Children and Social Work Bill [ Lords ] (First sitting)

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 13th December 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Wilson. I welcome all Committee members to this sitting. As this is my first time on the Front Bench in a Bill Committee, I ask everyone to bear with me. I am happy to take any guidance from those in the room who are more experienced than I am.

First, I would like briefly to echo some comments made in the other place about the rushed pace and hurried nature of the Bill. Noble Lords expressed concern that the Bill had not been carefully thought out; they were right, of course, because thanks to their diligent work the Bill before us is markedly different from the one that was introduced. The legislation appears not to have been made in response to any particular burning issues or needs—nor, despite its being a Bill about children and social workers, does it appear to be built on extensive consultation with children or social workers.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend commented on how extensively the Bill has changed; my understanding is that we are on more or less the fourth version. If there was extensive consultation, how come the Minister brought the Bill before Parliament in a condition so inadequate that it needed to be changed so substantially before it got here?

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

That is a question that the Minister might answer. I hope that the Bill will be changed again after our deliberations in Committee—so there may well be a sixth or seventh version.

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[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

Unfortunately, I completely disagree with the hon. Gentleman. The most deprived local authorities have received the biggest cuts.

[Steve McCabe]

If the hon. Member for North Dorset is right, perhaps he can tell us how it is that some Tory-controlled authorities up and down the country have seen an 8% increase in their funding, while other parts of the country have seen an 8% reduction.

[Michael Tomlinson]

That’s not true.

[Steve McCabe]

It is true.

[The Chair]

Order.

[The Minister for Vulnerable Children and Families (Edward Timpson)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Wilson, both this side of Christmas and in the new year. In the run-up to Christmas, I am looking forward to a cracker of a Committee, full of joy and, I hope, understanding.

I know the hon. Member for South Shields will be wondering what present I have brought for her this year, but I will wait to hear what she wants first. I apologise in advance if what she asks for is either out of stock or outside my budget range. I will listen carefully to the case she makes and do my best to try and fulfil her wishes.

I am also grateful to the hon. Lady for this opportunity to re-emphasise the importance of clause 1, which in many ways is the beating heart of this Bill. The intention behind amendments 18 to 25 is to ensure that the corporate parenting principles cannot be ignored and are meaningful. I am equally determined to ensure that. That is why the clause states that a local authority “must…have regard to” the needs identified in the clause as the corporate parenting principles, rather than simply “may” have regard to them. A local authority must take account of the needs articulated in subsection (1)(a) to (g) whenever they carry out any local authority function in relation to looked-after children and care leavers.

Framing the duty in terms of “having regard to” is the right approach. Local authorities already have a range of statutory duties in relation to looked-after children and care leavers that derive from the Children Act 1989 and its associated regulation, which set out a long list of statutory duties that underpin our current child protection system and also create a strong and robust system within which the corporate parenting principles may be operated.

[Steve McCabe]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Wilson. If the principles are the beating heart of the Bill, will the Minister take some time to explain the major distinction between the seven principles and the duties in the 1989 Act? On the one hand we have clear duties imposed on the local authority, and on the other we have a new piece of legislation setting out new principles that local authorities must only “have regard to”. The implication is that one is an obligation and the other is simply something that they should have regard to. What is the distinction between the duties and the principles that made it necessary for the Minister to bring these principles forward?

[Edward Timpson]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s question, because it is important that local authorities understand how this sits within their wider duties as the corporate parent for children in their care.

The principles do not sit in isolation. Clause 1 ensures that existing local authority duties and responsibilities for looked-after children and care leavers are carried out with these principles in mind. It requires local authorities to consider how they carry out all their functions in relation to looked-after children and care leavers. The principles sit above the local authority’s substantial current duties towards looked-after children and care leavers within existing legislation. Those duties remain unchanged; the corporate parenting principles are intended to inform how local authorities fulfil those duties and promote a culture in which all parts of the local authority contribute to their role as corporate parent.

The hon. Gentleman will know as well as I do from his period shadowing me and the time he has spent talking to local authorities and children in care that we are trying to ensure that the responsibility for children in a local authority’s care does not just sit at the door of social workers; it should be the responsibility of the whole council under the seven principles we have set out. The principles give lead members for children’s services and independent reviewing officers a lever to help to achieve just that, both at a strategic level and for individual young people. It is important that the Committee knows that statutory guidance—we have provided a draft—will underpin the principles to make them as clear as possible.

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[Edward Timpson]

My hon. Friend is right to raise what is still an ongoing issue in many parts of the country. I know that many children, often from central London, are placed out of area in Kent, where her constituency is. Although in a small number of cases there is a clear justification for doing so relating to the young person’s needs, we hope that the corporate parenting principles will bind the local authority’s decision making together, so that when a final view is taken on where the child is best placed to meet their needs the local authority will look at how it can improve its local provision, set against the corporate parenting principles, which include housing and the wishes and feelings of the young person. I anticipate that the corporate parenting principles will provide a better mechanism for ensuring that those who are charged with the responsibility of finding the right path for those young people do so in a way that enables them to find a placement that is in keeping not just with their wishes but their needs, which more often than not means being much closer to home than in some cases currently.

[Steve McCabe]

Further to the point made by the hon. Member for Faversham and Mid Kent, would not the receiving authority also be bound by the corporate principles, so that if a child were placed outside the borough, the receiving authority would be subject to all these principles in the way it looked after the young person in exactly the same way as if they were placed in borough?

[Edward Timpson]

That is a helpful clarification. For any child who is placed in a local authority’s area, the corporate parenting principles will apply to that local authority. That duty to act on their behalf in their best interests does not end or not start because the child is moving around the system.

One thing we want to get away from are the artificial boundaries that have been put up by virtue of local government lines that do not always serve children well, although it may be more comfortable for those who are carrying out those function not to think about what happens beyond their borders. That is an issue that is becoming more prevalent, with children being moved around the system, losing track of where they are living and their circumstances. We know that makes them extremely vulnerable. The strong message that comes out of this Committee, having heard both sides, is that these principles should be seen as a national cause, not just a local one, so that every local authority and all its officers ensure that they fulfil its responsibilities as a corporate parent.

[Steve McCabe]

I want to ensure that I have understood this. That was a very helpful contribution from the Minister and I understand exactly what he is trying to achieve, but I am curious about what would happen in a situation where a child is placed out of borough and the child or their advocate argues that one of the authorities is acting in accordance with some of the corporate principles but the other one is not and is therefore obstructing the quality of their care. How would that situation be resolved, given that the object of the exercise is to ensure the best care and to make this a national set of principles?

[Edward Timpson]

In some respects, in what I hope are very limited cases, that situation already arises, where a child or young person has been moved out of their host local authority and they are not content with the arrangements that have been set up in the new local authority. [Interruption.] Will the hon. Gentleman bear with me? They may want to pursue that through the advocacy that they are entitled to. We are seeking to ensure that when that situation arises, though we hope it does not in the vast majority of cases, if at all, there is whole local authority ownership of that issue and that transcends local authority boundaries. That would ensure greater consistency of approach, not just from social workers but those who are responsible for housing and other functions of that local authority.

If the hon. Gentleman looks at some of the changes that we have already made to the residential care system for children, if a child moves out of area, that has to be signed off by the director of children’s services of the host local authority and there has to be a proper level of consultation and agreement between the local authorities as to what the arrangements will be. The aim is to ensure a good and consistent level of service provided by both the local authorities, irrespective of where the child happens to be between the two of them—in some cases it is more than two.

It is important to recognise that these seven principles and the areas they cover are designed to touch every aspect of that child’s time in care. By having to have regard to those principles, we will end up in a situation in which local authorities more widely are taking account of their responsibilities more seriously, irrespective of the type of placement that child or young person is in, their age, their background, or the sort of placement that is best suited to their needs. The whole point of having statutory guidance is to try to assist local authorities in coming up with practical ways, as well as engendering the culture change we want to see, to make sure that we get the improvements that we want to be part of.

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Looked-after children deserve the best possible start. Local authorities, as their corporate parents, have a responsibility to ensure that they adopt an approach to facilitate that happening. That is why clause 1 is a pivotal clause in the Bill. I hope that all I have said provides the reassurance the hon. Member for South Shields is seeking, and that she will withdraw her amendment.

[Steve McCabe]

I do not want to take up too much of the Committee’s time. Having listened to the Minister, I am in no doubt about his aspirations. I also had the benefit of shadowing his post in the previous Parliament, and I have no doubt that his actions are well intentioned. However, I wonder whether he will be able to achieve his ambitions with this set of proposals, which is why the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields is of such significance. The danger here is that we have a set of words but no guarantee that they will translate into action.

I would have liked the Minister to explain to the Committee why there are seven principles in the first place. There were three others suggested in the House of Lords, but they were rejected out of hand. The Minister has made no reference to those whatsoever, and we have been left almost short-changed in terms of the information we have. The danger of not making this a duty is that although the Minister might think that this is the heartbeat of his legislation, to other people it looks like window dressing. The statute books are littered with children’s legislation that has been nothing more than window dressing.

