Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 21st July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

5. What recent assessment she has made of the performance of free schools; and if she will make a statement.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

14. What recent assessment she has made of the performance of free schools; and if she will make a statement.

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)]

Based on Ofsted inspections of free schools undertaken so far, the majority of free schools are performing well. They are also more likely to be rated outstanding than other state-funded schools.

[Mr Gibb]

My hon. Friend is, I know, closely involved with all the schools in Brentford and Isleworth and is active in helping to identify sites for new free schools. I would welcome the opportunity to visit that one free school she refers to—I think it is the Nishkam school in Isleworth—and to join her in meeting her constituents who want to establish new free schools in response to parental demand. That is what the free schools programme is all about—new schools set up in response to local parental demand, delivering strong discipline and high academic standards.

[Charlie Elphicke]

The Minister will be aware that free schools are very popular with parents and achieve results that outperform many maintained schools. In view of that, would he consider supporting a new free school in Deal in my constituency?

[Mr Gibb]

My hon. Friend is right. There are currently 174 free schools up and running, of which 40% have already had a section 5 Ofsted inspection, in addition to their pre-opening inspection. Of those, 24% are graded outstanding, which is a staggering achievement for a school that has been open for just four or five terms. This represents a higher proportion than other schools. Some 71% of free schools are graded good or outstanding. We would certainly welcome an application for a new free school in Deal if there is evidence of a need for more good school places.

British Values: Teaching

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Wednesday 25th June 2014 Westminster Hall

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr Denham) on securing this timely debate. It is as always a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis).

When it comes to teaching British values, the clue is in the title. We are all British; we are all one nation and it should be so basic that we do not need to say it. Yet everywhere we look there is no shortage of people seeking to divide us from each other. North of the border, in Scotland, there are those who seek to divide that nation from Britain. In Wales, devolution tends to deepen, with advocates for more devolution, which could be a through-train in the direction that Scotland has gone. In Cornwall there are those who seek to separate that area too, and in Northern Ireland. In Dover we are simple souls. We do not want any particular devolution; we just want Calais back, and we would like Boulogne back as well in due course. [Laughter.]

We need to sound a warning against all those who seek to divide regions from the nation, because wherever there is division or separation or where people are divided from other people and separated, we rapidly get a lack of trust and the those sorts of problems we have seen. If we tell someone that they have to go and live in a castle and we tell someone else that they have to live in a different castle, sooner or later they will start to raise the drawbridge and go to war with each other. There will be separation, division and a lack of understanding. The best way to counteract that is to say we are all one people—we are all in it together, we are all integrated, we are all one community and one nation, and we should all stand together.

That is why the whole idea of multiculturalism was such a massive error, because it feeds on division. It creates division and a sense of separation—a sense that we are not all the same, not all in it together, not all joined together and not integrated; a sense, rather, that we are disintegrated. Poor pity that they did not think multiculturalism through or see that it would lead to the distrust that we see in some areas and some nations of our country. What we need is a greater sense of unity, a greater sense of shared identity and a shared mission as a country.

I think we have deeper values, beyond the value that we are one nation, and they are the values of what that means and what our history teaches us. In saying that, I am very aware that I am the Member of Parliament for Dover and Deal, the representative of the white cliffs. So much of what our nation is about is tied up in that land, which is hallowed, like Gettysburg, not by any special holiness, but by the acts of the people—our forefathers—and the values they fought for. We should not shirk from underlining that, first and foremost, they fought for freedom—for what the Americans think of as first amendment rights: freedom of religion, freedom of association, freedom of the press and freedom of speech. Those freedoms, so dearly won, are so easily lost and so often under siege. We should be valiant and strong in standing up for them and ensuring that we can talk and communicate with respect. I do not accept the word “tolerance”; I think that “live and let live” is a better way to explain our understanding of different thoughts in our communities.

There is also the rule of law and the flexibility of our constitution, which bends like a reed in the wind. As times change, we change; our laws, customs and mores change. Finally, there is our fighting for the underdog—our sense of justice and our sense of going to war, as we did back then to defeat the gnarled hand of tyranny that crept across Europe, casting a deep shadow. We were responsible for turning it back and for leading the charge against it. That is an important part of what it is to be British. We should be proud of what we have achieved as a nation and we should be strong and very clear in saying that we are one people. Make the case for integration, do not go for multiculturalism and talk about how we draw people together, because that way lies hope, whereas in division lies fear and mistrust.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 10th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Timpson]

As I said in Committee, I did not feel it was necessary to add anything more to the clause in order to explain its function, but that was not the view of their lordships. The reference to “direct or indirect” contact makes it clear what we mean by “contact”. As I know from my time practising in the family courts, many orders are set out in those same terms. It does not mean, however, that indirect contact, in itself, fulfils the presumption that we have now set in law; it simply makes it clear what we mean by “contact”.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

I thank the Minister for establishing the important principle that children’s rights include knowing, and having contact with, both their parents, but for the benefit of the House and those outside, will he confirm that “indirect” contact will not be interpreted as meaning just a phone call at Christmas or a book of photographs, and that it will be meaningful contact, even if indirect?

