Children’s Social Care: Enduring Relationships Strategy

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Thursday 4th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Josh MacAlister]

That is a great question, because it gets to the heart of how the system behaves when it finds a parent who is perhaps struggling with a substance misuse problem, or is in a violent relationship, or has mental health needs and cannot continue to look after the child by themselves, but could be an important part of that child’s life for the foreseeable future, and when there are relatives saying, “We can help. We can be part of the solution. We do not need this child to go into the care system.” There needs to be a mechanism to fund those solutions, and that is what family network support packages do. The £2.4 billion that I referred to is available to fund those family network support packages. In the kinship zones, we are expecting much higher use of those FNSPs so that we can properly evaluate things. When I looked at the differences in the care population around the UK in the review, it was striking that the strength of civil society in Northern Ireland was one of the reasons, perhaps—this is just an idea—why communities were better able to come together around those children who might be at risk of going into care.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Minister on managing to unite the whole House around this issue—a rare moment. I declare an interest as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on kinship care, for which the Family Rights Group acts as the secretariat. I also reference the Lifelong Links programme, as the Minister has done. It has been a game changer, and it is a proof of concept for the ambitions that he has set out today. This approach can make significant changes for young people as they go through their lives. One of my questions is about the Family Finding approaches that the Minister mentioned. There is £8.4 million to roll that out. Does he have any more information on the timescales for that?

The Minister mentioned DoLs—deprivation of liberty orders—in his statement. On Tuesday, there was a Supreme Court judgment on deprivation of liberty and the changes to the acid test set in the Cheshire West judgment. Is that going to have any bearing on the roll-out of the strategy? Will any further guidance come out between now and the review that is expected to take place at the beginning of next year? And will he join me in congratulating North East Lincolnshire council’s fostering team, who have made enormous efforts to support foster-friendly employer schemes? All across the borough are orange stickers declaring that people are foster-friendly employers. That has raised awareness and done a huge amount to boost fostering in north-east Lincolnshire. Of course, he is welcome to come to my constituency any time.

[Josh MacAlister]

I thank my hon. Friend for her questions. We are announcing today that the Family Finding programme will be extended and taken further, and the aim is to have it rolled out across the whole of England within the next two years. The procurement for that starts today, and it will be swift. We are looking to find an organisation that will not just support us to deliver a pilot or programme that sits alongside, or on top of, existing services—as has been done over the last few years—but work with local areas to embed in the core of how social workers and PAs are currently operating the features of those sorts of models, so that this becomes completely mainstream within the next two years. That is a bold goal, but we absolutely need to help shift the time and practice of social workers and PAs. We will need to make changes to some of the statutory guidance and regulation in order to free up social workers and PAs to be able to do that, but that is absolutely the right decision.

On deprivation of liberty orders, we will look really closely at the Supreme Court judgment earlier this week, but we do not expect that it will have any material impact on the Home Again programme that we are looking to roll out this summer. Finally, I would be delighted to congratulate the fostering team in my hon. Friend’s local authority. I was inspired when I saw their videos.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Bailey]

I am sorry but I am going to make some progress.

I will now turn to the amendments relating to looked-after children and deprivation of liberty. Lords amendment 16 concerns a proposed review of the level of funding for the adoption and special guardianship support fund. We all know the importance of effective support for the success of adoptive families. That is why the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Whitehaven and Workington (Josh MacAlister), announced £55 million for the fund in 2026-27 and confirmed that the fund will continue in 2027-28. He also announced a 12-week consultation on adoption support, including the ASGSF. I am sure that hon. Members will agree that it is important that we do not undermine the integrity of the consultation by undertaking a separate review.

Lords amendment 17 intends to strengthen relationships between looked-after children and their siblings. In practice, it would require local authorities to record in the care plan any contact arrangements made between looked-after children and any sibling they are not living with.

I am proud that this Government have set out the biggest reforms to the children’s social care system in a generation. In particular, we are implementing changes to expand fostering, creating 10,000 additional places for children, and resetting the system to back kinship care, so that more children can grow up safely with people who already know and love them. These changes will allow many more children who grow up in care to spend time with their brothers or sisters.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Government on making kinship care central to their policies. Many children in care experience significant disruption in their lives, through multiple home moves and school changes, and relationships with their brothers and sisters are so central to a child’s sense of identity, belonging and emotional security. Will the Minister look again at how regulations and guidance could better ensure that those relationships are protected?

[Olivia Bailey]

I agree with my hon. Friend about the importance of sibling relationships. Lords amendment 17 would do little to advance that cause, but the reforms that we are driving forward on children’s social care will.

Lords amendment 19 seeks to include integrated care boards in regional co-operation arrangements. The Government agree that is important to include health partners in regional arrangements to improve looked-after children’s outcomes, but there are already legal requirements on local authorities to do this. These duties will continue to apply to local authorities that form regional care co-operatives, and the amendment is therefore unnecessary.

Lords amendment 21 concerns joint funding arrangements for children deprived of their liberty. Mechanisms for pooled funding already exist and work well in some areas, and legislating now would be premature ahead of pilots that will test effective models.

Lords amendments 41 and 42 seek a monetary cap rather than a numeric limit on branded school uniform. I welcome their lordships’ support of the Government’s aim to tackle the cost of uniform for parents. Our manifesto was clear that we will limit of branded items of uniform required, so uniforms make children look smarter but do not make families poorer. However, these amendments would undermine our shared aims. A cost cap would risk creating perverse incentives for schools by creating a financial target; many schools could require more branded items, reducing savings for parents.

A cost cap would require Government to regulate for wider, unworkable factors, including how many spares parents might buy, cost variations for clothing sizes and even promotional pricing. It would also impose new bureaucracy on schools to carry out regular retail price monitoring, often across multiple suppliers. We recognise concerns about high-cost individual items, which is why we will strengthen existing cost guidance to be clear that high-cost compulsory branded uniform items should be avoided.

