Lucy Allan
Main Page: Lucy Allan (Independent - Telford)Department Debates - View all Lucy Allan's debates with the Northern Ireland Office
(6 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberFirst, in relation to the right hon. Gentleman’s question about what is happening in the United States, I clearly, wholly and unequivocally said that that was wrong. On the issue of the detention policy here in the United Kingdom, he referred to the detention of families with children and, as I have said, we ended the routine detention of families with children early after 2010. We do, on occasion, need to detain people, but we take their welfare extremely seriously. That is why, when I was Home Secretary, I commissioned Stephen Shaw, the former prisons and probation ombudsman, to look at this issue. As a result of his report, we introduced the at-risk policy, which means that we have a clear presumption that adults who are at risk should not be detained, along with better mental health provision for them. We have asked him to go back and look at this issue again, and he has reported. We are carefully studying that report and will publish in due course.
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that care proceedings should be a last resort. They should be undertaken only after other steps have failed, because we want every child to be in a stable, loving home that is right for them. The sector-led review that she mentions is an important contribution to work that is being done across the family justice system to address the pressure caused by rising public law volumes in family courts, and we are carefully considering the report’s findings and recommendations.