[Mr Timpson]

Once again, I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his persistence in pushing this issue. I cannot prescribe exactly the outcome of every case before the courts or the view of a judge concerning the correct order to make. However, the clause seeks to make it abundantly clear that, where it is safe to do so and in the child’s best interests, the child should have meaningful contact with both parents. How that contact takes place is then for the judge to determine according to the usual criteria. I was trying to make it clear to my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham that indirect contact, on its own, could not, in every case, fulfil the presumption. It is important to put that on the record, and I wrote to him today about that to put—I hope—his mind at rest.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve McCabe]

The Professional Association for Childcare and Early Years and the Family and Childcare Trust say exactly that this model will increase costs for parents. A recent Netmums survey shows that people say that Ofsted inspection of childminders increases their confidence in the suitability of the childminders they choose, while an almost equal proportion say that regulation by an agency other than Ofsted would reduce their confidence. We will be keen to hear more about how the Minister will pilot his approach and how it will work in practice. Will he take on board the fact that parents will want to access reliable information about the quality of childminders, which they currently obtain through Ofsted inspection grades and reports?

[Charlie Elphicke]

I am interested in the hon. Gentleman’s concern for childminders. Did the number of childminders rise or fall under the previous Government?

[Steve McCabe]

I understand that the number has fallen since this Government came to office, but the hon. Gentleman misses the point. I am talking about childminding on the cheap, yet with a service of insufficient quality to make it worth having. If that is the outcome, it will be understandable when parents do not agree with him.

The Government have already scrapped local authorities’ power to consider the sufficiency of child care in their area. If they fail to equip Ofsted with proper powers to investigate what is happening at a childminder’s place of work, they risk exposing vulnerable young children to untold risk. I am sure that the Minister would not want to be associated with that legacy.

[Charlie Elphicke]

The hon. Gentleman and I both know that the number of childminders plummeted because the previous Government engaged in a war on childminders. It is disappointing that he tries to cloak the continuation of that war under the cover of standards.

[Steve McCabe]

The hon. Gentleman is probably wrong because I think he is referring to the impact of Ofsted registration—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) can neigh as much he likes, but we are talking about the quality of child care.

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Nokes]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. CAFCASS has an incredibly difficult job to do, but too often it fails to deal with issues such as parental alienation, and it is important that we consider the problem of poor enforcement of contact orders when non-resident parents are granted access but resident parents ignore them.

The current situation does not work, and both coalition partners gave commitments on several areas relating to family law reform. Some of those issues—mediation and dispute resolution, better enforcement of contact orders and, I hope, reform of court practices—will be genuinely improved by the Bill, but both coalition partners also gave clear commitments on the subject of shared parenting or shared contact. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Minister said that courts are seen as creating winners and losers, and it is vital that both parents feel confident that the court will consider fully the benefits of their involvement.

The Government have worked hard to strike the right balance, called for by groups such as Families Need Fathers, UK Family Law Reform and the Association for Shared Parenting. Clearly, the legislative intent of clause 11 was to bridge the gap between delivering tangible progress on shared parenting while ensuring the paramount need of the child’s welfare was preserved through a presumption in favour of shared contact, providing there was no good reason to oppose it.

I was elected on a promise to seek a legal presumption in favour of automatic shared contact, something that the Bill achieved before the amendment was added, but clause 11, as amended, will not deliver what we promised. I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure me on that point and confirm that I am incorrect in that. There is a whole library of research showing the benefits to a child of a proper, meaningful and ongoing relationship with the non-resident parent. If, as a society, we are genuinely interested in tackling the impact of family breakdown, we must start by encouraging and enabling non-resident parents to remain active in their children’s lives.

The amendment plays into the hands of obstructive resident parents who wish to prevent a child from having a meaningful, ongoing relationship with an absent parent, and puts us back into a situation of winners and losers. Some 10% to 20% of separations—often those that are the most rancorous and upsetting, and in which winners and losers are created—come before the courts. It is right that the court should be bound by the paramountcy principle, but the culture of shared parenting should be driven home, forcing hitherto hostile and oppositional parents to work together in the interests of their child.

I hope that the Minister can provide me with the reassurance I seek. Apart from that, I believe this to be an excellent Bill on which we have all worked long and hard. I support the rest of the clauses and the amendments, and thank him for his attention on these matters.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I, too, have a long history with the Bill, having served in Committee, and being here for its final Commons stage today. It has been a real privilege to watch a master class from my hon. Friend the Minister in how to pilot a Bill with great dignity, courtesy and endless quantities of patience.