Lords amendment 102 seeks to limit the circumstances in which the adjudicator can specify a lower published admissions number following an upheld objection. Every parent should be able to send their child to a good local school, and we want a choice of good schools for all families. That is why, when we bring forward the updated statutory school admissions code, it will make securing a high-quality education and high levels of parental choice central factors in any decision on PAN. However, at a time of declining pupil numbers, schools acting unilaterally in isolation can put that parental choice at risk. That is exactly why clause 56, unamended, is essential to help to ensure that all schools and local authorities work together to ensure that place-planning delivers a choice of high-quality schools for all families.

Kinship Carer Identification

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Monday 23rd February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Tom Collins]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising good cases and good examples that we might like to follow. I also appreciate his having spoken to me beforehand about his experiences with the situation in Northern Ireland.

I would like to share the experiences of Clare. She said:

“I rushed into A&E in a complete panic. I was carrying my two-year-old nephew…who was struggling to breathe. The receptionist barely looked up as she asked me my nephew’s name and date of birth. Her next question filled me with fear: Who are you? As I answered, she looked up and I knew what was coming—a barrage of questions about why I had taken care of this child. Where was his mother? Could I prove that social services knew he was in my care? And—most terrifyingly of all—did I know that the hospital could not treat him without the consent of someone with parental responsibility? He was struggling to breathe, his face white as a sheet and his chest heaving, while this person was calmly telling me they couldn’t help.”

Donna’s step-grandchild was badly injured. The only thing she could do was call the local authority to see if it would vouch for her. It took two hours for the call to be returned. The child had lost blood and was in tremendous pain. Only once it was explained by the social worker that Donna was the legal guardian did they give him pain relief and begin to treat the injury. However, the injury required surgery and at a hospital in the next county, an hour’s drive away, Donna once again had to explain who she was. No one from the first hospital was there to verify that Donna was the carer. She had to call children’s services again and wait four hours for verification.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

The examples that my hon. Friend cites are incredibly traumatic. These situations are even more complicated for those who do not have legal parental rights and who have an informal kinship arrangement. Has he had any thoughts about what could be done to support those families?

[Tom Collins]

It is true that there is a real diversity in the situations of kinship carers, both in the causes of people finding themselves caring for young people and in the legal structures that they are operating under. We totally recognise that, as we move forward in trying to tackle these issues, we need to be really open-eyed to that full range of different experiences and situations.

Caroline tells her story:

“Eve landed on her arm, screamed out in pain, one look and I knew it was broken. I took her to the emergency department…and she was admitted immediately to the children’s ward. An X-ray was taken and Eve was administered morphine. The consultant booked Eve in for an operation the following day. She had been on morphine all night to help her with the pain. The surgeon came round and explained the procedure. Eve was prepped and then the anaesthetist came with a form to sign. He asked who I was. I told him I was aunt and the legal guardian. He then asked to see my legal order. I told him that no one had asked…He said, ‘I refuse to administer anaesthetic without seeing the legal document.’ I had been up all night with a crying young girl; the last thing I thought about was a legal order. I called my husband, who had to leave work to go home and find the document. It took two hours for the photo ID to be sent…During this time, Eve was hooked up to morphine. We had to wait for the anaesthetist to finish his surgery list to look at the photo on my phone, which was accepted in the blink of an eye.”

Steph points out that this happens consistently:

“I have to show copies at all doctors, dentist, school, etc. Any time we have to make a decision for him I have to show proof. Can you imagine if I lost that piece of paper? It’s not right having to explain that you are the carer in front of the child again and again. Imagine how the child feels.”

Sadly, these situations are typical and, as Steph points out, they can be deeply traumatising for both children and carers.

Christine says:

“I really don’t want to carry my SGO with me; I’m worried I will lose it or it will get into the wrong hands.”

She is not alone. It is also perhaps unfair of us to expect clinical professionals to recognise the various forms of legal document that are not recorded on any Government system but instead live as paper artefacts with mysterious acronyms such as SGO, special guardianship order, or CAO, child arrangement order. How can we be failing children and kinship carers so badly?

Yet there is hope. Christine goes on to say:

“We should be given a card with a barcode and all the details they need to know so that you can keep it in your purse.”

Caroline agrees:

“We need an ID card that will live in my purse, so I don’t have to go through this again.”

Kinship Carers UK, a national charity based in my constituency of Worcester, has the answer. It is ready to help develop an authorised photographic kinship carer ID card and app for all carers, regardless of the type of legal order. This card would allow kinship carers to live fully prepared for any eventuality. It would allow clinical staff to immediately recognise and validate a kinship guardianship situation and to deliver best practice in trauma-informed care, never requiring a family to retell their story or relive past trauma simply to access basic care.

The benefits go further. Preventing the situation described by our kinship families would save money as well as distress. The cost savings to councils on social worker time no longer spent answering queries or to the NHS in rebooked appointments are hard to quantify, especially as the Office for National Statistics has not managed to identify all kinship children, and health trusts do not record instances of rebook treatments for that reason. Even conservative estimates show a kinship carer ID card paying for itself within a year.

Kinship Carers UK has already been in talks with the Department of Health and Social Care and has received a positive response. It is ready to fundraise to secure resources for development, but talks have stalled, as work on the NHS app pushes a full digital implementation of a kinship carer ID back to potentially 10 years away. For kinship families, that is too long, and we as a Government of action, innovation, partnership and collaboration can do better. With a co-ordinated plan in partnership with the Department for Education, DHSC and possibly the Ministry of Justice, Kinship Carers UK can lead a consortium of charities to realise the ID card and information resources for NHS workers. That could be realised within two years, with later digital integration with the NHS in a decade.

