and 6 continue to expand, opportunities at levels 3 and 4 are shrinking. This surely is a cruel paradox. Young people who have university degrees will be able to access higher-level apprenticeships. Meanwhile, those who most need levels 3 and 4 to begin their careers—16 to 18 year-olds without prior qualifications—are left stranded. These young people are not lacking in ambition or ability. They simply seek a different path—one that is rooted in practical skills and real-world experience. Yet we are closing the doors in their faces at the very moment that they are ready to step through them.

We saw at first hand the transformative power of apprenticeships for young people who thrive outside traditional academic settings. This amendment would ensure that, as we develop apprenticeship policy, we do not forget the young people who need these opportunities the most. It is about fairness, opening pathways, and giving every young person, regardless of whether they go to a university, a genuine chance to build a meaningful future. I urge the House to support it.

On my Amendment 243B, we know that schools are not VAT-rated, and that sixth forms in schools are not VAT-rated. Then along came the academisation of our schools, and a very clever move was made by the noble Lord, Lord Gove—I hope I am not using his name in vain; he is not here—who saw a very quick way to enable sixth forms to become part of multi-academy trusts. So, guess what? The sixth forms that chose to go into a multi-academy trust were not VAT-rated. Those poor sixth forms who decided to stay on their own and not be swallowed up by a multi-academy trust are VAT-ed: they have to pay VAT. How unfair is that?

The average stand-alone sixth-form college turnover is around £15 million, and it spends 80% or more on staff, examination fees, food and depreciation, which does not attract VAT. So a 20% refund on what remains would save them about £500,000. But, of course, would it be unthinkable that the DfE would bring sixth-form colleges into Section 33: in other words, they would not be VAT-rated but would not be FE colleges? Imagine what that extra money would do to attract students and further the skills agenda that is so important to the Government. Perhaps the Minister will tell us clearly why these stand-alone sixth-form colleges cannot be treated in a fair and equitable way, like sixth forms in schools or sixth forms in multi-academy trusts.

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Moved by

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

233: After Clause 63, insert the following new Clause—
“Establishment of a national children’s wellbeing measurement programme(1) The Secretary of State must establish a national children’s wellbeing measurement programme.(2) A programme established under this section must—(a) conduct a voluntary annual online national survey of the wellbeing of children in relevant schools in England;(b) make provision for school, parental and student consent to participation in the survey, ensuring that participation is voluntary and that results are handled confidentially;(c) provide central analysis of data and support for schools in the administration of the survey;(d) regularly publish the results of the survey and provide relevant data to participating schools, local authorities and other public bodies for the purposes of improving children’s wellbeing.(3) For the purposes of this section, “wellbeing” includes the drivers of wellbeing, including nutrition, physical activity, participation in arts, culture and entertainment and any other factors the Secretary of State deems relevant.(4) For the purposes of this section, “relevant schools” includes academy schools, alternative provision, maintained schools, non-maintained special schools, independent schools, and pupil referral units.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require the department to introduce a national wellbeing measurement programme, based on a survey that would be voluntary for schools and pupils. The intention is to protect the anonymity of participants, ensure that no one is compelled to take part, and safeguard the privacy of any information provided.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 233, to which my name is attached, in the place of the noble Lord, Lord O’Donnell, who apologises that he is unable to be present. I will also speak briefly to my Amendment 237.

I am sure many of us were struck by the passionate arguments put forward by the noble Lord, Lord O’Donnell, and others in Committee for a national well-being measurement programme. The need for a holistic, regular survey of young people’s experiences remains pressing. Surveys show that the UK’s young people have some of the lowest well-being in Europe and the second worst in the OECD, according to PISA data.

Amendment 233 would provide for an optional online well-being survey, delivered annually in schools, with centralised support, administration, analysis and data storage. I thank the noble Lords, Lord Layard and Lord Watson, for adding their names to this amendment as well. It is not calling for that data to be published or used in any way to penalise schools, and the wording requires confidentiality and consent at three levels: schools, parents or carers, and pupils. It is a fundamental point of this amendment that the survey is optional.

A national scheme such as this would give young people a louder voice and would create a shared evidence base that would allow us to make a shift to prevention and early intervention across a wide range of services and issues that impact on well-being. It would also promote action outside school gates to support young people. This is important because schools alone are not responsible for our children’s well-being; we all are. The new national youth strategy highlights that fact, but without good data the Government will fund the scheme yet be unable to measure its impact.