I also wish to pay tribute to the shadow Minister, who is no longer in her place but performed her role in Committee with great aplomb. She has handed over to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), whom I pressed earlier on the subject of childminders. It has been a pleasure to serve on this landmark Bill, and it will also be a pleasure to see it brought into force.

I shall concentrate on one basic statistic. In 1986, the employment rate for mothers whose youngest child is under three was 25%. Today, it is 56% and rising. That matters because it says everything about how the world has changed. If so many more women are in work—more than half of all mothers with children under three—child care is instantly an issue. That is why I raised the issue of childminders. In my constituency, if a family is above the benefits threshold but cannot afford £10,000 or so a year for a nursery, it has a real problem. That is why childminders are so important for that intermediate child care and why I make the case for the need to consider people in that salary band. There is a lot of deprivation in my constituency, and many people in low-skilled, low-paid work are in that position.

It also means that, because both partners are in work, parental love, affection and child care have to be juggled. Involvement in the child’s life has been transformed in the past 25 years: fathers are more involved with their children. Both parents are more involved with their children than ever before because of social change. That is why I welcome the changes in the Bill that relate to parental leave. Shared parental leave is a recognition of how the world has changed so very much.

I have raised the issue of contact many times in this place: the rights of children to have access to their parents. I thank the shadow Minister for using that formulation, because it is very important. It is a damning statistic that, of the 3 million children who live apart from a parent, 1 million have no contact with a parent three years after separation. That is really tragic, particularly given the way the world has changed. One parent, who was heavily involved in a child’s upbringing, is suddenly no longer there at all. That is destabilising to the child. That is why, in times past, I brought in a Bill to this House to enforce contact properly and place a duty on all. The right is not the right of the parent, but the right of the child to know and have a relationship with both their parents: the right of the child to have access to their parents.

This massive social change over the past 25 years matters so much because not all our judiciary are young people living the lives of modern parents seeking to get by. Not all academics or our social work establishment are young and as aware as they could be in their daily lives of this particular situation. It is for that reason that I want to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) on her passionate, heartfelt and deeply thoughtful speech. She is absolutely right in all she says. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) on taking up this case originally and putting it forward.

The statistic on the involvement of both parents in the life of their child is particularly relevant to clause 11, which states

“unless the contrary is shown, that involvement of that parent in the life of the child concerned will further the child’s welfare.”

I, too, share the concerns raised today that the amendment originally tabled by Baroness Butler-Sloss in the Lords Grand Committee risks watering that down. I recognise my hon. Friend the Minister’s assurances when he says that he is confident that the amendment does not alter the meaning of the clause or its intended effect. I hope that that will be reflected in the guidance issued to the family division, and that the family division will take note of that. It is really important that this principle is not ceded, particularly given that Baroness Butler-Sloss included not just the irrelevant issue of the division of a child’s time that resulted from the Norgrove report getting distracted by the Australian experience and the issue of the direct and indirect access.

It would not be right to have a situation in which the only contact for a parent who has been heavily involved in a child’s life is a phone call at Christmas, a book of photographs or the odd letter exchange. That does not constitute a right to know and a relationship with both parents. The right of children to have access to both their parents is essential. It matters because they may wish to turn one parent or to the other parent for mentorship, guidance, love and affection. We should enable that to happen. We should recognise that the world has changed.

[Tessa Munt (Wells) (LD)]

Of course, children will have access to their further family through both parents, so it is critical that they have an absolute right to direct, physical contact, and that should be a presumption, unless there is a proven safety reason.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I have great sympathy with my hon. Friend, who has been a staunch supporter of this principle in her time here. I thank her for her support in times past.

In closing, I want to note what Baroness Butler-Sloss said in another place:

“I had very useful discussions with an organisation, Families Need Fathers, and I ask the Minister to see that any information that is sent out to various organisations also goes to that one because it has an utterly sensible approach. It is very keen that the non-resident parent should have a proper connection with the child to further the child’s welfare, but recognises that it is not shared parenting. It is an extremely useful organisation and I commend it.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 5 February 2014; Vol. 752, c. 206.]

[Mr Brian Binley (Northampton South) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his speech and on introducing his private Member’s Bill, which followed mine a couple of years ago. I am concerned that Butler-Sloss’s amendment will water down the rights that we want to create for parents of either sex who do not generally live with the family. I urge the Minister, through you, Madam Deputy Speaker, to be absolutely firm on this point—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

Probably not.

[Charlie Elphicke]

May I be the first to welcome you to the Chair, Mr Speaker? I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South (Mr Binley), who has been passionate about these issues for many years. Many of us have made common cause on this matter.