My ask of the Minister is simple: will he and the Secretary of State for Health arrange to meet Kinship Carers UK and myself to formulate a plan with the goal of having authorised kinship carer ID cards issued by the end of 2028, for final adoption by the NHS by 2035? It is time for us to act and do what kinship carers are asking us to do and make the system work for them, not against them. Kinship carers work tirelessly to give the children they raise the very best opportunities in life; let us match their commitment. Let us commit to ending the stories we heard this evening and begin a new one: when this Government stepped up and delivered the kinship ID card.

--- Later in debate ---

[Josh MacAlister]

I would be absolutely delighted to recognise Sue Nash and the amazing work that she and so many others are doing across the country through kinship support groups.

The Government have supported the charity Kinship to run 140 peer support groups and training packages across England so that kinship carers have a platform to support one another and navigate the complex systems that sit around the kinship family system. We widened therapeutic help for children through the adoption and special guardianship support fund, for which I recently announced an extension of two years and a 10% increase so that we can continue to meet the needs of adoptive and special guardianship families. We have introduced the first national definition of kinship care, published statutory guidance and appointed a national kinship care ambassador.

We will continue to go further. I know that many kinship carers face financial hardship. That is why the Government will very soon launch a large trial, which will represent the largest single financial investment in kinship carers this country has ever seen, to test the impact of providing a weekly financial allowance equal to the national minimum allowance for foster carers in a number of local authorities across the country. The allowance will not be means-tested and will not impact benefits such as universal credit.

[Melanie Onn]

I thank the Minister for the serious consideration that has been given to this pilot. It is exceptional. We heard from the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) what a difference financial support makes. I congratulate the Minister on making sure that this happens for these families, who are not asking for the earth—they’re really not. They just need a little bit of help, and they want that money to go towards the children they are looking after.

[Josh MacAlister]

I thank my hon. Friend for mentioning that. The tireless campaigning of so many kinship families over the years has led the Government to the point of setting in train these changes, which will be announced in full very soon. The fantastic work done by the all-party parliamentary group on kinship care, which my hon. Friend chairs, means that we are now in a position to take these steps in the next few weeks.

Through the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, we are legislating to require every local authority to publish a clear and accessible kinship local offer setting out the support available to kinship carers and children. The national kinship care ambassador will provide support and expertise to help local authorities to implement that new national duty, and will shortly release a national report summarising learning generated through engagement with the sector. That is the first step in creating a national kinship standard for a consistent kinship care framework across the country, tackling directly the current postcode lottery in support.

My hon. Friend the Member for Worcester raised the importance of kinship carers having employment leave rights equal to those of parents who are adopting. I reassure my hon. Friend and the House that the Government are considering that. We have launched a review of the parental leave system, and it is clear that kinship carers, and the parental leave to which they are entitled, are within the scope of the review. I thank all the carers who have taken the time to respond to the review. We will also improve data by adding a kinship indicator to the schools census in autumn 2026, and launch the first national study focused on children’s experiences in kinship care.

It is vital to ensure that children have someone advocating for them in education. We will ensure that the virtual school head role has statutory footing for children in kinship care in 2027. Of course, the generational reforms to special educational needs and disabilities announced today will support many children in kinship families. We know that the legal routes through which kinship care arrangements are made can be confusing, and carry different assessments and entitlements to different forms of support, which is why we have asked the Law Commission to review the kinship legal frameworks. Together, those actions show how serious the Government are about ensuring that kinship carers, children and families are recognised, supported and valued.

On the specific issue of identification for kinship carers, I am aware that there is an existing campaign promoting the need for kinship carer ID, led by Kinship Carers UK. I thank that organisation for the work that it has undertaken to shine such an important spotlight on the issue. It is of the utmost importance that our national health service and other public services have robust systems in place to ensure that parental responsibility is recognised quickly and efficiently in all situations in which a child is no longer being cared for by their parents, whether temporarily or permanently. It is concerning to hear of instances in which vulnerable children have been denied access to appropriate and timely medical treatment because of a combination of existing processes failing and a lack of understanding by professionals about kinship care.

The issue of professionals not understanding kinship care is not unique to health services. Just last week, I was in Newcastle speaking to kinship carers who told me about their experience working with their children’s schools, and the continued need to re-explain the status of their special guardianship order. I have also heard of cases in which kinship carers have copies of their SGOs, but professionals still seek further verification of the validity of those documents. The challenge is not simply to have a document that sets out parental responsibility or the role that a carer has in a child’s life, but to ensure that services understand the nature of the orders. I agree that we need a clear way for kinship families to demonstrate where they have parental rights, and that it is a recognised and accepted process wherever it is needed. However, the more pressing concern is ensuring that professionals across all our services recognise and understand kinship care.

I am committed to having conversations with Kinship Carers UK, my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester, the Department of Health and Social Care, the Ministry of Justice, and local authority colleagues to explore the best way to ensure that the situation of kinship children and their carers is recognised and understood, and that they get the support they need in a timely manner, ensuring that public services do not add more stress during what can already be extremely stressful times. Across the House, we agree that kinship carers are remarkable people who step in during extraordinary circumstances and times to give their kin a safe, stable and loving home within their family network. We all agree that it is not acceptable that there are situations in which children are experiencing unnecessary delays in receiving important medical treatment or other public services, due to challenges in providing the legal status of the guardian.

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s contribution to this debate. He is a strong advocate for kinship care, and I thank others for their interventions. I look forward to speaking to my hon. Friend in future about the progress we are making for kinship children and families, and to working with him on the specific issue of ensuring that kinship carers and family members are able to prove parental responsibility as easily as possible, so that they can step up and step into the lives of those children readily and easily.

Question put and agreed to.

Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Thursday 4th September 2025 Westminster Hall

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

It is a privilege to speak in this very important debate, and I thank the hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Alison Bennett) for securing it. I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on kinship care and have lived experience of kinship care, so I know how significant this discussion is for families across the country, including in my constituency.

Since coming into office, I am pleased that the Labour Government have been engaging much more in the wider kinship conversation, and I want to acknowledge and welcome the positive steps that the Government have already taken in making it a legal duty for every local authority to have a kinship local offer once the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill receives Royal Assent. That local offer includes information about therapeutic support and is exactly what kinship families have long called for. I am grateful to the Minister for acting swiftly on that.

