Children and Families Bill

Viscount Younger of Leckie Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I hope it has been very clear that this side of the House strongly supports the main thrust of the measures in this part of the Bill in relation to parental leave, and we do not want to do anything to withhold any form of approval for what is happening. We have tried to express our support for that. The amendments tabled today are a reflection of two things. First, that the broad thrust of the way in which the Government have taken forward this agenda is exactly as we would like to see it. Indeed, I might almost say that they have done a little bit more than we would have considered had we been in power and had to take forward this responsibility. Secondly, in so doing they have thrown into sharp relief a number of areas in which measures could be taken which would level up kinship carers to the position that is now being adopted for parental leave.

I sympathise with the Minister responding to the debate, but we should reflect on the fact that, during the passage of the Bill, we have moved from the original position we found ourselves in when we opened up discussions on this part, which was that nothing could be done in this area, to a situation where a number of reviews and considerations of particular issues are now taking place. The purpose of these amendments is to invite the Minister to reflect upon and read into the record the decisions that he has been able to reach in relation to kinship and friendship care, some of which were mentioned by my noble friend Lady Drake, and to ask him whether he will use this opportunity to reflect a little more on the gaps that remain.

I do not think it would require a lot to do the sort of work required, but the important point, as has just been said, is to get some sense of the timescale, so that those who might not be given first priority this time round have something to look forward to so that they can work towards a better achievement of the objectives that they want, particularly in the areas that we have just been talking about.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Viscount Younger of Leckie) (Con)]

My Lords, I intend to keep my remarks as brief as possible while aiming to respond effectively to the substance of the amendments.

Noble Lords will remember our discussions on this very important area of support for family and friends carers during Grand Committee. I welcome this debate and reaffirm our commitment to supporting kinship and friendship care. I appreciate the broad support for these measures from the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, and Members opposite. I commend the noble Baronesses, Lady Massey and Lady Drake, on their tireless work in this area.

Where family and friends carer policies are applied effectively, the aims expressed in Amendments 58 and 59 will already be met. For this reason, the Government have in place a programme of work to improve the practice of professionals in this area. It is our belief that the key issue in this area is improving quality of practice on the ground rather than changing the legislation which already exists for this group of carers.

First, on Amendment 58, it is already a requirement of the Children Act 1989 that local authorities should support the upbringing of children by their families wherever possible if the child cannot return to live with the birth parents and if it is the most appropriate way to safeguard and promote their welfare. This legislative position is re-enforced by Volume 1 of the Children Act 1989 statutory guidance, which outlines that the local authority should have,

“considered family members and friends as potential carers at each stage of its decision making”.

That guidance is currently being revised to reflect the legislative changes in this Bill and to align it with the new Public Law Outline. The revised version will include strengthened content on good pre-proceedings practice and will re-emphasise the importance of early work with families. It will also provide information on the key elements of good pre-proceedings practice and the use of family group conferences.

I know that officials in the Department for Education have been in regular contact with interested parties, including the Family Rights Group, during the drafting of this guidance and have listened carefully to their concerns. A working group made up of expert practitioners, including directors of children’s services and social workers, has also been formed to act as a critical friend to the department and comment on early drafts. The guidance will be published for public consultation in mid-February and we would welcome any further views from noble Lords as part of that process.

The Government remain committed to the use of interventions at the pre-proceedings stage, which is why we are now funding the rollout of an accreditation scheme of family group conferences and the further use of this service at the pre-proceedings stage. Practice in this area will be monitored and inspected by Ofsted under the new single inspection framework for children’s services, which is designed to assess local authority practice and decision-making at all stages of a child’s journey.

On Amendment 59, we have discussed at length the valuable contribution of family and friends carers and it was with that in mind that in March 2011 we issued statutory guidance for local authorities on families and friends who are carers. That guidance makes it clear that wider family members should receive appropriate support to bring up a child in their care, regardless of whether those children are looked after by a local authority or not:

“The range and level of family support services which may be provided under section 17 is wide … As well as practical support, family and friends carers may need advice, guidance or counselling about how to manage issues such as those arising from contact or from caring for children with emotional or behavioural difficulties due to their earlier experiences. Such services may be provided by local authorities to support both formal and informal family and friends care arrangements”.

Therefore, non-looked-after children can already be included in such care arrangements under Section 17 of the 1989 Act. The 1989 Act does not impose a limit on the amount of support which may be provided under that section.

As I mentioned earlier, we are aware that the quality and quantity of local authority policies is not always at the level it should be. That is why we currently have a programme of work to reduce the variation in practice within and across local authorities. The Department for Education will continue to look at the barriers to implementing the policies and will be looking to take forward work that clarifies the role of the local authority and the importance of good support systems for this group of carers.