In conclusion, I simply enjoin the Minister to take up Baroness Butler-Sloss’s recommendation, in line with the guidance of Families Need Fathers, and to work positively to ensure that children have a right of access to both their parents and that the amendment is not misconstrued.

[Mr Timpson]

I would like to thank all hon. Members who have engaged in this detailed—

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Hancock]

I am highly aware of the pressures on sixth-form college budgets, and of the work they do to ensure standards are very high. I am in constant dialogue with sixth-form college leaders to explore all options to ensure that they can continue to deliver the very high standards they achieve today.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

T9. A recent National Audit Office report showed an encouraging 10% rise in adoptions. What is being done to help even more potential adopters to have the confidence to come forward and to support them through what can be a trying process?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Mr Edward Timpson)]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight the encouraging rise in the number of people who want to adopt coming forward and the number of adoptions taking place. However, we still need to do more to ensure there are no barriers in the way of anyone who wants to come forward and give a child who needs the best possible start in life that permanent future, and we are determined to see it through.

Children and Families Bill

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 25th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Timpson]

We have provided local authorities with £150 million to try to improve their adoption service. This is a good opportunity for them to show that they can deliver for children in their care whose plan is for adoption. I do not see why the hon. Lady should feel that this is not an appropriate way of trying to resolve this national crisis. What we are trying to do is simply to provide a practical solution to the problem created when all 180-plus adoption agencies have no incentive to recruit beyond their own boundaries, which prevents children from being placed with a family that is potentially waiting for them in a different part of the country. We want to break down such barriers, ensuring that every child whose future lies in adoptive placements gets that opportunity as soon as possible.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Is not the key issue the fact that although about 4,500 children are waiting to be adopted, potential adopters are being put off by the checks and the intrusive nature of the whole process? Is it not important to streamline the system to encourage more adopters to come forward rather than to worry about whether it is local authorities or adoption agencies that are providing the placements?

[Mr Timpson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why we are streamlining the assessment process for adopters so that it will take no longer than six months, whereas I have heard of cases in which it takes as long as three years for a couple or a single person to be approved as a prospective adopter. It is also why we have launched the national gateway to provide a single point of advice and information for anyone who is interested in adopting so that they are not immediately cocooned within their own local authority area as regards any potential assessment and thereafter matching. We are doing what we can right across the adoption system to make it more adopter-led and more streamlined to break down some of the barriers that have existed for far too long.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak in support of the Bill, albeit briefly. I offer my apologies for not being in the Chamber for the beginning of the Minister’s comments; I was upholding the honour of the parliamentary hockey team, which is why I am now limping.

There are many things in the Bill to support. It takes forward much of the work done over our past few years in government, and indeed when we were in opposition, especially on adoption and parenting, and I shall talk about those two subjects in particular.

I very much welcome the special educational need reforms, and I think the Minister is open to amendments to tweak and improve them. I welcome the Children’s Commissioner reforms, on the basis of John Dunford’s excellent report. I also welcome the innovative proposals on parental leave and flexible working, especially in respect of adoption. The hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) should be complimented on her private Member’s Bill a couple of years ago, which brought the matter to the attention of the Government.

I welcome those provisions, but a number of things could be done better. The subject of shared parenting, or parental involvement, as we are now to call it, has a lot of history. We put forward proposals for the 2006 Children and Adoption Bill. I was disappointed that although more than half of Labour MPs, and Liberal Democrats, supported an identical early-day motion, they voted against proposals that could have brought in the provisions in 2006.

The Bill should be seen in the context of many other things that the Government are doing on private law cases in the justice system, such as better mediation services, better relationship support upstream and better enforcement. The Chairman of the Justice Committee, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), who spoke for the Liberal Democrats, seemed to think there was not a problem. There is a perceived problem and an actual problem. In research on children who do not live with both parents, resident parents reported that between a quarter and a third of the children rarely, if ever, see their non-resident parent. That is a real problem. In 2011, despite serial breaching of contact orders in the many cases that as constituency MPs we see week in, week out, only 53 enforcement orders were granted for non-resident parents to have contact with their children.

[Charlie Elphicke]

We know there is a problem, do we not, because these cases so often fill our constituency surgeries. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for his work in helping to bring forward this part of the Bill.

[Tim Loughton]

I am grateful. It is a problem that we have all known about, but have shied away from doing something about. This is a real opportunity at last to do something about it. It is not about parental rights; it is about parental responsibilities. That includes the responsibilities of parents who have done a runner. The legislation will make it clear to them that they have a responsibility to their children, whether they are on the scene or not. The provision does nothing to dilute the principle of the paramountcy of the welfare of the child; that is absolutely clear. If it did anything else, I would not support it. It is in clause 1; it is subjugated to that very important paramountcy principle in the opening section of the Children Act 1989.