The adoption and special guardianship support fund provides vital therapeutic support for children who have experienced trauma and loss. Today’s announcement will extend funding for next year, and having that certainty is important, as it gives families some of the clarity and reassurance that they have been seeking. It is right that after supporting 54,000 children already, this much-needed fund is continuing. I welcome the Minister’s commitment to review the scheme and to launch a public engagement process, so that kinship families themselves can help to shape its future. I can say with confidence that the kinship care APPG will be more than happy to support the Government in that endeavour, having recently heard from a wide range of kinship carers in our evidence sessions.

Nevertheless, despite those welcome announcements, challenges remain. Support for kinship families still varies dramatically depending on where they live. The Family Rights Group’s 2024 audit found that a third of local authorities do not yet have a kinship care policy in place, despite being required to have one, and a survey by Foundations showed that not all have a designated kinship care worker. That postcode lottery simply is not good enough. Every family should be able to expect clear, consistent and accessible support.

The further challenge of the level of financial support now on offer through the fund disproportionately affects children with the highest need. The Kinship 2024 annual survey found that more than one in eight kinship carers said that they were concerned about their ability to continue caring for their kinship—

[Emma Lewell (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Lee Dillon.

Oral Answers to Questions

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Monday 28th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for School Standards (Catherine McKinnell)]

I appreciate the concerns that the hon. Gentleman raises. I know that the Isle of Wight local authority is working to address the issue of surplus primary places in the best way. I recognise the challenge around funding. It will take some time to look at that, but the system is designed not to give every school the same amount of money but to address some of the needs that he outlines. I am more than happy to continue this discussion, as I appreciate the issue is very important in his constituency.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

Has the Department made an estimate of how many children with SEND are at risk of losing therapeutic support as a result of the recent changes to the adoption and special guardianship support fund?

[Janet Daby]

I hear the concerns around the adoption and special guardianship support fund. We have had to make some really difficult decisions, but we have chosen the fairest approach to manage tight resources in the face of increasing demand for support. We will continue to review the situation.

Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Tuesday 1st April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Janet Daby]

The hon. Member has given me something to think about, so I thank her for that. I congratulate her on being an adoptive auntie. Since 2015, over £400 million has helped support nearly 53,000 children who have received therapeutic support. I agree that more people should consider being adopters and that their financial situation should not prevent them from being able to adopt.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) on securing this really important UQ. I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on kinship care. I welcome the Minister’s confirmation that £50 million will be allocated this year to this incredibly important fund. That will end the limbo that families have found themselves in while they have experienced this unfortunate delay.

It is essential that we give all kinship children the same opportunities to heal, to achieve and to thrive. This is the second service affecting kinship families that has received late confirmation in the past few months. I know that the Minister, as a former social worker, cares for and has a particular interest in this group of young people. Will she work with the APPG to support longer-term planning for funding for kinship families?

[Janet Daby]

I thank my hon. Friend for all her comments. I assure her that I remain committed to working with the APPG on kinship care.

Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill [ Lords ] (First sitting)

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 13th March 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Neil O’Brien]

I saw that, and I wonder whether the hon. Lady noted in that submission the organisation’s pretty strong criticisms of the Government’s decision to cut adult skills spending. That is an example of what I was just talking about. Instead of addressing the real issues, we have reorganisation. I was not going to bring up the document from the Association of Colleges, but I am glad that the hon. Lady has.

Let me return to the Institute of the Motor Industry. Its evidence states:

“Without dedicated attention to the unique challenges faced by the automotive industry, Skills England risks creating further disconnection between education policy and real-world workforce demands.”

It talks about the risk of losing employer-led standards:

“Transitioning to Skills England could introduce additional confusion and delays, undermining apprenticeship approvals and disrupting funding streams critical to maintaining employer confidence.”

In fairness, that is what the Government’s impact assessment said. It stated that the issues around transition are likely to lead to delays, which will have a real-world impact. I will come back to that point in a second.

The criticisms from different people in industry of the move away from independence and employer ownership —those two things go hand in hand—take us back to the origin of IfATE. It was set up alongside the introduction of the apprenticeship levy. It was, in a sense, a quid pro quo. There was employers’ money and, in return, employer ownership of the system, for the first time. The move away from this being something independent and properly arm’s length to it being run by a bit of the DFE, by just some DFE officials, is a move away from that sense of employer ownership.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

Will the shadow Minister explain why he does not think that the rationalisation of unelected and largely unaccountable arm’s length bodies—quangos—is a bad thing? Why should the Secretary of State not be the person who is held accountable for post-16 skills education?

--- Later in debate ---

[Neil O’Brien]

As I said, I am absolutely ready to hear detailed thoughts and to have the detailed discussion about how one improves all these different things, and I am pleased that the hon. Lady’s local college seems to be highly successful in delivering these things. Every year, on average, twice as many people started apprenticeships under the last Government as started them under the previous Labour Government, so we did get a lot more of them, as well as higher quality. I do not know what the 90 bits of paper are, but I am absolutely ready to hear and to talk about ways we could improve those matters.

On the point about SMEs that the hon. Lady raised, that is exactly why last March we moved to 100% funding for SMEs—to make things easier for them. I agree with the hon. Lady: there is a lot to do to make it easier for SMEs to participate in the levy-led system. I am just not convinced that any of the concerns she raises will be addressed by shutting down IfATE or setting up Skills England. She might hope that they will be—I hope that they will be—but I do not see anything in this legislation that will fix any of the problems that she complains about. Obviously, we hope that collectively we will solve the problems in the system.