That is why we should take advantage of this opportunity to probe exactly what these principles will do. If they are that important, why is the Minister not prepared to insist that local authorities should act on them? It is hard to find fault with their general wording, but I wonder whether in fact they give local authorities a great many opportunities to dance around the issues.

I note that the Minister spoke of his desire not to straitjacket local authorities, which was his reason for saying that they must “have regard to” the principles, rather than imposing them as duties. He took as his example clause 1(1)(e), about having high aspirations. I want to probe that a little further to see what he really has in mind. Are those aspirations governed by the local authority’s view of what might be high aspirations?

Once a child comes into care, their health is likely to deteriorate, particularly their mental health, which has a 50% greater chance of resulting in some kind of episode. Their education is likely to deteriorate, which is why we have created the post of virtual school head. That is why there was so much emphasis in what the Minister did in the previous Parliament on trying to raise children’s educational aspirations. Whose aspirations are we talking about: the local authority’s, the child’s, their natural parents’ or their advocate’s? Who will determine what is a high enough standard for that child? The rest of us would determine for our own children, and we would want the absolute best for them. But when the Minister talks about aspirations, whose decision will be the determining factor?

The Minister talks about not wanting to straitjacket the local authority. He gave an interesting example about refuse collection not necessarily being an area where one would want to tie the local authority into aspiration. On the surface, I would agree with him. He went on to say that in the case of housing that might be different. What about the quality of housing that a young person is placed in? Does that not affect aspiration? What about the level of the repair service they receive, if the place is in a difficult, high-rise block with mould and water running down the walls? What about the local environment that the young person is placed in? If the local authority deems it all right to put them in a run-down block of flats in a difficult part of town, where the walls are littered with graffiti and there are needles, syringes and broken bottles everywhere, does that not affect a young person’s aspiration? Should that not be something the Minister is telling us about?

Actually, clause 1(1)(e) has a huge impact on how that young person is affected. If these principles mean anything at all, should we not be leaving the Committee absolutely certain that the Minister for Children and Families is saying that the principle of aspiration, as defined in clause 1(1)(e), means that no longer will any local authority be allowed to place a child in the appalling environmental conditions that can do nothing but diminish their aspiration and affect their overall wellbeing and health?

I want to check on one other thing. In the other place, Lord Nash referred to the Minister for Vulnerable Children and Families. Has the Minister had a change of role? Has something been slightly altered? If these principles apply specifically to vulnerable young people, I wonder what that distinction is. We all know that many kinds of young people come into care, driven by many different factors, but often those who have suffered the worst neglect and abuse are the most vulnerable. If he is saying that an additional level of consideration should be applied to them, it would be good to know that.

I understand the Minister’s point—this was raised by the hon. Member for Faversham and Mid Kent—about a young person received into care by one authority who then lives in another authority. He will know as well as I do the tragedy of that. It is probably best exemplified by events in Rotherham and Rochdale. When these children, often from the south of England, are transferred to authorities in the north of England, they are completely forgotten. That is why it was possible for some of the terrible things that happened there to take place and go unnoticed. The Minister said that both authorities would have responsibility. When I pursued him on the question of conflict between authorities, he assured us that the present system is designed to cater for that. I want to raise that question once more, in relation to the point his hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset made at the outset of the Committee about the different levels of cuts and finance available to local authorities.

If a child is received into care by one local authority and then sent to live in the care of a different local authority, and if there is a set of proposals for their welfare—their education, for example, or perhaps they need counselling because of trauma they have suffered, or particular needs that were identified through an assessment following their placement—and it is deemed that they should receive a particular kind of formal support, what would happen if the local authority that received them then refused on the basis that its budget situation had since changed substantially, to the extent that it could no longer afford that service? Who would be responsible for ensuring that these principles were applied? Would it be the local authority where the child is now residing, which would undoubtedly argue that the bill had to be picked up by the local authority that had received the child into care?

I raise that point because, as the Minister said at the outset, these principles are the heartbeat of his legislation. The principles are worthless unless we know exactly how they will be applied and how they will directly affect the interests of a particular child. If the Minister cannot give us a graphic description of how that would work, these are empty principles; they are not principles that underpin a better future for children. Otherwise, this is empty legislation and these are empty words on paper that will litter the walls and shelves of social work offices up and down the country and contribute nothing to the welfare of the young people we are concerned about.

The Minister should therefore consider once again whether his principles are so essential to his legislation that they should be applied as a duty to the local authority, which should have no wriggle room from addressing them. That is the only way he will ensure that he gets the outcomes that I am sure he wants to achieve.

[Tulip Siddiq]

I note what the Minister said about a holistic approach to looking after these children. He mentioned front-line staff and the council working together as a whole, which I agree with. I was a councillor for many years in a council that is rated in the top three boroughs in the country, and I was also a cabinet member. We faced a £80 million shortfall overall and I had to make a 30% cut to the services that I was in charge of. Although I appreciate the sentiment behind these principles and I think they are very timely and needed, will the Minister comment on the fact that councils are stretched? Front-line staff are disappearing because they cannot afford to keep them on, and councils are struggling to provide even the basic services because of the lack of funding.

This is not a political point. Councils across the country are struggling with what I saw first-hand. I appreciate the sentiment that there should be an holistic approach to looking after these children—and I agree that that should happen, because they are the most vulnerable in society—can we carry that out at a time when councils are struggling with their funding because of the cuts to local government budgets from national Government?

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I do not want the hon. Gentleman to come away with the impression that the corporate parenting principles in themselves are what local authorities must ensure they have regard to. Those principles overlay what is a very clear structure of statutory responsibilities that have served well since they were introduced almost 30 years ago.

[Steve McCabe]

I am not sure whether I have misunderstood; perhaps the Minister can help me. He is quite right to identify all those duties, but am I not right in thinking that in later clauses that deal with innovation, he plans to allow local authorities to opt out of these very duties and responsibilities? He talks about safeguards being applied to children, but he will later tell us he plans to let local authorities give those responsibilities up.

[Edward Timpson]

I am afraid the hon. Gentleman is wrong. If he looks at the provisions we have introduced, he will see that the sections I referred to are explicitly removed from that ability in relation to the power to innovate. He will also want to familiarise himself with the guidance, which will set out in a more practical and meaningful way how we want local authorities to behave in relation to the principles. At present, many local authorities are fulfilling those duties in a way that is very much aligned with the principles. We do not want to overlay further legislation that puts additional duties on local authorities, when they are already able to do this within the framework that is in place. This is about a shift in approach, not creating new burdens on local authorities.

The hon. Gentleman talked about aspirations. All of us have the highest possible aspirations for any child growing up in the care system, and local authorities must have those high aspirations too. That is what the clause is all about. He gave an example of a young person being placed in housing in an area of deep deprivation, with syringes lying on the floor of alleyways and so on. That, in anyone’s reading, would be wholly inappropriate. I do not think anyone would dispute that someone placing a child in that area clearly does not have high aspirations for them. There is still, as seen in too many Ofsted reports, an acceptance of an unfulfilled level of aspiration for children and young people in that local authority’s care.

We want to put front and centre of the Bill a very clear message, backed up by the statutory guidance, to every local authority: “Whether you are a social worker, a housing officer or working in the finance department, you should have high aspirations for this young person. You shouldn’t accept second best for them, because you are fulfilling the role of corporate parent, and that should drive you on to ensure you do your very best.”

[Steve McCabe]

As I said, I have great respect for the Minister. There is nothing personal in what I am saying, but he knows as well as I do that there are young people around the country being put in bed-and-breakfast accommodation by local authorities, alongside alcoholics and junkies—it is happening now. If his aspiration is to put an end to that, why does not he legislate for it, rather than giving us principles that local authorities will be able to opt out of, as it suits them?

[Edward Timpson]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman knows that we have already tightened the rules on the use of bed and breakfast—local government welcomed that—to try to get the right placement for each young person, depending on their circumstances. I do not want him to give the impression that the principles are the only thing the Government have introduced to try to improve experiences and outcomes for children in the care system.

I want to challenge the hon. Gentleman on his point about the health and education of children in care deteriorating during their time in care. That is not what the evidence suggests. He will have seen the report from the Rees centre, whose research showed that care has an overall positive impact on children. Those in care do better than children in need, in terms of educational improvement. There is no evidence that their health deteriorates, although of course there are individual cases where that does happen. They are more likely to have health checks while they are in care than when they are not.

I reassure the hon. Gentleman that my job title, Minister for Vulnerable Children and Families, does not affect my other responsibilities; in fact, I have even more responsibilities than I did when the name of my portfolio did not include the word “vulnerable”. Part of my mission involves the clear and consistent approach that the Government have set out in the “Putting Children First” policy paper, which the hon. Gentleman will have read. That sets out our ambition to improve services in every way, for children in care and for care leavers. [Interruption.] I see that the hon. Gentleman has the paper in front of him—he has made my Christmas.

