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

Debate between Tulip Siddiq and Steve McCabe

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

[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?

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

Debate between Tulip Siddiq and Steve McCabe

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.