There are quite a lot of concerns—including concerns among those on the Labour Benches, which I will come on to—about the transfer of IfATE’s powers to the Secretary of State compromising the independence with which apprenticeships and wider technical qualifications, such as T-levels, are accredited, and diluting the voice of employers. As numerous people have pointed out, we would not and do not accept that on the academic side, where we have both independent exam boards and Ofqual creating and monitoring specifications and exams. This is yet another example of our treating the academic side—the route that most of us went down—differently from the technical side. As the Labour peer Lord Knight has pointed out:

“The problem that some of us have with the Bill is that it feels like the second half is missing. The second half is the establishment of Skills England as a statutory body…Being subsumed within a division of the Department for Education…is problematic. The Minister needs to reflect on it.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 21 November 2024; Vol. 841, c. GC87.]

As another Labour peer, Baroness Blower, pointed out,

“the appropriate move from where we are would be to a statutory body”.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 21 November 2024; Vol. 841, c. GC90.]

Stephen Evans, chief executive of the Learning and Work Institute, said that giving Skills England legislative backing

“would…cement the body’s independence.”

In contrast, the Bill originally introduced by the Government did not even include the words “Skills England”. The very act of a further reorganisation, even if one thinks it is a good idea, is likely to further compound the effects of the Budget and the decision to move apprenticeships money to other things. I will just rehearse that for a moment. Obviously, the Budget saw a £40 billion overall tax increase and the largest part of that is a £25 billion increase in national insurance, which is squarely targeted on part-time and lower-income workers. It hits exactly the tier of the workforce that is typically the apprenticeship kind of tier. Of course, apprenticeships do not require payment of national insurance, but when we see lots of employers, as we do now, shedding jobs in that tier, that is inevitably bad for the number of apprenticeships.

That is compounded by what the Government want to do in terms of taking money out of apprenticeships. There has been some confusion about that, because safely before the election, Labour in opposition had the idea that it was going to let employers take 50% of the money from the levy and spend it on things that were not apprenticeships. Then, as the election drew nearer, that idea seemed to disappear and did not feature any more. Lots of people assumed that it was gone. Then I assumed it was definitely gone, because I asked the current Minister—whom we have here today—in Westminster Hall whether the 50% target still stood, and the Minister said that the policy was under review. Then a couple of weeks later, in oral questions, when we asked the Secretary of State whether the 50% target still stood, she said that it did, even though lots of people in industry think that that is not the plan.

This whole question about how much of the money will be taken out of apprenticeships and put elsewhere is shrouded in confusion. I would love it—I would be delighted—if the Minister could talk about that point today and tell us whether it is still 50%. It is a binary thing: it either is 50% or is not. I would love the Minister to tell us the answer one way or another. At the moment, the levy raises about £2 billion a year. If the Government take 50% of that money out, they might think that is a good thing. They might say, “Yes, we want employers to be able to spend a billion quid on other stuff.” But if they take all that money out of apprenticeships, one thing they will definitely have is fewer apprenticeships. They could say it is fine—

[Melanie Onn]

The shadow Minister references the number of apprentices, and he pointed to the previous Government’s record on that, but, in my constituency, apprenticeship starts fell year on year under the previous Government. Lots of young people have been completely disenfranchised, having had their apprenticeships end early without getting to completion. There has to be some kind of change so that we are not failing young people. There has to be a review of the levy, which employers have said is far too restrictive. The hon. Member’s points do not actually bear scrutiny when we get down to constituency-level data, do they?

[Neil O’Brien]

I give the hon. Lady the national-level data—I think I did already—because I do not have in my head the data for every constituency. At the national level, we had twice as many apprenticeship starts every year under the last Conservative Government as we did under the previous Labour Government. The hon. Lady might say, “That’s not enough; it should’ve been even higher,” and I would perhaps even agree with her. I would have liked the number to be even higher as well.

The hon. Lady said that numbers fell. What we saw was that, even though the overall number of starts was twice as high under the Conservatives as it had been under Labour, absolutely, the shift from frameworks to standards and to a higher quality of apprenticeships did reduce numbers. It did not take them down to where they had been under Labour, but it did reduce them. However, that shift was essential, and I do not think that anyone wants to go back from standards to frameworks.

There was a damning 2015 Ofsted report, which the hon. Lady will remember well, that found that quite a lot of people—a lot of learners—had been on an apprenticeship for more than a year and did not even know they were on an apprenticeship.

[Melanie Onn]

rose—

[Neil O’Brien]

Such was the low level of quality—such was the total absence of any training or meaningful content in the apprenticeship. What we had was an abuse. What we had was employers being able to pay below the national minimum wage—below the rates even for young people—and, at the same time, not providing meaningful training and what all of us want, which is proper, high-quality apprenticeships. I do not think the hon. Lady is really going to argue for a move back to those previous frameworks—

[Melanie Onn]

rose—

[Neil O’Brien]

But, as she rises to her feet, perhaps she will tell me if she does want to go backwards to frameworks.

[Melanie Onn]

That is not what I am rising to my feet to say. It is interesting that the shadow Minister points out the differential rates of pay between young people and older people, because we have just had the Employment Rights Bill going through Parliament, during which Conservative Members were absolutely incandescent that we might seek to raise the pay of young people, equalise it and recognise fair rates of pay regardless of age.

I am interested in that 2015 report. The hon. Gentleman said “a lot of people”; was that the actual wording in the report?

[Neil O’Brien]

I am not sure what the question is. Is the hon. Lady asking whether what I said about the 2015 report was correct?

[Melanie Onn]

I was asking the shadow Minister to clarify the numbers. He refers to the report and makes a sweeping generalisation about it, so what exactly were the numbers? What is the accuracy of the report?

[Neil O’Brien]

Just to reassure the lady, the numbers are correct. Although I do not encourage people to use mobile phones in Committee, Sir Christopher, the hon. Lady can google her way to the 2015 Ofsted report. She can read it for herself and be chilled, as I was, by its description of the pre-reform system and the low level of quality that was being provided in it.