I recognise that since we began debating this Bill, the Minister’s department has begun consulting on a pupil experience framework, and this is a positive first step. However, there are two notable exceptions in the draft that I feel substantially reduce its potential. First, there are no proposed questions on psychological well-being and, secondly, there is no intent to collate or publish any of the data. I am very keen to hear from the Minister whether the Government are willing and able in some way to address these concerns. On this amendment, I end by pointing out that it is popular. According to a recent YouGov poll, 75% of parents agree that to improve young people’s well-being we need to measure it. More than 60 organisations included in the Our Well-being, Our Voice campaign, which includes the Association of School and College Leaders and the Local Government Association, are keen to see this introduced.

I now turn to my Amendment 237 on the vital topic of mental health support in schools. Mental health support teams are already making an important contribution, particularly in providing early intervention for children with mild to moderate mental health needs. The Government’s commitment to expanding these teams and, indeed, to piloting an enhanced model, is very welcome, but the evidence from schools, families and practitioners is clear. The current model does not work for all children. There is a well-recognised group of children whose needs are too complex for these low interventions, yet who do not anything like meet the threshold for specialist support. These children are often referred to as the missing middle. Too many of them are left without timely or appropriate help, and their needs often escalate as a result. As a consequence of perverse incentives within the system, children must become more unwell before they can access the support they need.

Many children also experience distress to do with family relationships or developmental issues. They benefit from therapeutic support that cannot always be delivered within the strictly structured and time-limited interventions often offered by mental health support teams. This amendment seeks to address that gap by ensuring that, alongside existing provision, children can access school-based counselling delivered by appropriately registered practitioners. It would create a clearer and more appropriate pathway for those whose needs are not currently being met and reduce pressure on CAMHS. I know that many schools are already trying to fill this gap by funding counselling services themselves, often at a significant cost to already overstretched budgets. The result is an uneven and unsustainable system in which access to support depends on geography or local resources rather than need. By placing this expectation in legislation, I feel that we can create greater consistency and equity. I also very much support Amendment 242 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Watson, which I will leave him to outline. I beg to move.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, nine months after Second Reading, in which I spoke, it falls to me to speak to the last of the, by my tally, 254 amendments on Report, on top of 725 amendments tabled in Committee, so we certainly had maximum scrutiny of this Bill in your Lordships’ House.

I shall speak to my Amendment 242 and support the two other amendments in this group. Amendment 242 is similar to the one I moved in Committee in September. In that debate and in subsequent correspondence, the Minister confirmed the Government’s commitment to the principle of whole-school approaches, but she also made it clear that existing guidance will remain non-statutory and that the key support programmes that are now closed will not be reintroduced.

As a result, significant inequity in provision remains, and that is the reason that I have returned with this amendment on Report. Children’s mental health and well-being are a significant concern, and recent statistics highlight that school is a major determinant of children’s lived experience and mental health, but the voluntary guidance on whole-school approaches to mental health and well-being has reached its limits after being first published in 2015.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

Well, as we approach nine hours of considering the 13 groups that we have got through today, I note—and I am not being churlish—that if everybody who stood up and said, “I will speak only briefly” spoke only briefly, we would have saved a reasonable amount of time.

However, let us move to the amendments. I start by assuring noble Lords that the Government are committed to improving mental health support for all children and young people, helping pupils to achieve and thrive in education. Of course, we are focused on, and have already made considerable progress in, providing access to specialist mental health professionals in every school. With that in mind, I turn to the amendments.

Amendment 233, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord O’Donnell, and introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, intends to establish a national children’s well-being measurement programme.  We welcome the added emphasis that the measurement should remain voluntary for schools. While we are committed to supporting more schools to do this effectively, legislation is not necessary.

As stated in Committee, the Government have already committed to publish non-statutory guidance helping schools to measure and act upon factors related to well-being. To do that, we are working with measurement experts, including from the Our Wellbeing Our Voice coalition, to establish standardised questions for schools to ask pupils about key modifiable factors that impact their engagement in school life and their well-being, including how this can inform their approach to promoting and supporting mental health. This will enable benchmarking, aggregation, and sharing of data and practice between schools and with partners. We are exploring whether and how this data could be collected centrally to inform national policy. In the meantime, we will continue to publish annually the data we collect centrally on pupils’ well-being and experiences in school.

Amendment 237, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, would require the Secretary of State to ensure access to professionally accredited counselling or equivalent therapeutic support in schools, alongside government commitments to expand mental health support teams. As we said in Committee, this Government will expand mental health support teams from 52% coverage of pupils and learners at the start of April 2025 to 100% by 2029. The noble Baroness makes an important point about ensuring that we provide support for pupils whose needs are too complex for low-intensity interventions but do not meet the threshold for specialist child and adolescent mental health services. That is why we will pilot enhancements to mental health support teams, developed with a range of experts, including from the counselling profession, to support more complex needs such as trauma, neurodivergence and disordered eating.