The Bill must send out a very clear message to warring parents—to the 10% of cases who still go to court: “If you think you can play winner takes all, and freeze the non-resident parent out of your child’s relationships and childhood, forget it. Think again, because both of you will have a responsibility to the children, or will be expected to play as full a part as possible in their upbringing.” That is what the provision is all about; it does not dilute the welfare principle.

A lot has happened on adoption in the past few years. This legislation builds on the work of the adoption action plan and the adoption gateway. It was encouraging to see the early glimmers of a reversal in the trend in adoption numbers since 2007; we saw a tick up in 2012, but it is early days. I very much support the measures on fostering for adoption, or concurrent planning, as we used to call it. Coram in particular has done some excellent work on that. It is about a seamless transition for a child, with the risk being taken by the prospective parents, not the child, and about maintaining continuity of care, which is so important to a child in care in the early years.

I strongly support the adoption support services mentioned in the Bill. Peri-adoption support services are probably the most important thing in ensuring a good-quality, lasting placement. As the hon. Member for Stockport (Ann Coffey) said, we absolutely need to do more research on those adoptions that are disrupted. I am afraid that it is also necessary for us to do more around ethnic matching. As to whether we need legislation to do it, I do not know, but we absolutely need to make it clear that first and foremost a child needs a safe, loving, stable environment from a family. If that family happens to be an ethnic match, that is a bonus; it should not be a deal-breaker for the child.

I am concerned that the £150 million taken from the early intervention grant may mean that provision is taken away from children who remain in care. Even if we double the number of children going into adoption—that is not a target—90% of children in the care system will remain in it, in foster care and residential homes, and will not go into adoption. Yet the only measures in the Bill relating to looked-after children are those for virtual heads, which I welcome, and those on contact arrangements. Why do we not extend personal budgets to foster carers? Why do we not do more to give children in care priority access to mental health services? Half of children in care suffer from mental health problems. That is probably the single biggest contribution we could make to giving them greater stability and a chance to do well at school.

As the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children has said, half of children who come into care because of abuse or neglect suffer further abuse when they return home, with up to half of them returning to care. If we did more to support them, so that they could stay with their families, we would have fewer kids in care.

We need to do more. Where I take issue with the Government is on recruitment. We desperately need to recruit more prospective adopters. We desperately need voluntary agencies to recruit more adopters, but it is too early to compel local authorities to take away the responsibility for recruiting adopters. It has been only a year since the adoption scorecard came out. They are three-year track records, and they are always retrospective. We need to give local authorities a greater chance to show that they can recruit more adopters and work in partnership with voluntary agencies. One thing that we could do to help those agencies is create a bounty fee; voluntary agencies would be paid for recruiting prospective adopters. At the moment, the more they recruit, the more they have to pay to retain and train them. They do not get paid until they receive the inter-agency fee. A bounty measure would incentivise voluntary agencies to do more of what they so successfully do to recruit. The Bill risks de-linking adoption from other permanent options.

Finally, I would like to see more measures for supporting young carers, as many hon. Members have mentioned. I would like to see an effective independent complaints or ombudsman system in adoption, for those cases that have gone badly wrong. I would like to see child performance regulations in the Bill—which my ten-minute rule Bill will propose—as it is the only opportunity that we have had and probably will have in this Parliament to introduce them. I would also like to see us do more to compel local safeguarding children’s boards to publish their serious case reviews and to commission them in the first place, as we do not have any primary legislation to do that. There are many other things that I would like to see, but I have run out of time.

--- Later in debate ---

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

I start by paying tribute to the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mr Timpson), for the exceptional way in which he introduced the debate and took the House through the detail of the Bill, of which he has such an incisive grasp. It is an excellent Bill, particularly when it comes to the rights of children to have a relationship with both their parents, an issue on which I have brought a ten-minute rule Bill before the House. I also want to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) for his part in helping to prepare this Bill.

Some 3 million children in this country are growing up in families that have separated, and around 1 million of them have no contact with one of their parents. The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service has been criticised in the past for having a heavy case load and for too often not being timely enough, so the provisions in clause 10 relating to mediation are extremely welcome.

Clause 11, most of all, is dear to my heart. It will give children the right to know, and to have a relationship with, both their parents. We need the understanding that the child must have the right to a relationship with both parents, because too often it is about mums’ rights and dads’ rights, but this is actually about the rights of the child. It is not right that a parent should sink their child’s right to know the other parent in a sea of acrimony when they split up. From my point of view, that is a very timely and welcome reform. I have had so many complaints about that from constituents, such as Mrs A of Wootton, who wrote about her son’s experience. She said, “Each time a visit is due, their mother creates a great deal of hassle, never being able to give a precise date etc., and she has twice prevented the visit completely.”