The hon. Lady tempts us off the topic to talk about wider issues. On those different rates, I would say that most systems around the world, including ours, have different rates of minimum wage by age. That is about making the so-called “bite” of the minimum wage similar for different ages. Different groups of people at different ages have different productivity levels and different typical rates of pay. Therefore, if a Government do not want to create large rates of youth unemployment—and most systems around the OECD do not—they end up with different minimum wage rates for different ages. That system has been there since the start; it was there when Labour created these things, and it was still there when we turned it into the national living wage, so none of that is novel.

I will say one thing about the Employment Rights Bill, since it has been brought up. We do not have the skills Minister herself with us, because, of course, she is in the other place, but I do just note that the Government have created a situation in which a lot of universities are facing industrial action—because the national insurance increase has wiped out all of the increases in fees, and one broken promise on fees is now being used to pay for another broken promise on tax. The Employment Rights Bill makes it easier to take industrial action. I think that a lot of universities, as employers, are dreading the impact. Having addressed that point, I will get back on topic.

SEND Education Support

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Tuesday 25th February 2025 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for School Standards (Catherine McKinnell)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Jenny Riddell-Carpenter) on securing this incredibly important debate, and on the way in which she set out her constituents’ case. Like many other hon. Members in the Chamber, she clearly has a keen interest in the support and services that are made available to children and young people with SEND.

I also thank hon. Members from both sides of the House, including the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), for recognising that work is needed to put right the terrible situation currently faced by far too many children in the system, and that we need to improve it. Doing so is a vital part of the Government’s opportunity mission. We want to break the link between background and opportunity, and that means giving every child, including children with special educational needs and disabilities, the very best start in life.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

On the point about giving children the best start at the earliest stage, what are the Minister’s thoughts on properly integrating family hubs into education, health and local authorities, to ensure seamless support for children with SEND?

[Catherine McKinnell]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. The Government are committed to expanding the work of the family hubs to ensure that every community has support to create that earliest intervention. Many hon. Members have mentioned the importance of early intervention. We agree that it is vital, but I will come to that in more detail. She tempts me down a different path from the one I was going down.

I reassure my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal that addressing challenges in the SEND system is a priority for me, for the Department for Education and for the Government. We recognise that this is a whole-Government effort, including the Department of Health and Social Care, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Department for Transport. Many hon. Members raised challenges around school transport. It is a priority to fix that system and get the best outcomes for every child. I also reassure my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal that I would be delighted to visit her constituency, which I hope can be arranged.

Home-to-School Transport: Children with SEND

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Jen Craft (Thurrock) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the statutory framework for home-to-school transport for children with SEND.

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Mark. I am delighted to have secured this debate on 3 December, which is the International Day of Persons with Disabilities. I am pleased to see a number of hon. Members present to speak, which truly reflects the importance of the issue.

Disabled children enter the education system with the odds stacked against them. The damage and chaos wrought by 14 years of underfunding and understaffing have left a broken special educational needs and disabilities system. Parents have to fight for the entitlements of their child at every step of the way, simply to ensure that they are given the same life chances as other children. As the parent of a disabled child, I have experienced that at first hand.

We know how vital each stage of the journey through education is for a disabled child. The importance of early intervention cannot be disputed, as it provides crucial support to their development and improves long-term outcomes. Similarly, the transition to adulthood is a key stage of development when disabled young people advance their independence and encounter new challenges. Yet, as it stands, we have a statutory framework for home-to-school transport that, in effect, excludes disabled children from accessing education. Even where the statute necessitates that local authorities provide home-to-school transport, this is often disputed and subject to many shortcomings, leaving parent carers with another fight on their hands. However, I will focus on the framework today.

Under the existing framework, the legal obligation of local authorities to provide free transport to a place of education applies only for eligible children aged five to 16 and young people aged 19 to 25. This is a vital lifeline for disabled children and their families, ensuring that even those with the most complex needs can attend a school that offers specialist provision to help them get on in life, but until they reach the age of five, and after the statutory duty falls at the age of 16, disabled children and their families are failed by the current system.

Before a disabled child turns five, it is at the discretion of local authorities to make suitable arrangements for them to attend early years settings. In reality, that can materialise as a flat refusal to any request for transport. Families who have been fortunate enough to secure a competitive place at a specialist early years setting are then denied support, and are unable to shoulder the burden of time and cost needed to transport their child themselves. One parent told me that the only school suitable for their child’s complex health condition was an 11-mile drive from home. Their transport application was rejected. As they cannot afford petrol for four trips a day, that parent now drives the child to school and stays there, leaving them unable to work.

Families are forced to make the impossible choice between transporting their child themselves or giving up work, and those children who are most in need of early intervention are unable to access it. Some local authorities even refuse to transport a child to primary school until the very day that they turn five, by which time a disabled child may have missed a term of reception and lost out on vital therapies and specialised support. That leaves disabled children playing catch-up from day one.

By the age of 16, many children with SEND will have been receiving free transport for more than a decade, but as the legal obligation for that provision falls, their education can be thrown into turmoil. In the past, many councils continued to provide free transport for children with SEND from the ages of 16 to 19. Funds put into those travel costs are saved further down the line—they allow students with disabilities to achieve qualifications and skills, and to gain confidence, independence and experience. This makes it much less likely that they will fall into unemployment or disengagement, and face challenges with mental and physical health. However, the rising demand—with 576,000 children and young people in England now having an education, health and care plan—coupled with local authorities being under immense financial strain, has led to local authorities across the country, including in my constituency of Thurrock, cutting the service.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making some excellent comments. She refers to the transportation being free; for some families it is free, but for local authorities, as we all know, it absolutely is not. My local authority, North East Lincolnshire, spent £1.4 million last year alone on transporting 114 children out of area. It is unsustainable for local authorities. Does she agree that the answer is more specialist provision in area, and combined support in mainstream school for those children?

[Jen Craft]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. The long-term goal must be better inclusion for disabled children in mainstream education—I would have loved to send my child to the outstanding school up the road, but it did not really want us. This is not a choice that parents want to make, and inclusion is the ultimate, long-term solution. However, disabled children should not be penalised for the financial burdens under which councils find themselves.