These teams already integrate with a school’s existing well-being offer, which can include counselling. However, while there is good evidence that CBT used by the teams can deliver lasting benefits, more research is needed into the effectiveness, implementation and cost efficiency of counselling in schools. Many pupils also benefit from other in-school support. It is important that schools continue to have the freedom to decide what pastoral support to offer their pupils based on need, making the best use of their funding.

Lastly, Amendment 242, tabled by my noble friend Lord Watson of Invergowrie, seeks to require statutory guidance for schools on whole-school approaches to mental health and well-being. As I said in Committee, existing statutory duties provide schools with a strong foundation to adopt whole-school approaches and secure the support that their pupils need. Our pupil engagement framework, to be published this year and developed with Mission 44, with support from other key stakeholders, will provide schools with guidance on whole-school approaches to pupil engagement and, in turn, well-being. Together with our ongoing work on measurement as part of this framework and the expansion of mental health support teams to 100% of pupils and learners, the Government are building on existing support in a consistent and equitable way—key components of my noble friend’s amendment.

Having described the progress that the Government are already making on the range of concerns that noble Lords have outlined, I hope the noble Baroness will feel able to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister and all noble Lords who have contributed to this important debate. It is never great to get the graveyard slot, particularly on an issue that is so fundamental to the success of the Bill, and to feel so time-constrained—but that is just life, is it not? I thank the Minister for outlining the progress that I acknowledge the Government are making in this area. I still think there is more to do, which is what these amendments press at, but I was grateful for her acknowledgement of the importance of the missing middle and the involvement of the counselling profession. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw.

Amendment 233 withdrawn.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments and / or reasons
Wednesday 25th March 2026 Lords Chamber

For these reasons, the Government do not consider legislative change necessary and do not support these amendments. I beg to move.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to Motion D and briefly to Motion F. I place on record the fact that I am extremely grateful to the Government for bringing forward Amendment 17B in lieu, in response to the amendments that I tabled in Committee and on Report. It is a major step forward in strengthening and protecting children in care’s relationships with their brothers and sisters, including half- and step-siblings. I am particularly grateful that the wording of the government amendment is broad and inclusive—something I very much support, as we discussed in earlier stages. I thank the Minister, Minister MacAlister and the Bill team for their very constructive engagement on this issue.

Over the years, I have heard directly from care-experienced children and young people about the absolutely crushing impact of not having consistent or adequate contact with their siblings. Sometimes their siblings are the only other people who know, who understand, who have shared experiences of what they have been through and the emotional distress it has caused them. They are the ones who can provide mutual support; it is a lifelong bond. So this amendment is a really important step forward in ensuring that contact with siblings is given the same weight in legislation as contact with parents.

Getting to this point has felt like a long journey. I place on record my heartfelt thanks to the colleagues across the House and in the other place who have supported us in getting through this process. I also thank two charities, Become and the Family Rights Group, for their unwavering support; they have campaigned on this issue for many years. It is vital that this change, which I hope we will see in legislation, drives practice so that all children who are separated from their siblings are supported in having the contact with their brothers and sisters that they need, whenever it is in their best interests to do so. I will be monitoring this with great care.

I turn briefly to Motion F and the deprivation of liberty. It is quite a complex subject, so I will not go into all the ins and outs, but I think we can all agree that the needs of children who are deprived of their liberty is something to which we need to give serious thought and attention, particularly in understanding better the increasing use of deprivation of liberty orders. I commend the work that the Nuffield Observatory has been doing in this area, because these children’s needs—including the help and support that they need, however they are funded—clearly require a package that involves health, social care, education and sometimes criminal justice. It needs to be effective. It needs to be a fully integrated package of health and support; at the heart of this is how that would best be delivered.

I am grateful to the Minister for allowing me to see the letter to which she referred, which was sent to the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, and the noble Lord, Lord Bellingham, about what is going on in this area. I read very carefully about what is happening in relation to the deprivation of liberty. I am encouraged that the work the Government are taking forward now has a national programme to try to understand the evidence better and to understand the options around things such as pooled budgets and the like. As I understand it, there are pilots taking place, with some more in train. Importantly, there is funding to test better-integrated, joined-up working and ideas for pooled budgets, improved collaboration, et cetera. It is encouraging that that is taking place.

My understanding—I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm this—is that that work is being backed up by £15.5 million of DfE funding over the next three years. I would also be grateful if, given the concerns that have been raised in this area, the House could be provided regular updates on this programme, including on the outcomes and the key findings that it is delivering.

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

I gently remind all noble Lords that, if they wish to speak, they should do so before the Official Opposition wind up, and that they should not be repeating lengthy arguments that have already been debated in Committee and on Report. Should they speak, they should speak briefly and to the amendments.