The paper sets out a clear and comprehensive strategy for the period from now to 2020, across the system, for the people working in children’s social care, the practice system that they work in, and the governance and accountability that will ensure we know what works and what does not. As a consequence, we will have the opportunity to see more children, with the principles in place, being looked after by those charged with the responsibility. That is the right approach.

The hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn raised the issue of how local authorities will be able to do what we envisage, at a time when local government funding is falling overall. The amount that local authorities have been spending on child protection has risen in recent years. That is partly because the number of children in care has gone up, but also because local authorities are taking the responsibility seriously. I welcome her support for the principles, but as for the impact of funding on the quality of children’s social care services, she will have seen that there is no correlation that can be determined between the amount that a local authority spends on services, and their quality and the outcomes for children. Some of the lowest-spending authorities have the highest outcomes for children in their care, and some of the highest-spending have some of the worst outcomes.

I suggest that the hon. Lady look at Hackney, not all that far from her constituency, to see how it turned around children’s services to the extent of being able to bear down on the overall cost. The services there work earlier and better with families, reducing the number of children who come into care, which means they can spend the money they have on improving services for the children who are in their care. I challenge the presumption that if we spend more money we get better services. That is clearly not the case. Of course we need to ensure that local authorities have sufficient funding to carry out their functions, but there is also room for them to ensure that they get the best possible value for the children in their care.

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[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

I welcome what is happening in my hon. Friend’s area. I agree completely with her comments. Once children who are unaccompanied asylum seekers reach 18, they are treated differently from other care leavers.

I recall working with many children who had escaped from conflict. Like children who have suffered abuse, their skin was grey and their eyes were emotionless. There was a look of permanent fear etched on their faces and they had an intense wariness of adults around them, which was reflected in their every movement and word. I have seen children slowly lose that look after being in placement for a while. The terror and sadness lift from their overall demeanour, because that is what feeling safe and being fed, clothed, cared for and away from a traumatic and ever-changing volatile environment can do for a child.

[Steve McCabe]

My hon. Friend will be aware that the Home Office is conducting some inquiries into what happens to unaccompanied children who enter this country. The system has not been terribly well supervised over recent years. There is a lot of concern.

Topically, there is a lot of concern about what happens with unaccompanied children who enter this country to attend sports schools and sports colleges—whether those arrangements are properly supervised and whether they could lead to abuse. In view of that situation, is it reasonable to assume that we may see further activity to receive some of those children into care as those inquiries reach fruition? In those circumstances, would it not be wise of the Minister to prepare for that eventuality in the Bill?

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

I shall come on to the absolute hash that the Home Office has made of the situation later in my comments.

After the children have been settled in placement for however long they have been in the UK, the rug is ripped out from underneath them as they reach 18 years old, when they must apply for extended leave to remain in the UK. The majority are turned down, so the place they understood to be their home is no longer their home. Worse still, the Home Office often does not get its act together and remove them, despite turning them down, so they disappear and are off the radar. The Government do not know how many care leavers are in that situation or where they have disappeared to, but it does not take long to guess that if someone is here illegally and is facing the fear of returning to their country of origin, they will go underground and be susceptible to exploitation, whether emotional, financial or sexual.

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In March 2016, of 26,340 former care leavers aged 19, 20 or 21, 40% were not in work, education or training, compared with 14% of all 19 to 21-year-olds. Children who have been in care are just as capable—some are more capable—of achieving as those who have not been in care, but their academic success and the number of them in employment remains stubbornly lower. A recent report by the University of Oxford said that children in care are falling way behind their peers, even in their early years. Only 13.2% of children in care obtain five good GCSEs, compared with just under 60% of all other children. Only 6% of care leavers, compared with 30% of all other young children, go to university.

[Steve McCabe]

I am listening with interest to the figures that my hon. Friend is quoting. Was she as surprised as I was to hear the Minister tell us that we should not be that concerned about the educational attainment of young people in care, because they are doing quite well?

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[Steve McCabe]

I, too, welcome the comments of the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole. Has my hon. Friend seen the comments of the Birmingham Social Housing Partnership, which warned that very good ambitions of the Homelessness Reduction Bill are likely to be undermined by the wiping out of the supporting people revenue grant, which will mean that we will apply new duties to local authorities and give them fewer resources to manage this issue?

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

It is a classic tale of this Government: give with one hand, take with the other, and we still end up in a worse situation.

Children and Social Work Bill [ Lords ] (Second sitting)

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Committee Debate: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 13th December 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow for her passionate speech. Even though she was interrupted mid-flow, she has summed up very well. It will not come as a surprise to the Committee that I wholeheartedly endorse her speech and the amendment on the national minimum standard for care leavers. I want to point out that we cannot just rely on local authorities to make specific decisions, because there are different standards across the country for different local authorities, as I saw as a councillor before entering Parliament.

Various policy concerns can be addressed by introducing a national minimum standard, but I want to focus specifically on people’s mental health, especially that of vulnerable people leaving the care system. One early study of care leavers in England that I found interesting found evidence of a range of mental health problems for care leavers. One in five care leavers reported long-term mental health problems. Everyone here will be aware of the stigma surrounding mental health. One in five is probably not a true reflection of how many mental health problems there really were among care leavers, because some of them would not want to report problems for fear of being stigmatised.

The mental health problems that the care leavers spoke about included eating disorders, bipolar issues, depression and serious phobias that haunted them later in life. In addition, there were shocking statistics: a quarter of care leavers reported heavy drinking on a regular basis and two thirds admitted that they used drugs regularly. It is no surprise that many of the care leavers who spoke about their experiences said that their mental health problems originated in the life that they led before they, in a sense, entered adulthood. They said that a lot of their mental health problems came from the poor housing that they had experienced and the lack of finance and intimate relationships in their life.

The NSPCC rightly pointed out in its 2014 report that leaving care is an extended process rather than a single event, which I wholeheartedly agree with and which speaks to our amendment. Care leavers face the significant challenge of psychologically moving forward towards adulthood, often trying to make sense of their past life experiences. With the withdrawal of care services, support services and care placements, they have to test out the reliability of their network of friends and family. The shadow Minister has made the point over and over again that we should not have a postcode lottery when it comes to care and the future of care leavers. Nor should we have a lottery of personal circumstances, where those who are lucky have a network of family and friends to rely on, but those who are not often fall into either depression or a life they would not have wanted to lead.

The Opposition acknowledge that multiple changes to someone’s living circumstances will affect them, but change cuts across every aspect of the lives of care leavers; we need to be aware of that, because we are dealing with the most vulnerable people in society. Those changes relate to their finances, access to housing and search for jobs, and care leavers confront those challenges while experiencing a withdrawal of care placements and social support services as they turn 18.

I point to a few stats from the Children’s Society that I thought were particularly striking: 63% of care leavers entered the care system because of abuse or neglect, which is a figure that should put us all to shame; 50% of children in care had emotional and behavioural health that was considered normal, while 13% were borderline and 37% gave cause for concern. I am sure that everyone agrees that those statistics are worrying. They should trouble us all, and they should compel us to act in the interests of the nation.

National minimum standards will allow for a fairer system overall, for which the cost will be wholly outweighed by the benefit of ensuring that the most vulnerable people across the country are treated equally. I trust that Members across the House and from different parties will agree with that after hearing some of the shocking statistics that I have outlined.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I will briefly comment on the part of clause 2 that relates to the local offer, before turning to the amendments and new clauses. I will try not to detain you for too long, Mr Wilson.

I am not really clear on the local offer. The Minister has a great deal of experience of the local offer; he pioneered the approach in the Children and Families Act 2014. I am not entirely sure how different what he proposes in the Bill is from the offer in that Act. I took the trouble during the lunch break to look at the rather helpful report from the Children’s Services Development Group entitled “The Local Offer, Children and Parental Rights”. It has a nice foreword by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), who is the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on autism. You will be delighted to know that I will not read the report to you, Mr Wilson, but there are some things in it that are worth noting.

The offer, as it exists in the Children and Families Act, was intended to help local authorities to identify gaps in provision and to make sure that they were addressed, and the report assesses how successful that has been. It found that there are significant variations in the offers made across the country, with some quite good examples in east midlands, Yorkshire and the Humber, and some very poor examples in the west midlands and the south-west. It also found that less than 4% of local authorities have a named person whom anyone trying to understand the local offer can contact, while less than half of all local authorities listed independent specialist schools on their website, despite that being a requirement that the Minister set out in the Act. There is also a significant variation in the information that is provided on those websites. The Children’s Services Development Group says that a best practice guide for local authorities and a mandated template for the local offer would be helpful.

I draw the Committee’s attention to that because the Opposition suggest that it would be helpful to the local offer in the Bill if there were minimum standards by which we could judge the progress of the Minister’s proposals. I asked him to look again at the experience of the local offer in the Children and Families Act and to check whether there is a risk that local authorities will simply seek to replicate that kind of approach in this piece of legislation. I am not saying that that approach is useless, but I am sure the Minister will share my disappointment that it has not been as successful as anticipated in its operation so far.