It is not simply about mothers with residence. There are cases in which the father has had residence and has blocked the mother from seeing the child. What I have to say is that it is wholly wrong in both cases, as it is an abuse of the child’s rights. It is a child’s right to know and have a relationship with both parents because both parents have love, affection, knowledge and mentorship to offer—and the law should not stand in the way of that; the law should assert and assist that and make it more possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Thursday 8th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

Let us be absolutely clear about what our reforms will do. They will save money for the Exchequer, but at the same time they will ensure that universities have, if anything, an increase in the cash they receive for teaching, and graduates will repay only when they are earning more than £21,000 a year. That is a fair deal for all the partners in the higher education system.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Is not it the case that costs would be lower if the cost of courses was lower, particularly for the Open university, which was not always supported by the previous Government as fully as it should have been, and for further education that is skills-based? I thank Ministers, in particular, for their recent intervention in Kent college to secure skills-based education in Kent.

[Mr Willetts]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is, of course, a range of options for access to higher education, and the Open university is an important part of them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Monday 3rd September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

2. What progress his Department has made on steps to speed up the adoption process.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

15. What progress his Department has made on steps to speed up the adoption process.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

In May, my Department published scorecards for local authorities to enable them to identify and tackle the causes of delay in the adoption system. My Department will shortly launch a consultation on changes to speed up processes for prospective adopters, and we plan to introduce legislation thereafter.

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend is quite right to raise that issue. There have been a number of occasions in the past when, for the best of motives, social workers have felt it inappropriate to match children with prospective adopters because faith might have been seen as a barrier. I do not believe that faith should be a barrier to ensuring that children find a loving home.

[Charlie Elphicke]

We know that some 5,000 children have placement orders, but the number of approved parents is less than a third of that figure. Does not this highlight the importance of hammering home to social services authorities the need to welcome prospective adopters and push the process through so that they can adopt children today?

[Michael Gove]

I absolutely agree. One of the most heartbreaking aspects of my job is reading about parents who want to adopt children but who have found that, for understandable reasons, the system has been far too bureaucratic and slow in allocating children to them. Working with the best in local authorities, I am sure that we can all do better.

Children’s Access to Parents

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Tuesday 13th December 2011 Westminster Hall

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

I am delighted to have secured this important debate. Week in, week out, our constituency surgeries are all too often full of parents who are struggling to see, have contact with or have access to their children. Evidence suggests that around 3 million children in the United Kingdom live apart from a parent, and 1 million of them have no contact with the non-resident parent three years after separation.

In recent years, the number of court applications, and the number of backlogged cases in the system, have increased. In 2005, there were 110,330 court applications, compared with 122,330 in 2010. The CAFCASS—Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service—case load has also been growing: in 2007-08 there were 39,432 cases, but in 2010-11 there were 43,759. A massive delay in family court cases is not in the best interests of children or parents.

Although the numbers of court applications and cases in the CAFCASS backlog look slightly better than last year, they are still far too high and I suggest that mediation would be a faster and better way forward. Mediation is cheaper at £752 per case compared with £1,682 for full court proceedings, and on average it takes 110 days, while court cases take 435 days. Some 95% of mediations are complete within nine months, while only 70% of court cases are over within 18 months.

In such circumstances, time is of the essence to provide stability for the child and their parents, and to ensure the protection of the child’s welfare and that there is closure and a settlement regarding how they will be looked after, with arrangements for parental contact and access. It is important that such situations are dealt with quickly, and from paragraph 115 onwards the Norgrove report promotes mediation, which is to be welcomed. My only caveat, however, is that the report goes on to state that if people do not like the results of mediation, they should still be able to apply to the courts. I do not agree; one needs closure as soon as possible, and parents who are busy arguing with one another should not be allowed further bites of the cherry.

A key issue is the right of children to see their parents following a separation. It is not an issue of dads’ rights, or fathers’ rights, or about those of the mother; it is about the fundamental and basic rights of the child. I believe that child welfare is best served by ensuring that children know and have a relationship with both parents after separation. Too often, parents sink their children’s rights in a sea of acrimony when they split up, which must be fundamentally wrong.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. He is right to say that such cases should be about the rights of the child, but does he agree that those rights also extend to a child’s right to see their grandparents?

[Charlie Elphicke]

The right of grandparents to see their grandchildren is important, although not, I hasten to add, in the teeth of the unity of both parents if the grandparents are, shall we say, of the more interfering busybody variety who destabilise families. In general terms, however, a relationship between a child and their grandparents is positive and should be encouraged. It is not good if one parent who has custody of the child tries to frustrates that relationship, just as they should not try to frustrate the non-resident parent. My hon. Friend is a passionate advocate of grandparents’ rights, and once again he makes a powerful and forceful point. If there is acrimony between families, it is flatly wrong for parents to inflict their mutual loathing, which too often exists in a relationship breakdown, on the child.