The transport arrangements that are provided are often unsuitable, such as a bus pass for a vulnerable young person. Parents are asked to make financial contributions or are provided with travel allowances that barely cover the costs. It is hard to overstate the impact that the yearly lottery for school transport can have on disabled children. It disrupts their education, places stress and anxiety on them and their families, reduces their independence, and asks their parents to carry financial costs.

I heard from one mother whose 18-year-old daughter attends a school offering specialist provision. This year, just 24 hours before her daughter was due to start her college course, she was told she would be charged a contribution for her daughter’s transport to school. She spoke of the anxiety inflicted on her daughter through days of uncertainty. Despite that stressful experience, that mother considers herself among the lucky ones. Her vulnerable daughter can continue to get to school safely every day, when others who are asked to contribute to transport costs may not.

Apprenticeships and T-Levels

Melanie Onn Excerpts

Wednesday 20th November 2024 Westminster Hall

[Damian Hinds]

Indeed—the hon. Member is absolutely right. Part of the point of careers advice is knowing which course to take and which qualification to pursue. The panel that I mentioned found that if someone was considering a career in plumbing, for example, there were 33 different qualifications that they might seek to take. It also found that in general the various qualifications were not providing the skills needed; they had become divorced from the occupations they were meant to serve, with no requirement, or only a weak requirement, to meet employers’ needs in those occupations.

The panel’s report, which came out in April 2016, became a blueprint for a major upgrade of technical and vocational education in this country. The panel was determined to address both the productivity gap and very clearly also the social justice gap, whereby some young people were being left behind. I stress that although the report was a blueprint, it was also a “redprint”: the panel was chaired by the noble Lord Sainsbury, the distinguished Labour peer. The report called for “a fundamental shift”, with

“a coherent technical education option…from levels 2…to…5”.

There would be 15 clearly defined sector routes, covering 35 different career pathways. Three of those routes would be available only through an apprenticeship; the other 12 would be available either through an apprenticeship or a college track, and there would be common standards for both. Both the apprenticeship and college-based routes would result in

“the same or equivalent technical knowledge, skills and behaviours”

to take into the workplace. The report said that this path

“needs to be clearly delineated from the academic option, as they are designed for different purposes. But, at the same time, movement between the two must be possible…in either direction”.

The report also recommended expanding the then Institute for Apprenticeships into an Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education, so as to cover both apprenticeship and college tracks. It added:

“Specifying the standards…is not a role for officials in central government but for professionals working in…occupations, supported by…education professionals.”

It recommended that there should be improvements to apprenticeships and a new, largely college-based qualification, which would become known as the T-level.

With T-levels, the knowledge, skills content and required behaviours are set not by somebody at the Department of Education but by employers. There is the core technical qualification, but there is also content in English, maths and digital. Crucially, there is a 45-day industrial placement. There are also more college hours than with traditional vocational qualifications and indeed more taught hours per week than for A-levels.

For the upgrade that we needed in our country, in both productivity and opportunities available to all young people, T-levels had to become the principal college-based option—not the only option, but the principal or main college-based vocational qualification. And the T-level could not be grafted on to a market that already had thousands of qualifications; there was an incumbency advantage and even commercial interests attached to some of those. It had to replace a number—a lot—of qualifications. Gordon Brown, the former Prime Minister, has been speaking about this quite recently.

The other thing that was always going to be difficult about T-levels was finding enough industry placements. Lord Sainsbury found that we might need up to 250,000 industry placements for 17-year-olds, and that, of course, is hard to achieve. We could say that it is too hard and give up, but if we did that we would be giving up on advancing our competitiveness.

The alternative is that we change culture in our country and say to companies that if they want to be a great success in their sector, and their sector to be a great success in our country, and our whole country to be a success in the world, we all have to invest both the resource and the time in the next generation.

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes) (Lab)]

I do not disagree with the right hon. Member on that point; I just wanted to highlight that in my constituency of Great Grimsby and Cleethorpes there is an apprenticeship provider called CATCH. Local businesses have come together to invest in a brand-new welding apprenticeship facility that will deliver 1,000 apprentices over the next few years. Is that the kind of partnership working that he envisages, which works well for local communities, young people and business?

[Damian Hinds]

I am sure it is. I will come to apprenticeships in a moment, but I was just talking about industry placements in T-levels.

From speaking to young people who are doing T-levels, colleagues will know that their most popular feature is probably the fact that young people get to do a real role in a real workplace. The placements are also popular with the employers that provide T-levels: first, the employers are investing in the next generation and helping develop all the things the lack of which they sometimes complain about—soft skills and workplace skills—and secondly, the placements are the most fantastic, longest-ever job interview, when employers get to see the people who may come and work in their company over an extended period. I appeal to Ministers to carry on the great work of shouting about T-levels and talking about these great opportunities and the upgrade they represent.

There were two big changes to apprenticeships. The first ensured that there were minimum standards. Previously, as colleagues will recall, some apprenticeships were so thin and flimsy that the apprentices did not know they were on one. After minimum standards came in, apprenticeships would last at least one year and involve at least 20% of time off the job. As with T-levels, there would be an end-point assessment, which would feature standards set by employers.

The second big change was the introduction of the apprenticeship levy. That has always been controversial with some employers, but it was there to do two things. First, it raises the funds needed to pay for a big upgrade in apprenticeship provision. Secondly, it deals with the free rider problem, with which we will all be familiar: some companies in a sector have always strongly invested in young people, but three years later those young people leave to work for another employer that can offer to pay more but has not made the investment in the first place. The apprenticeship levy deals directly with that free rider problem, as economists call it, so that every sizeable company contributes properly.

