Child Welfare

Baroness Walmsley Excerpts

Wednesday 5th July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

The noble Earl makes a good point. A start has been made because the Children’s Commissioner wrote an interesting report that came out yesterday. We will be able to expand upon this in a Question tomorrow on children with vulnerability. There are four key areas. This is work in progress but she has made a very good start. We will build on that to see how we can tackle these serious problems.

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, some of the most vulnerable children are those with life-limiting or life-threatening illnesses. They require a lot of social care. Yet the Government omitted children when promising to address the challenges of social care. Will the Government include children in the forthcoming Green Paper on social care? Secondly, how will they fulfil their promise on end-of-life care for children when some children’s hospices and children’s palliative care charities have to review the care they offer because of a 61% cut in local council funding for their activities?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

The noble Baroness is correct that the Green Paper is being produced. We aim to publish it by the end of the year. It will focus on children and young people, particularly on mental health. As the noble Baroness will know, this is a key priority for the Government. This includes preventing mental illness in children and young people and raising awareness of mental health issues among young people and adults.