In its conclusions in paragraph 109, the Norgrove report states:

“The child’s welfare should be the court’s paramount consideration, as required by the Children Act 1989. No change should be made that might compromise this principle. Accordingly, no legislation should be introduced that creates or risks creating the perception that there is a parental right to substantially shared or equal time for both parents. For that reason and taking account of further evidence we also do not recommend a change canvassed in our interim report that legislation might state the importance to the child of a meaningful relationship with both parents after their separation where this is safe. While true, and indeed a principle that guides court decisions, we have concluded that this would do more harm than good.”

The most important words are,

“no legislation should be introduced that creates or risks creating the perception that there is a parental right to substantially shared or equal time for both parents.”

The difficulty with the report is that it confuses the issue of time with that of an emotional bond. An emotional bond—love and affection—is not about the amount of time spent with someone. A person could have a best friend from university they have not seen for years. When they next meet, however, the friendship will pick up as if it had been only five minutes and that is because a relationship exists. The person may not have spent much time with their friend over the intervening years, but they know and have a relationship with them. That, in essence, is what we must ensure for our children, because they have the right to know both their parents and to have a relationship, reasonable access and contact with them following a separation.

The Norgrove report has confused those two issues. A relationship is not about time but about that bond, that sharing between parent and child, and the love and affection that goes with it. A clear social message needs to be sent out, which is why I have tabled the Children (Access to Parents) Bill, and why I secured this debate. A relationship is not about the amount of time spent together but about the bond created, and that lies at the heart of my case.

We need action because 1 million children do not see both their parents. Society has changed and is still changing, and social change means that over the past few decades, both parents have become more actively engaged than was previously the case. One study showed that parental involvement by fathers rose 200% between 1974 and 2000, and the change in work patterns seen over recent decades suggests that there is more joint parenting. According to research that I requested from the House of Commons Library, the number of men in part-time work has risen from about 500,000 in 1985 to 2 million today, while the number of partnered mothers in work rose from 52% in 1986 to 71% in 2010. That suggests that parents are sharing work and bringing up their children, and all of us, particularly the younger Members of the House, know that the work-life balance includes more juggling and sharing of parenting and parental responsibility.

[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this extremely important debate. He has mentioned some of the latest data but is he aware of recent research by the insurance company Aviva showing that the number of stay-at-home dads has doubled in a year? That is part of the trend that he mentions.

Together with taking on more of the burden and responsibilities of parenting should come more of the rights. I agree with points raised earlier about the rights of the child, but there is also an issue of securing paternal access. I have heard cases in my constituency surgery where although an access order has been passed by the court, it is flouted, sometimes dozens of times, by the other partner. Does my hon. Friend agree that we must take a firmer, clearer look at enforcement action against recalcitrant partners?

[Charlie Elphicke]

I thank my hon. Friend for that powerful intervention. I will come later to the key issue of orders being flouted.

Parents share work and the bringing up of children, and that should not end at separation. It should not be a case of falling off a cliff; it should not suddenly be the case that children never see one of their parents any more. That is a mad way to proceed and it is destabilising for the child. The welfare of the child is best served by ensuring a continuing relationship with both parents.

The same is true in respect of educational attainment. In December 2010, the Fatherhood Institute published a report showing that better school results, better behaviour, lower criminality and less drug abuse are associated with children having the type of relationship with both parents that I have described. That is why it matters that the child has the right to know both parents and have a relationship with them through reasonable access and contact. It is essential to the rights of the child, the welfare of the child and the success of the child.

My hon. Friend made a powerful and telling point: too often, court orders are flouted. One sees this from the Norgrove report and the sixth report of Session 2010-12 of the Select Committee on Justice. People say, “Oh, there’s no need to change anything. We can see from the court figures that it all looks perfectly fine. In only a couple of hundred cases is contact denied.” However, the reality is that even if orders are made, they are just ignored. Even if people go down the route of a court process, they may be forced into abandoning it simply because of how long it all takes.

That is why a change in the law should send a social message as much as a legal message. I urge the Minister to reject the aspect of the Norgrove report that I have described and to support a change in the law. We need that change to send a clear message to the courts, but also to all parents who, as my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) said, deny their children the right to see and know both their parents through reasonable access and contact. That right should be enshrined in law. I hope that if I end my contribution now, it will allow a little time for my hon. Friends the Members for Harlow (Robert Halfon) and for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) to speak.

Economic Growth and Employment

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Umunna]

With the greatest respect to the hon. Gentleman, the reason the Monetary Policy Committee has set our interest rates so low is that we are struggling to find growth in this country. Without growth, we will be unable to reduce our borrowing. Our not being in the eurozone is another reason we are able to adopt lower interest rates.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

I, too, congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his much-deserved elevation and on his speech, which has been very interesting so far. I put it to him that the Opposition’s plan would have been to borrow about £100 billion more than the Government plan to borrow in the current Parliament, which would lead to higher interest rates and push us closer to the situation Italy and Greece find themselves in and to what is happening in the eurozone, which would be irresponsible and reckless.