I turn to the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn has just been tackling about the needs of children leaving care. The Minister and I obviously got into the wrong place before lunch when I thought that he was telling me that I should not be too concerned about the educational and mental health outcomes for children leaving care. If that is not what the Minister was saying, I am more than happy to accept that.

However, I took the trouble to go back and have a quick look over lunch at some of the things that we know. I looked at the report by Saunders and Broad which examined long-term mental health conditions—the very things that my hon. Friend has just been talking about—with a greater propensity among children in care and leaving care, who suffer from depression, eating disorders and phobias.

I looked at the mental health and wellbeing report produced by the Select Committee on Education in the fourth Session of Parliament. The first line of that report says:

“The mental health of looked-after children is significantly poorer than that of their peers, with almost half of children and young people in care meeting the criteria for a psychiatric disorder”.

That report, as the Minister knows, went on to recommend that child and adolescent mental health services should be made available for all looked-after young people up to the age of 25, in recognition of the distinct issues which this vulnerable group of young people experience as they attempt to leave the care system.

I also looked at the situation on employment. As I understand it, these are the Government’s figures: three-quarters of care leavers are inclined to leave schooling without any formal qualifications. Of the Government’s study of 26,340 former care leavers aged 19, 20 and 21, 40%—nearly 10,500 young people—were not in employment, education or training, compared with 14% of all 19 to 21-year-olds. The percentage of care leavers who could be described as NEETs has risen by 1% in the past two years.

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Timpson]

I am explaining the current situation. As the law stands, the local authority will continue to provide the same care-leaving service for those children and young people until all their appeal rights have been exhausted. There will be a period following a decision during which every effort will be made to repatriate them to their country of origin. Of course, that will not happen immediately after the courts have made a final decision.

The local authority can, of course, continue to provide ongoing and further support in such circumstances, which may include the continuation of a foster placement or continuing support from a personal adviser, where it considers that appropriate. The Department for Education and the Home Office will continue to work with local authorities and relevant non-governmental organisations on the development of the regulations and guidance required to implement the new arrangements for support set out in the Immigration Act 2016. Those regulations will be made under provisions that will be subject, in due course, to debate and approval in both Houses of Parliament under the affirmative procedure, which I suspect will be the forum for Opposition Members to continue pressing on the issue. I have set out the Government’s position and the rationale behind it.

New clause 13 would require the Secretary of State to undertake an annual review of care leavers’ access to education. I reassure the Committee that we already publish such information, and I will set out the measures we have already taken to better support care leavers into education, employment and training. As the hon. Member for South Shields said, the high proportion of care leavers who are not in education, employment or training is a long-standing problem.

Of course, there are many reasons for the NEET rate being higher for care leavers than for young people in the general population, not least the impact of pre-care experiences. That is why, earlier this year, we published “Keep on Caring,” our new cross-Government care leaver strategy. One of the five outcomes we set out in the strategy is to improve care leavers’

“access to education, training and employment”.

A number of new measures were announced in the strategy that are designed to turn that ambition into reality, including: a commitment to provide funding for a new approach to helping care leavers into education, employment and training by using social investments to fund “payment by results” contracts that reward providers only when care leavers achieve positive outcomes; and a pilot work placement programme to provide care leavers with opportunities to work in central Government Departments.

Care leavers have already been recruited to work in the Department for Education, the Department of Health and the Department for Work and Pensions. Indeed, a new member of my private office is a care leaver, and she has been a fantastic acquisition for the team. Through our new care leaver covenant, we are also encouraging organisations from across society to offer work opportunities to care leavers and to work specifically with FE and HE providers to set out a clear offer of support for care leavers studying in further and higher education.

Financial support is also already provided to care leavers in education. Where care leavers are in higher education, there is a duty on local authorities to provide a £2,000 bursary to help with the cost of studies and a requirement to provide accommodation during university holidays. Care leavers in further education can also receive financial support through the 16-to-19 bursary, for which care leavers are a priority group. The bursary provides up to £1,200 a year to support the cost of their studies. Through DWP’s second chance learning initiative, care leavers are able to claim benefits while studying full time up until the age of 21.

The Government also publish data on the activity of care leavers aged 17 to 21, which previously were not available. The data identify the proportion of care leavers at each age point who are in higher education, other non-advanced education, employment or training, and those who are NEET, which provides the information necessary to track progress over time and will be a key way of ensuring that we can tell whether our changes are having the desired impact.

[Steve McCabe]

The Minister is describing the various things that the Department is doing to try to improve the situation. Does he recognise that a problem that young people themselves regularly identify is the number of school changes they experience as a direct result of being received into care? The Barnardo’s study says that care leavers are saying that they have experienced five changes of school, which makes life difficult for them. Does he have any plans to encourage or persuade local authorities to seek to restrict those movements between schools, which is clearly impairing these young people’s education?

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Timpson]

I do not have those figures to hand. One of the issues I raised earlier is around identification and knowing who is accessing benefits and is also a care leaver. We need to improve that information, hence the additional data we are now collecting as a Department. That will give us a more granular understanding of who these young people are and how they have come into contact with the benefits system. I will write to the hon. Lady with more details about that, so she has as much information as we can give.

It is important we start to understand where this leads, what the destination inevitably is and what we could have done in the intervening period to make the direction in which a young person goes different. I am happy to give the hon. Lady further information about that.

[Steve McCabe]

This is a minor point on the same sort of area. As I understand universal credit, where that applies to the youth obligation, that obligation will be available to young people only in areas where universal credit is fully operational. In those circumstances, what will be the provision for youngsters leaving care? We could end up in a situation where youngsters leaving care in some parts of the country will be entitled to a different set of opportunities from those in areas where universal credit is fully operational. Has the Minister had an opportunity to look at that, or will he look at that and come back to us? It has not been presented quite like that, from my understanding.

[Edward Timpson]

I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point. Any roll-out as wide and as significant as universal credit is going to have various knock-on effects, depending on what other initiatives fall off the back of those changes. I will take that away and talk to my colleagues in the Department for Work and Pensions to see whether that has been factored in as part of the roll-out through to 2018.

I want to reiterate that care leavers cannot currently claim working tax credit. Anyone over 18 on universal credit will be able to claim in-work benefits. We want to ensure that care leavers are aware of that and that they get the necessary support that falls off the back of that change.

I turn to the issue of paying council tax. We believe, as a long-standing position, that local council tax support is and should be a matter for local authorities, hence the Government giving councils wide powers to design council tax support schemes that protect the most vulnerable. We know that authorities such as Birmingham and Wolverhampton have already taken the decision to exempt care leavers from council tax and I applaud them for doing so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Timpson]

I thank the hon. Lady for tabling amendments 28 to 31, which would provide that when a local authority assesses care leavers’ needs, they must take account of that young person’s requirements in relation to their physical and mental health, their emotional wellbeing and their needs as a young parent if that applies. Amendment 29 would require that any mental health assessment should be conducted by a qualified professional. I recognise that these issues are important, and that they could impact significantly on the lives of care leavers, whose health and wellbeing outcomes tend to be worse than for young people who have never been in care. The likelihood of care leavers becoming teenage parents is also much greater than for their peers, for the reasons set out by the hon. Lady in her speech.

There are, however, many other wider issues, such as health and development, education, training and employment, and financial and accommodation needs, which are also vital to care leavers’ transition to independent life and adulthood. All these issues— it would not be practical to list them all—are arguably of equal importance and will be different for every child, so I do not agree with giving some more weight than others. It is also unnecessary because these and other issues are already comprehensively covered in volume 3 of “The Children Act 1989 guidance and regulations”. The statutory guidance is clear that local authorities must produce for each care leaver a comprehensive pathway plan, which must be based on an up-to-date and thorough needs assessment taking into account how to support their health and development and their physical, emotional and mental health needs. I shall read a small extract from that guidance, which states that pathway plans must address the

“young person’s health and development building on the information included in the young person’s health plan established within their care plan when they were looked after”

and that personal advisers, who, under the clause, will cover all care leavers up to the age of 25,

“should work closely with doctors and nurses involved in health assessments and would benefit from training in how to promote both physical and mental health.”

I reiterate that the Government have established the expert group on the mental health of looked-after children and care leavers, and we have asked them to recommend the most appropriate way to deliver the care. The group have already met twice, and I have met them, and they are free to make recommendations during the period of their work. Their remit is substantial and wider than that which they had in relation to the Education Committee, albeit that that also had worth.

On the initial assessment when a child comes into care, it is not just a strengths and difficulties questionnaire, as regulations already require the responsible authority to ensure that all looked-after children have an initial health assessment by a registered medical practitioner, who should cover their emotional and mental health as well as their physical health needs. The reason we wanted the expert group to consider the matter is that there will be circumstances where it is not appropriate for a child coming into care to have a mental health assessment at that specific moment, either because they have suffered trauma at the moment of coming into care, or because they are a newborn baby, or because other elements in their circumstances might require it to be done in a more individually appropriate way. That will ensure that the right decisions are made about how to get to the bottom of what may be underlying issues due to pre-care experiences. We do not want to set a single process that restricts those who are charged with responsibilities to ensure that they take the appropriate action for that child.