The new Government plan to change the scope of the levy and to introduce two new types of apprenticeship, which it is fair to say we do not know a huge amount about: foundation apprenticeships and shorter apprenticeships. There is an argument that we already make the word “apprenticeship” do a lot of work—it covers a wide spectrum. Arguably, there are three types of development of self and training, which have different needs: someone may be a career starter, career developer or career changer, and the specifications of the courses and qualifications are different. For example, a 50-year-old who is changing career does not need to learn as many things about what it is like to enter a workplace for the first time as an 18-year-old does. In truth, only one of those types of training is what a normal member of the public associates with the word “apprentice”: we think typically of people who are young and starting out on their working journey.

It is totally legitimate to look at changing what the levy covers, and it is good to refocus on young people—career starters. It is also reasonable to say that the levy could cover some things that are not apprenticeships, such as management development or traineeships, but there is huge value in maintaining integrity around what we mean by the word “apprenticeship”, and keeping a minimum length and quantity of college or off-work content.

Whatever the Government do with the levy, they need to find a way to deal with the free rider problem. The Government will always be lobbied by companies saying, “We should be able to use the levy for this, that and the other”, but if “this, that and the other” means training that they would have paid for anyway, then the levy will not have achieved its goal. It has to be something that creates a net increase in the amount of training and development available.

That brings me to Skills England. Now, Ministers like shiny new things, and some people will always lobby for things to change. A sweet spot is found in public policy when the two coincide: Ministers get lobbied to do something, and they think they have come up with a shiny new thing that sounds like it will achieve those ends. Skills England is one of those things; I am afraid that, without major design change, it is doomed to failure. I have no doubt that plenty of people who lobbied the Government when they were in opposition said, “We need a different approach to skills. We need to think about them across Government, take the long view, listen to employers, listen to young people and have an integrated approach.” The Government have come up with this thing called Skills England, which they think will do that.

Skills England will be the 13th new skills agency in five decades. If all it took to solve our skills and productivity problem was a change in the machinery of government, do the Government not think that one of the previous 12 might already have managed it? The instinct in difficult circumstances is to break glass and reach for a quango, but Skills England is not even a quango; it is nada—not quasi-autonomous, but a non-accountable departmental agency—and there is no reason to think it will be any better at working across Government, let alone across the economy, in solving these issues.

If the Government were serious about creating something new to join together the Home Office, the Department for Business and Trade, the DFE and everybody else, they would put it in the Treasury or perhaps the Cabinet Office. They would not just make it part of the DFE management structure. Worse than that is the loss of independence compared with the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education.

There is legislation currently going through the other place that ostensibly creates Skills England, but it does no such thing. All it does is abolish the independent institute and move all of its powers into the Department for Education. The Secretary of State will now have responsibility for standards for T-levels. Imagine if that were the case for A-levels. If it is not all right for A-levels, why should it be all right for T-levels?

--- Later in debate ---

[Luke Taylor (Sutton and Cheam) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I thank the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) for securing this debate on such a critical issue for our young people. Today, I want to highlight a major concern among college staff and students: the need for certainty about the potential defunding of BTECs in favour of T-levels.

For years, BTECs have served as a trusted form of level 3 qualification, providing students with practical and theoretical skills in a format that staff are experienced in delivering. I have heard from teachers about the pride and joy they take in teaching BTECs and watching their students thrive as they apply themselves to often very practical subjects. In many cases, it is the first time that those children have ever felt passionate about learning and excited to go further. It gives them the chance to finally start down the path—a path I imagine all of us in the Chamber want young people to take—towards realising their full potential. That is why so many are concerned about the replacement of BTECs with T-levels, and why I hope that the Government address those concerns when they publish the findings of their review of the policy next month.

I have heard from teachers who say they will struggle with the suggested rapid adoption of new course structures and unfamiliar theoretical components across the whole range of non-A-level subjects. Staff at South Thames Colleges Group, which serves many of my local students, have expressed concerns about how those sweeping changes will be implemented effectively. Currently, around 58 courses are at risk of being defunded.

[Melanie Onn]

Is some of the concern coming from colleges not also about the timing of those decisions? Franklin college in my constituency has said that the earlier it knows, the better it can plan. It is already receiving parents and young people in for open days for courses next year.

[Luke Taylor]

The hon. Lady makes a point so good that I will be getting to it shortly—I completely agree.

Staff worry about having to adapt their curricula to align with the new T-levels, which will involve updating course content, revising teaching methods and redesigning assessment strategies to meet the new required standards. There is no way to do that without enormous, time-consuming upheaval, which they will need as much notice as possible to prepare for. Teachers deserve a definitive answer on what will happen next.

It is not just teaching staff; students have been left in the dark, too. Approximately 380 students planning to enrol at a college in the South Thames Colleges Group are affected by the confusion surrounding the implementation of T-levels. Those currently completing GCSEs and planning for their post-16 education face uncertainty about what their courses will look like in September 2025. They fear the removal of the element of choice in the system.

BTECs formerly offered the option of a professional placement, but T-levels are geared specifically to placements. That leaves those who may not be academically suited to A-levels but do not wish to begin a T-level course, 20% of which is effectively a job, with no real support. On a visit to Carshalton college, I was told that there were 120 applicants for a diploma in childcare but only seven for a T-level in childcare. That could create a shortage in qualified staff coming through the system. The impact is felt disproportionately by those with special educational needs and disabilities, many of whom need extra support to explore their options before entering adult life, and for whom entry into the world of work may not be the right option so early in adulthood.

Nobody is denying the merit in reviewing periodically the way we train our young people for the future, but forcing students to choose exclusively between A-levels and T-levels could represent a narrowing of their options. I fear that this is a poorly managed top-down change for teachers to implement, and a gamble with the opportunities of a generation of young people who, let us not forget, have already had their education severely disrupted by the covid pandemic. With September 2025 rapidly approaching, I urge the Government to provide clarity to all those affected so both students and staff can plan for the change ahead. The Government must also think again, and give colleges and students flexibility to choose the appropriate qualifications for them and their communities.