[Mr Umunna]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for welcoming me to my post. First, if he looks at page 22 of the Government’s summary of independent forecasts, he will see that they are projected to borrow, on average, over £100 billion more than the Government thought they would. Secondly, when he returns to his constituency he might wish to explain to his constituents, particularly the young people—youth unemployment there is up by 155% since January this year—why he cannot get his Government to change course.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Umunna]

I have given way several times, and I want to make a bit of progress.

Instead of reverting to the tired old mantras and doing over the people who work in this country, perhaps the Secretary of State could tell us what he will do to get banks lending to small and medium-sized businesses that are, by his and the Chancellor’s own admission, currently being starved of credit. We know that the Project Merlin accord between the banks and the Government failed. The Secretary of State more or less admitted as much when he said:

“Merlin was necessary but it was never going to be sufficient. I don’t think any of us pretended it was enough.”

We know that the figures published under Merlin are entirely misleading, because under the agreement between the banks and the Government a gross lending measure was adopted, not the more meaningful net figure used by the Bank of England. The truth is that Project Merlin was really no more than a public relations gimmick designed to get the Government out of a hole when banks’ declarations of bonuses were in full flow earlier this year.

For real businesses, the failure is real. The Bank of England’s “Trends in Lending” publication for last month showed the stock of lending to UK businesses contracting overall in the three months to August. The Bank’s latest agents’ summary, for this month, stated that small businesses were still reporting that credit conditions

“remained tight, and in some cases had become tighter.”

That is supported by the figures released this morning by the British Bankers Association, showing lending by the high street banking groups to non-financial businesses contracting this month.

To resolve that problem, the Government first need to change their overall economic strategy, to give businesses the confidence to borrow and grow. The small and medium-sized enterprise finance monitor published last week showed that the main barrier to future borrowing by SMEs was the economic climate, but that the other major barrier was the lending practices of the banks. The Government need to use their influence with the banks, particularly through United Kingdom Financial Investments in the case of the banks in which the state has a stake, to insist that they get money out of the door to responsible businesses that have sound business models but are struggling to access finance. In addition, they must urge those banks to adopt a better lending culture—for example, by ensuring that they have local relationship managers on the ground who get to know the business concerned.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I am sure the whole House has considerable sympathy with the hon. Gentleman’s position. Unfortunately, the Government’s hands are somewhat tied, because UKFI was set up on the basis that it was at arm’s length. When the original deal was done with the banks, the then Government did not force any lending targets on them. This Government have been trying their best to undo that damage through Merlin and other measures, but the previous Government should have got it right in the first place and have made it harder now.

[Mr Umunna]

When will Government Members take responsibility? I wish that we were still in government, but we have not been for 18 months now. It is about time that they got used to the fact that they are in government and took responsibility.

Business is crying out not for a Government who step aside and fail or refuse to act but for one who adopt an active approach, using all the tools at their disposal to create the conditions for private sector growth. For all their claims about our record, such as the ones that we have just heard, the Government have kept in place some of the support measures for business that we left them on leaving office. I should point out that under Labour, 1.1 million businesses were created. When we left office, the UK was rated fourth by the World Bank for the ease of doing business, and first in Europe. Under this Government, the UK has dropped to seventh in the global rankings. We will take no lectures from the Government on support for business.

In government, we set up the Better Regulation Executive and the Regulatory Policy Committee to improve the quality, and where appropriate reduce the quantity, of regulation on business. I note that the Government have continued with them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Charlie Elphicke Excerpts

Thursday 27th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

16. If he will consider changing the MPharm qualification from level 6 to level 7.

[The Minister for Universities and Science (Mr David Willetts)]

The Government do not determine the academic levels of higher education qualifications. The Higher Education Funding Council funds the MPharm as an undergraduate master's degree, to the benefit of 10,000 students a year who are entitled to teaching grants and student support.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I thank the Minister for that answer. My constituent Louis Leir has done an undergraduate degree and wants to do a MPharm, but unfortunately it is classified as an undergraduate-level degree. He is therefore caught by the equivalent or lower qualifications —ELQ—policy and is unable to get help with tuition fees. Will Ministers give further considerations to the issues relating to master's level qualifications? The MPharm truly is one of those, as most of the House probably recognises.

[Mr Willetts]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his ingenuity in pursuing that constituency case, about which we have corresponded. Just as he was with the Pfizer case at Sandwich, he is a persistent hon. Member and I congratulate him on that. However, we believe that if we were to take the ingenious approach he proposes, it might mean that the 10,000 undergraduates currently benefiting from financial support lose it.