[Steve McCabe]

I understand the Minister’s point about a relatively young child or a baby not necessarily having a mental health assessment, but who would make the decision whether it was appropriate for a child to have a mental health assessment? Would it be a qualified mental health practitioner who would have the ability to make that judgment, or would it be a member of the local authority, or a member of the residential home, or the social worker? There is clearly a temptation for people to say, “Well, it is not appropriate at the moment.” Given what we now know about the longer-term effect on the mental health of many of these children, who is the most appropriate person to make that judgment, and at what stage?

[Edward Timpson]

As I set out a few moments ago, the regulations make it clear that the health assessment is carried out by a registered medical practitioner.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve McCabe]

That’s not what I asked.

[Edward Timpson]

The hon. Gentleman asked who makes the decision, and the regulations are clear about who carries out the assessment. He knows as well as I do that local authorities have a responsibility to triage cases according to the law and the regulations that apply. If he is suggesting that it should or should not be a certain person, I would be interested to hear his views.

[Steve McCabe]

That is not quite what I asked. It is all very well to say that, at the moment, a child coming into care has a regular health assessment, but the Minister then told us why it would not be appropriate at certain stages or certain ages for children to have a mental health assessment. He is making that judgment at the moment. I am asking who is entitled to make a judgment about a child’s mental health, given what we now know about the long-term consequences for many of these children.

[Edward Timpson]

I have already explained to the hon. Gentleman that the process is clearly set out in law. I am not making that judgment; I am reflecting on the evidence provided by others about the experience of children who are brought into the care system. The whole point of the expert group is to try to ensure that the care pathway that is created for each child coming into care will ensure that they get the right support based on the right diagnosis at the right time. We want to avoid ending up with a process at the inception of a child’s time in care that does not enable that pathway to be created in a way that meets their individual needs.

The hon. Member for South Shields spoke about the most vulnerable mothers who have had multiple children taken into care. As we know, that group includes a disproportionate number of care leavers. I draw the Committee’s attention to the Pause programme, which seeks to break the intergenerational cycle of care, which the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston mentioned. Pause has been operating in Hackney for some time and has now been extended to six other local authority areas, with funding from my Department’s innovation programme.

Last month, the Secretary of State announced funding to roll out the Pause programme in a further nine areas, bringing Government funding support to more than £6.4 million in the next four years. The programme works intensively with young women to prevent repeat pregnancies and the subsequent removal of their children into care. The initial findings are extremely encouraging and, by extending the programme, we want to reach out to more parts of the country so that more mothers who find themselves in that situation get the support they need so that they can make good life choices and have a future that is not just about turning up at court once every few years to fight for custody of their own child.

National Living Wage

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Monday 18th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Joan Ryan]

I could not in any way disagree with my hon. Friend, and as ever, it is the most vulnerable and the needy who suffer the most.

Companies such as B&Q use the introduction of the national living wage to “reform their pay and reward structures”, as they put it. That is a euphemism for cutting staff pay. My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden received a rather panicky email from B&Q requesting a meeting to clear things up. Indeed, B&Q’s chief executive officer and its head of human resources were eager to convey how much they appreciated their staff and how generous the reward package was. At the same time as my hon. Friend’s meeting with them, they announced that they would extend by an extra 12 months the period of compensation for those staff members who were going to lose out—an increase from 12 to 24 months. Of course that was because of the reputational pressure that B&Q was under. Although that is definitely a good step forward, achieved because of the considerable public pressure, lots of questions remain unanswered. What will happen to these employees after 24 months? Does B&Q hope that we will forget about the issue and quietly let these long-serving staff members lose out? Will it review its pay structures to guarantee that staff receive the pay they deserve?

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend think that the Chancellor’s decision to conflate the national minimum wage with the reality of the living wage was the gimmick at the outset that allowed these employers to think that this was not to be treated seriously, and that that is why we see these different actions by big chains and unscrupulous employers?

[Joan Ryan]

Undoubtedly that is the impression, especially as the real living wage recommended by the Living Wage Foundation is significantly higher than the one that the Chancellor proposed. We certainly could question it, as he could not have been unaware that what happened was always going to be possible.

Education and Adoption Bill

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Nic Dakin]

I always listen carefully to what the former Chair of the Education Committee has to say, and he is right on this occasion. We all have a leadership role in our communities when it comes to supporting our schools and colleges and ensuring that they deliver.

This is the second occasion on which AET and E-ACT—the two largest multi-academy trusts in the country, responsible between them for 85 schools—have received significant criticism from the Independent Schools Inspectorate. That is telling. The Secretary of State is ultimately responsible for holding academies to account, but, two years after Ofsted’s warning that the trusts were failing to raise standards, we are again being told that their schools are not delivering for many pupils. I am sure we all agree that that is not good enough, and that it illustrates the size of the challenge.

Parents have a fundamental wish to be involved in their children’s education. A recent survey by PTA-UK found that 97% of parents wanted to be consulted when big changes were made to how their schools were run. When a school becomes a sponsored academy and the sponsor is chosen, that represents a big change and a big deal. Parents have an important role to play in challenging—and helping—school communities to improve, and their views should be taken into account at such important moments.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Might there be a risk that the Government are laying the foundation for future legal challenges against academy trusts if the duty to inform turns out to be a duty to misinform, because they misrepresent the information to parents and they are not allowed to consult on it?

[Nic Dakin]

My hon. Friend has done a great deal of work on the Bill, and I am sure that Ministers have heard what he has said. No doubt their legal advisers will have already looked into the point very carefully, but they may want—with his assistance—to double-check the position. Why the Government cannot trust parents is beyond me, but the House has an opportunity to put that right by voting for our amendments (a) to (d).

There is real concern about whether the pool of current and potential academy sponsors has the capacity to improve additional schools. The Government’s own statistics show that only 15% of the 20 largest chains are performing above the national average, compared with 44% of maintained schools. Since September 2012, 75% of maintained schools have gained good or outstanding judgments, compared with 69% of academies. According to the National Foundation for Educational Research, in 2014 pupils at maintained schools achieved the same high standard of GCSE results as those attending academies. The facts suggest that the Government would help schools to improve by ending their ideological obsession with academisation, and pragmatically removing the bureaucratic barriers that prevent councils from intervening in underperforming schools.

In my constituency, Priory Lane school received an Ofsted judgment that meant that it needed significant improvement. The governors indicated that they wanted to go down the academy route, but that they wanted a choice of academy sponsor. Owing to a lack of academy sponsor capacity, the Department for Education and the regional schools commissioner could offer only one option, so governors and parents were presented with a “take it or leave it” choice. Despite representations from all and sundry—including myself—the Government remained adamant that the shotgun wedding would go ahead.

I understand where the Government were coming from, and, indeed, their sense of urgency and exasperation has been made clear today. In the event, however, owing to the skilled intervention of the local authority, a better solution was found. The school formed a federation with a successful partner, Westcliffe Primary, and that process is now benefiting both school communities. Ultimately, the local authority’s skilled intervention has produced a better outcome for children and parents—the very people on whom we should all be focusing. That is the sort of best practice that should be applauded and learnt from in the interests of children and parents everywhere. Of course we are pleased that the Government acceded to our arguments, and have included academies in the “coasting arena” so that action can be taken when necessary.

We come to the 80 lines of amendment 8, which was inserted to recognise that academies—as we already know—can also fail or be coasting and need improvement. Academy governance is a mess. There are 5,000-plus academies and 5,000-plus funding agreements. The private contract, as opposed to public law, cannot work for such a large number. It is a bureaucratic nightmare.

It baffles me that this Bill insists on treating schools differently depending on what type of school structure they have. If Ministers truly believe that no parent should have to put up with their child spending a single day in a failing school—to be fair, they have reiterated that today, and we agree wholeheartedly with them on it—and that leadership and governance should be replaced immediately, I simply cannot fathom why that would not apply to failing academies, too. Rather than double standards for pupils, there needs to be robust, purposeful action taken over any school that should be doing better.

In conclusion, let me remind Members of the words of Sir Keith Joseph, one of the Secretary of State’s illustrious predecessors, in introducing his 1984 Green Paper:

“Parents care about their children’s progress—how they develop and what they learn. They share the general desire for higher standards of education…We have not yet… allowed parents sufficient scope for discharging their unique responsibilities. Our education system is poorer for this. The Government now intends—while fully respecting the responsibilities of local education authorities—to extend its policies for raising standards in schools by enabling parents to improve the work of the schools.”

This is an old-fashioned one nation Tory who respected local authorities and wanted to empower parents. I applaud his words.

How times have changed when it is now a Labour Opposition who have to remind a Conservative Government of the need to respect parents and recognise the role of local government in providing oversight and accountability. Amendment 8 goes a tiny way towards bringing improvement by stating what funding agreements should say—whether they say or do not—about Government action when a school causes concern. Much more robust legislation is required, and the Minister might like to indicate whether it is true that the Government’s much touted next White Paper will ideologically academise the rest of the school estate. If so, will there be further reams of words trying to make sense out of nonsense?

The Labour amendment highlights the fact that when an academy has an Ofsted inadequate judgment, the Secretary of State must listen to representations from the school’s academy trust before taking further actions. No such opportunity is afforded to local authority-maintained schools.

The noble Lord Nash said amusingly in the other place when introducing amendment 8 that a myth had grown that Government

“somehow favour academies and hold them to account less robustly than maintained schools”,

adding:

“That is not the case.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 16 December 2015; Vol. 767, c. 2095.]

He is clearly a dab hand at irony. The reality is that this clause further treats academies more favourably than maintained schools by giving them the right of appeal to the Secretary of State in these circumstances when maintained schools cannot.

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Nick Boles]

I do. I had an excellent meeting with my hon. Friend and the leaders of his local college. Their plans are very exciting. We very much want to make a move towards greater local involvement in the commissioning of adult skills provision, so that local industries can be supported.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Is the Minister planning any particular response to the Government-commissioned Foresight report of 2014 on lifelong learning and continuous training by Dr Martin Hyde and Professor Chris Phillipson? If so, when are we likely to see that response?

[Nick Boles]

All our policies are a response to that report and many other reports that have rightly highlighted the need for continuing investment in adult education through people’s long and ever-changing working lives. One of the most significant measures we are taking is the introduction of an apprenticeship levy to double the level of funding for apprenticeships—apprenticeships that are available to adults in their 30s, 40s and 50s, not just to young people.

Student Maintenance Grants

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Tuesday 19th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Marsden]

My hon. Friend makes a striking point. That is only one of a series of delinquencies that I want to move on to.

The Conservatives have shied away from the light of debate, challenge and scrutiny on this issue, preferring instead to use a legislative sleight of hand to ensure that the sweeping changes were made in Committee in the hope that no one would notice. All the way through this process, they have been defensive. They have been less than candid and they have systematically resisted the path of openness. There was little detail to be had when the Chancellor first mooted this change in the summer, and not much more in the autumn statement. It was only when the National Union of Students raised the alarm about the impact of the process and threatened a judicial review over the lack of consultation and the failure to publish the interim equality assessment—which the Government have still not done—that a separate equality impact assessment was slipped out.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle), the shadow Secretary of State of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, wrote to the Business Secretary explaining our concerns and asking for a full debate on this matter. This was reflected in early-day motion 829, which attracted a number of cross-party signatures. However, the Business Secretary’s reply largely ignored the issues. The issue of failing to bring the matter to the Floor of the Commons was raised by the shadow Leader of the House in December, and at that time the Leader of the House intimated that there should be a debate on the Floor of the House, but no such debate has taken place. A question from my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) was ducked by the Prime Minister last Wednesday. Colleagues raised the issue again in last week’s business questions, and I put a series of detailed questions to the Minister in the Delegated Legislation Committee. I and the other members of the Committee would like to see the responses to those questions in due course.

It is perhaps no surprise that The Independent led today on the way in which this Government have been using statutory instruments systematically to force through profound and controversial changes to the law without proper debate and scrutiny. Nor is it surprising that my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey told the newspaper:

“This is arbitrary rule that massively decreases the power of the Commons to effectively scrutinise the Government.”

The equality impact assessment was slipped out with a relative lack of ceremony at the end of November. As I said last week, this is the document that almost dare not speak its name, not least because the detailed evidence of the negative impact was tucked away in its central pages, to which I will refer later, and was rather belied by the bland conclusions appended to the front of the document. What is driving these panic measures from the Government—the £1.5 billion raid on grants and the threshold fees—is their belated recognition that the whole set of financial assumptions about repayment that underpinned their trebling of fees in 2012 is producing a black hole for them and for future taxpayers.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Did not a Tory Minister stand at the Dispatch Box in 2012 and assure us, on the question of tripling the fees, that increased maintenance grants and the national scholarship programme would protect students from the poorest backgrounds? Now the Government are scrapping both and trying to sneak the measures through. Is this not an absolute betrayal?

[Mr Marsden]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and he obviously has the power of telepathy, because I intend to refer to that later.

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gyimah]

I am glad my hon. Friend has asked that question. We have been working with the PSHE Association to develop age-appropriate lesson plans, as well as improving counselling and guidance, so that teachers know how to teach about mental health and deal with the range of issues they come across in young people.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

As well as offering welcome advice and support to schools, will the Government consider introducing a compulsory psychological assessment for all children entering care to complement the physical assessment already required?

[Mr Gyimah]

That is a very good suggestion. I understand from my hon. Friend the Minister for Children and Families that we already have a health assessment, but we are open-minded on all ideas about how to tackle the problem. I will happily meet the hon. Gentleman to discuss his suggestion.

Term-time Leave

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2015 Westminster Hall

[Steve McCabe (in the Chair)]

Mr Speaker has agreed that for this debate members of the public may use handheld electronic devices in the Public Gallery, provided that the devices are on silent. Photographs, however, must not be taken.

Education and Adoption Bill

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Wednesday 16th September 2015 Commons Chamber

Local authority adoption functions: joint arrangements

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I beg to move amendment 19, page 8, line 35, at end insert—

“(3A) The Secretary of State shall lay an annual report before Parliament on the use of the power to give directions under subsection (1), which shall include information on—

(a) how often directions were given;

(b) the safeguards put in place to ensure that voluntary agencies were not adversely affected by actions of local authorities or agencies complying with directions given and an assessment of the impact of the actions and the effectiveness of the safeguards;

(c) the impact of the directions on models of care other than adoption for children in the areas covered by the directions; and

(d) the extent and adequacy of provisions that have been put in place to ensure that post-adoption support, including in respect of mental health, is available for the children and adoptive parents who have dealt with a local authority or agency carrying out the functions within subsection (3) on behalf of a local authority, following directions from the Secretary of State.”

This amendment would require the Secretary of State to lay an annual report before Parliament containing information about how she has exercised the power given to her in Clause 13 and the safeguards she has put in place to protect voluntary agencies, other models of care and the provision of post-adoption support.

In Committee, the Labour Opposition sought to persuade the Minister that it was wrong of the Secretary of State to take executive power that would lead to fundamental changes in the country’s adoption arrangements without further reference to Parliament. Indeed, we sought to persuade him that such power should be subject to parliamentary orders, rather than under the right to give directions conferred by the Bill. I accept that we were defeated on that argument in Committee, so today I want to focus on safeguards.

If the Secretary of State is given unfettered power to intervene in our adoption arrangements, it is surely right that she should report to Parliament annually on the way in which she has sought to exercise that power and on its impact. In particular, she should report on the impact on voluntary adoption agencies, the whole area of children in care and the question of support for adopted children and their parents, especially in relation to mental health issues, which a great many people and child welfare organisations consider a major cause of concern.

[Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)]

Is this proposal not unnecessarily bureaucratic? If something went seriously wrong, surely the facts would be in the public domain anyway.

[Steve McCabe]

In my experience it is amazing how many facts do not get into the public domain and how many times it is Members of this House who question what happened and ask how a power was used. I am therefore not persuaded by the right hon. Gentleman’s argument.

The Minister said in Committee that it was his intention to change our adoption arrangements by consent and persuasion, and that the powers in the Bill were intended as a backstop to be used sparingly. If that is the case, an annual report to Parliament will not involve too many examples of their use and could hardly be regarded as onerous or unduly bureaucratic. Consequently, I hope that the Minister will have no difficulty in accepting the amendment.

An annual report is important because, although I accept the good intent of the Minister for Children and Families, Ministers and Secretaries of State come and go. The powers that we are granting today are extensive and it is not right that Parliament should lose all control over a matter that affects such vulnerable young people. We are the people who should ensure that there are safeguards. We need to have confidence that the new adoption arrangements are fit for purpose and improve on the existing arrangements.

We can deduce that in cases where the Secretary of State uses the powers of direction, it will be because she has failed to achieve the consensus and the voluntary arrangements that the Minister says are his ambition. In those circumstances, is it not right that Parliament should know what happened and what persuaded the Secretary of State of the need to exercise her powers? An annual report would give parliamentarians access to that information.

We discussed the role of voluntary adoption agencies extensively in Committee. The Minister gave assurances that he wanted to protect such agencies and that he recognised their expertise, particularly in finding families for what are sometimes called “hard-to-place children”. That might mean children with disabilities or learning disabilities, or it might cover a situation where there are several siblings. For years, small, specialised voluntary adoption agencies in this country have pioneered that kind of work. I do not want new consortiums to be developed by local authorities to protect their interests if it leads to a squeeze on those small, influential agencies. That concern was raised by several witnesses who gave evidence to the Committee. We know that when adoption agencies were reorganised in Wales into five regional groupings, smaller voluntary agencies were the casualties.

The Minister was not able to tell us in Committee what steps he would take to protect the voluntary agencies. It is therefore important that we are able to see, in a report to Parliament, what has happened to the voluntary sector so that we can judge whether the Minister has taken adequate steps to safeguard that vital element of our adoption service. It is also reasonable that the report should comment on the effectiveness of the monitoring and inspection arrangements for any new adoption consortiums.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend makes a good point about the importance of protecting specialist services. My wife and I took advantage of one such excellent adoption agency when we adopted our children, so I speak from personal experience. What concerns me slightly is that if we wait for a report to see what has happened, it could be too late. How quickly does he envisage these proposals being implemented? How early would he want the report to be produced, so that it was not too late to protect the high-quality services to which he rightly refers?

[Steve McCabe]

I concede the danger that if I ask the Minister to report on the operation of the powers, we will only find out after the event what has happened if agencies have got into difficulty. Obviously, I would much prefer the Minister to come forward today with clearer proposals for the steps he will take to protect those agencies, but without some reporting mechanism, how will Parliament hold the Executive to account?

We heard from witnesses during the evidence session that there is concern about the way that contracts can be drawn up by larger local authorities, as that can have an adverse impact on smaller, voluntary organisations. The British Association for Adoption and Fostering had been going for more than 70 years, but it collapsed during the parliamentary recess with the loss of about 50 jobs—a whole area of expertise wiped out because of the financial climate in some parts of the voluntary sector. The uncertainty created by these proposals is adding to that pressure, so it would be helpful if the Minister demonstrated that he recognised the dire circumstances that much of the voluntary sector is facing.

We must know in an annual report that if the Secretary of State exercises these powers, the expertise of voluntary agencies will not be lost for vulnerable children, that contract arrangements are fair and do not favour larger local authorities, and that they are subject to proper monitoring and inspection. Parliament has a right to such information.

One concern about the Bill is the focus on adoption to the exclusion of all other forms of childcare. In Committee, several Members mentioned special guardianship orders, long-term fostering and kinship care. Many people who work in childcare believe that the Government need to focus more on permanent arrangements, rather than appearing to favour one model of childcare over another.

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend mentioned special guardianship orders. I have written to the Minister about the case of Tracy Phillips in my constituency as that highlights the ambiguity in the way that SGOs are treated, affecting things such as child maintenance and so on, and how they fit into the child maintenance system. Could the report cover that, or is there some other way for the Minister and Government to tackle some of the ambiguities between SGOs and other adoption arrangements?

[Steve McCabe]

The Department published a report in August entitled “Impact of the Family Justice Reforms on Front-line Practice Phase Two: Special Guardianship Orders”. I also believe the Minister is planning a more extensive review of SGOs.

[The Minister for Children and Families (Edward Timpson)]

indicated assent.

[Steve McCabe]

There are two issues: first, there might be evidence that some local authorities are favouring SGOs in circumstances where they were not originally intended; and secondly, there are financial concerns, particularly for grandparents with SGOs. Local authorities have discretionary powers to provide financial support, but it is inevitably means-tested, meaning that some grandparents, having been persuaded by local authorities, sometimes on the basis of limited information, that SGOs are the best route to go down, and thinking they are doing the right thing by the child or children, could find themselves in dire financial circumstances, with the local authority all too happy to wash its hands of it all. As I said, a report in the summer was illuminating on this subject, and I believe the Minister is planning a further review. I hope he will say a bit more about this problem before the end of the day.

[Bill Esterson]

I am glad my hon. Friend has raised that point, and I saw the Minister nodding earlier. I have had cases drawn to my attention of kinship carers taking advantage of respite care using foster care, only to say, because of financial hardship, that they are not taking the children back into their family. Does this not highlight how important it is that the Minister address these issues of funding and support, and that adoption is not the only form of permanence addressed in the Bill?

[Steve McCabe]

I agree. I think it is a mistake to appear to favour one model of childcare over another and that the questions of finance and the use of SGOs need more attention.

We have seen that the courts believe it is the duty of social workers to explore all available options for permanence arrangements when placing children, and that adoption should be favoured only when it is clearly the best option and when it has been weighed against other possibilities. There is an understandable fear that if the Minister creates a new range of Rolls-Royce adoption consortia and we end up with a massive flow of resources to these agencies, adoption will inevitably acquire a new elevated status, especially among social workers and cash-strapped local authorities battling to find permanent solutions with ever-decreasing resources. That would be wrong. It would not be in the best interests of the child, it would fail to recognise the phenomenal success that other models of care can achieve, and it would amount to a form of social engineering that belongs more to a bygone era than to the present day. Parliament will have a right to know what impact the Bill is having on other forms of childcare, so it is only right and proper that there should be a routine report on it.

Perhaps more than anything else, what the House needs to know is that the Government’s measures succeed not only in speeding up adoption and preventing children from languishing in the care system, but in ensuring that the quality of the placements leads to long-term better outcomes for the children.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Esterson]

At risk of drawing too much on my own experience, my hon. Friend has sadly described some of the things that my wife and I have come across, as I know have many other adoptive parents, foster carers and kinship carers. My hon. Friend started to talk about mental health services. Will he join me in making a plea to the Government to make a dramatic effort to improve the quality of mental health services for children and adolescents? The investment and the effort must be made to recruit and train the dedicated staff who are needed. Adoptive parents and foster carers cannot on their own give children—who, as my hon. Friend says, are often damaged—the support and care that they require for their psychological development and other needs.

[Steve McCabe]

I am happy to make that plea, and I hope to say a little more about mental health before I conclude. I say in passing that I certainly welcome the decision of the new Leader of the Opposition to create a Cabinet health post specifically for mental health.

What we need to know is that the Government’s ambitions are not just about speeding up adoptions and presenting us with tables showing an increase in numbers. We need to know that the extent of these problems has been properly appreciated and that the need for continuing support for these children and families is built into the fabric of any new adoption arrangements.

The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children wanted me to table a much broader amendment on children’s mental health. Although I am extremely sympathetic to its ambitions, I concluded after discussion and advice that what we had in mind was probably too broad for the scope of the Bill. If you will allow me, Mr Speaker, it is worth taking a moment to share what it had in mind. The NSPCC asks the Minister to consider amending either the Children Act 1989 or the Adoption and Children Act 2002 by placing a duty on local authorities to ensure that a child receives a mental health assessment at the point they enter care, and to provide immediately the necessary support services to meet the identified needs of the child for as long as necessary, with regular monitoring of the child’s ongoing need for mental health support.

I want to make it clear that I support counselling and proper intervention to address mental health issues as a key element of securing permanence in placements. It is good that the functions to be transferred under the Bill will include the provision of adoption support services, but what these children and their new adoptive parents need is a guarantee from the Government that the necessary support will be available. Having the right to assessment is not enough; what is needed is a right to the treatment, therapy and support identified by that assessment. It seems strange to me that children currently entering our care system are subject to a routine physical health check, but given the trauma that many of them have experienced prior to entering care are not automatically also given access to a mental health check.

If the Minister really wants to make a difference, he will give a commitment today to make it a requirement that all children entering the care system have access to a mental health assessment, and that any treatment, counselling, therapy or support recommended as a result of that assessment will be theirs as of right, and to include those requirements in any new adoption arrangements he makes with local authorities or other bodies.

[Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)]

I have a lot of sympathy with the line that the hon. Gentleman is taking. From talking to a number of my constituents, I am concerned that meeting organisations six or seven times a week is seen as support, whereas adoptive families need actual, real support.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve McCabe]

First, I hope the Minister can see that there is a degree of cross-party consent on this point. I certainly agree that what people want is real, practical help. I meet plenty of foster parents and adoptive parents who say they have begged for help and real support. We do not need anything that falls short of that.

There should be a duty on agencies to focus on the mental health needs of these children, and to ensure that their adoptive parents get the real support they need so they are equipped to cope with the enormous responsibilities they take on.

I have some doubts about the proposed legislation: the focus on adoption, perhaps at the expense of other models of care; the risk that smaller voluntary agencies, which are a vital feature of our current adoption arrangements, might find themselves cast adrift by a large, local authority-driven regional consortium; and an anxiety that the monitoring and inspection arrangements might not be all that they need to be. I have a burning sense that the energy being put into the structures should be matched by efforts to address the children’s support and mental health needs.

I hope that for today’s purposes the Minister will feel that he can accept our amendment as a guarantee of the Government’s good faith that they intend to keep Parliament in touch with the developments and changes arising from the Bill. I hope that, in the not too distant future, the Minister will return to the Dispatch Box with proposals to strengthen overall permanence arrangements for children in care and to tackle the legacy of mental health neglect which often persists for children even after intervention by the state in the form of care proceedings.

I do not doubt the sincerity or decency of the current Minister for Children and Families. I hope his adoption proposals succeed, but I hope he will make renewed efforts to address the concerns that I, and other hon. Members, have raised today. I hope he will find himself able to accept that this straightforward and helpful amendment is designed to strengthen the Bill.

[Bill Esterson]

May I say how much I agree with what my hon. Friend said, particularly at the end of his speech? I want to see better outcomes for adopted children and I hope the provisions in the Bill will help to achieve that—it is important to say that. As we discussed in Committee, the overall approach to permanence in improving the life outcomes of children, whether they are adopted or in other forms of permanence, must be addressed. I share my hon. Friend’s desire to see the Minister back at the Dispatch Box as soon as possible, proposing improvements in permanence in foster care, kinship care, special guardianship arrangements and residential children’s care, which, as the Education Committee pointed out in its report last Session, has been a cause of particular concern.

Not the least of the issues that the Minister should address is the desperate need for an improvement in child and adolescent mental health services, which the Leader of the Opposition raised at Prime Minister’s Question Time. CAMHS provides vital services. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak that the psychological needs of children entering the care system should be assessed and supported every bit as much as their physical needs. I was heartened by what the Prime Minister said today about the importance of addressing people’s mental health needs as much as their physical needs, and I hope that that will be the Government’s direction of travel in health policy generally.

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Timpson]

An essential element of all of this work is that anyone who takes on a child who has had trauma in their early life understands what it is. I am talking about not just its presentation but its causes. As part of that, we need to look at foetal alcohol syndrome, and I commend the hon. Gentleman for the work that he and his new all-party group are doing to raise awareness of that issue. I am happy to engage with him on that matter as I indicated in Committee.

As I set out in Committee, the current adoption system is highly fragmented, with around 180 agencies recruiting and matching adopters for only 5,000 children per year. We do not believe that such a localised system can give the best service for some of our most vulnerable children. As well as being inefficient in scale, it also too often leads to ineffective practice across the system. The introduction of regional adoption agencies will help to address those issues in several ways.

The first way is through matching. It still takes an average of eight months between placement order and match. We know that delays are often caused by an unwillingness to seek a family outside a local authority’s own group of approved adopters. That is simply not good enough. No child should suffer the lasting harm that we know delays cause because the local authority refuses to look elsewhere for a match. That is why we are making £30 million available to pay the inter-agency fee over 12 months for particular groups of children. That will help to ensure that they are matched quickly in the short term while regional adoption agencies improve things in the long term. Successful matching relies on being able to access a wide range of potential adopters from the very beginning, and regionalising adoption would give adoption workers that choice.

The second way is through recruitment. Although we have adopters approved and waiting to be matched, we have too few who are willing and able to adopt harder to place children, which means certain groups of children wait significantly longer than others to find adoptive families. For example, as at 31 March 2014, disabled children were waiting 7.6 months longer than the average child. The current system is not serving those children well enough, and we cannot just accept that as it is. Regional adoption agencies would be able to take account of the needs of a larger number of children when planning a regional recruitment strategy. Recruitment could therefore be better targeted, leading to the right adopters being approved and fewer children having to wait.

The third way is through adoption support. In too many cases the specialist support that many adopted children so desperately need, including mental health services, has simply not been available. In many areas, the number of adopted children is so small that local authorities are unable to ensure that the right provision is available. Regional adoption agencies will assess more children’s needs and give them a greater understanding of what should be commissioned. Commissioning at a regional scale will allow providers to expand their services, provide better value for money for the taxpayer and help ensure that all adoptive families receive a consistently high quality of assessment and provision. That will build on the adoption support fund that we have set up, which is now running, to the tune of £19.3 million. It is vital that adopted children receive the therapeutic and mental health services they need, which is why we have made that significant investment. Since May it has helped more than 1,400 families and spent £5 million, and all but 10 local authorities have already made a bid to the fund, which demonstrates how essential it is for those children.

I would like to set out what work has already been done to help achieve that regional approach. We want to support and work with local authorities and voluntary adoption agencies to help deliver regional adoption agencies. That is why we are providing £4.5 million of funding this year to support early adopters to accelerate their development and early implementation. I am pleased to tell the House that we have already received 30 expressions of interest for that support, covering every region of the country.

I would also like to assure hon. Members that through this process we are carefully considering the impact that moving to regional adoption agencies will have on voluntary adoption agencies, other models of care and the provision of support, which the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak rightly raised in his contribution. It is worth noting that voluntary adoption agencies are formally or informally involved with consortia across all regions already. We have been very clear that proposals need to look at how links with other children’s services can be maintained and how support functions will be carried out.

We have also been clear that voluntary adoption agencies have an important role to play. In our paper “Regionalising Adoption” we set out that we are particularly keen to consider models that bring together the best of the voluntary and statutory sectors. Proposals for regional adoption agencies that include voluntary adoption agencies will be looked on favourably, even for those that do not see partnership with local authorities as an option for them. The service they provide in recruiting adopters, particularly for some of the most vulnerable and complex children, will still be much needed by the new regional adoption agencies. That is built on our knowledge of the enormous expertise, service quality and excellent outcomes that voluntary adoption agencies have a record of delivering, as well as our desire and determination to ensure that the move to regional adoption agencies does not adversely impact on them. We will continue to monitor that closely as regional adoption agencies take shape.

Our intention is that, as far as possible, the sector will move to regional adoption agencies by itself. As I said in Committee, this power is simply a backstop measure for those agencies that do not rise to the challenge, as well as allowing the Secretary of State to direct local authorities to have a particular function carried out on their behalf by a voluntary adoption agency if an individual council or regional adoption agency is not doing so effectively.

We are confident that the majority of local authorities will seize this opportunity to deliver their services in new and exciting ways. I am pleased to see how the sector has already responded to the move to regional adoption agencies. The Association of Directors of Children’s Services sees this as a sensible development and Carol Homden, chief executive of Coram, stated in her oral evidence that the Bill will help children regarded as harder to place. The move to regional adoption agencies involves real potential to improve the life chances of some of our most vulnerable children, and I believe the majority of those working in adoption will make this a reality.

As I set out earlier, we have already had 30 expressions of interest for the support available this year. It is hugely encouraging that these bids cover all regions and the majority of them involve a voluntary adoption agency. Each expression of interest is currently being fully assessed and funding decisions will be made by the end of the month. It is also important to note that prior to this programme, we had already seen the emergence of some new delivery models for adoption and some growth of consortia and regional collaboration. For example, Wokingham Borough Council, Bracknell Forest Council, West Berkshire Council and the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead have launched a combined adoption service, known as Adopt Berkshire.

This is a move that is already seen as beneficial and we will build on this impressive momentum. Therefore, as noted by Sir Martin Narey in his oral evidence, we expect to use this power rarely, if at all. I can reassure the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak that if the power is required, the decision to use it will be made following extensive and detailed discussions with the agencies involved. These discussions will cover a range of areas, including the role of voluntary adoption agencies, the provision of support and the link with other care options. In addition, I listened carefully to the suggestions made by the hon. Gentleman in Committee, and before making any final decision we will write to any relevant local authority seeking its views and requesting supporting evidence. I can therefore reassure the House that all those involved will have a chance to comment on the proposal before a final decision is taken.

There is no requirement for the Secretary of State to lay an annual report before Parliament about directions issued to local authorities when the direction, as here, is to arrange for another body to exercise a wide range of functions on behalf of the local authority. As such, a more proportionate approach than laying an annual report before Parliament is to discuss directly the use of the power and its impact with those charged with delivering adoption services. We will work with both individual agencies and through the Adoption Leadership Board and regional adoption boards to ensure the effectiveness of this joined-up approach. As a consequence, I hope the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak will withdraw the amendment.

This has been a good and helpful debate which has drawn out some of the issues that surround adoption, not just what is in the Bill. I will endeavour, of course, to continue to work hard for all children in care, whatever their route to adult life happens to be. This is an important step in making sure that adoption and the adoption services function better, more quickly and in the best interests of every child for whom it is the right future.

[Steve McCabe]

I am sure we will return to many of these issues in the days and months ahead. For the time being, as a sign of my good faith, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Third Reading

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Monday 20th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Edward Timpson]

One of the core principles of our reforms to special educational needs is making sure that every aspect of the system, whether it be education, health or social care, is working relentlessly to a single assessment of and plan for the child, so that we have a whole-school and whole-system approach—and a nought-to-25 system as well. It will mean that we move away from different parts of a child’s educational experience being truncated and re-started as they move to the next part. We are working hard to make sure that support is consistent, and we are building on great programmes such as Achievement for All, in which we have had excellent results.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I am sure the Minister will be aware of the impressive claims made about the benefits of applied behavioural analysis for the treatment of those with autism. Does he have any plans to support research into the efficacy of that therapy?

[Edward Timpson]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, we have supported research into and evidence on not only the condition of autism, but how it can best be supported in schools and more widely through a child’s education. We have funded the National Autistic Society to that end, and we will continue to look at ways in which we can support it and other organisations that are working hard in this area in the future. We know that specific types of interventions, some of which have come from overseas, need to be properly and rigorously assessed. As I understand it, the one he mentions may fall into that category, but of course I am happy to discuss it with him as we move forward.