We understand that many family and friends carers could do with extra help with the parenting of these children, particularly when dealing with children with behavioural problems. That is why the Department for Education continues to fund initiatives like the Keep programme, which is a group programme which provides family and friends carers and mainstream foster carers with specialist training and support.

While we agree that support and services are sometimes not of the quality that they should be for family and friends carers, we feel that improvements need to be made not by changing current legislation but, as I said earlier, by improving practice on the ground. We will improve the lives of these dedicated and inspirational carers by empowering them to have the information they need to ask for services when they need them and by ensuring that each local authority is aware of their responsibility and has the tools to deliver it. That is exactly what our current programme of work aims to accomplish.

Finally, on Amendment 63, I fully understand the sentiment behind what is proposed, but it is essential that we take the time fully to understand how becoming a kinship or friendship carer affects an individual’s labour market attachment before proposing policy interventions. For this reason, I announced in Grand Committee that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills will lead a research project into those issues. Officials met recently with the noble Baronesses, Lady Massey and Lady Drake, and representatives from a number of interested organisations such as Grandparents Plus and the Family Rights Group to discuss these issues, and I know that the officials found that very useful.

We will hold a further research scoping event for relevant stakeholders in the coming weeks to gain a fuller understanding of the issues and research challenges and to harness the extensive knowledge and expertise of these organisations. I hope that we will continue to build on these productive discussions and that noble Lords will encourage interested parties to attend the scoping event. It is essential that we properly understand the labour market issues faced by these individuals before deciding whether further policy interventions aimed at strengthening labour market attachment may be the most effective intervention. The research that I have outlined will help government to gain a better understanding of the evidence base, which is the important first step that is needed.

I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Drake, raised at least three questions, and I will write to her to answer them. However, on the point about timing, this is a very urgent matter, but it will depend on the scoping nature of that research. I will write to her on that point, but I want to clarify that we on this side regard this as an urgent matter and will endeavour to move as fast as we possibly can.

In the mean time, I hope that I have given noble Lords sufficient reassurance that the Government are committed to supporting family and friends carers. I therefore urge the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Massey of Darwen]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his complete response. I appreciate that all the questions cannot be answered this evening. My noble friend and I look forward to further correspondence and to receiving further information about the review.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

62A: Clause 99, page 92, line 22, at end insert—
“(3CA) Regulations may provide for a reduction in the duration of the maternity allowance period as it applies to a woman to be revoked, or to be treated as revoked, subject to prescribed restrictions and conditions.”

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

I shall speak also to government Amendments 62B, 62C, 62D and 63A. I shall encapsulate my overview of the amendments in some very brief remarks. There is more that I could say and I am happy to write with more details should noble Lords feel it necessary.

The amendments will ensure that those who are entitled to statutory maternity pay, maternity allowance or statutory adoption pay are not left without these statutory payments in the event that they have opted into the shared parental system, are eligible to withdraw from that system and subsequently decide to do so. These are minor and technical amendments to enable the policy to operate in the way in which it was intended. I hope that noble Lords will agree that the amendments are necessary and desirable. I beg to move.

Amendment 62A agreed.

Moved by

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

62B: Clause 99, page 92, line 23, leave out “(3C)” and insert “(3CA)”

--- Later in debate ---

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

My Lords, I am glad of the opportunity to return to this important issue on Report. The noble Lord, Lord Knight of Weymouth, has spoken passionately about this matter at Second Reading, in Grand Committee and again this evening. I have been deeply moved and saddened by the distressing accounts that I have heard of employees not receiving the support from their employers that they needed at such a difficult time. We have heard more tragic examples this evening from the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, and the noble Lord, Lord Knight.

Losing a loved one is always a difficult experience. Losing a child must cause a grief that is beyond words. It is of course right that employees are able and feel comfortable to take time off to grieve in those awful circumstances. Grief is extremely personal, and everybody copes with the challenges that it brings in different ways. Individual employers are best placed to respond to the varied needs of grieving employees in a sensitive and appropriate way. Fortunately, as has been pointed out this evening, many employers are understanding and compassionate, enabling individuals to take all the time off that they need when they need it. However, as I acknowledged during Grand Committee, this is sadly not always the case.

At present, there is very little advice and support available to employers to help them to develop company policies or approaches to time off for bereaved employees. This lack of advice can mean that employers, particularly small employers who have no experience of bereavement in the workplace, are confronted with a situation that they do not know how to deal with. As a result, they may inadvertently fail to give their employees the compassion and support that they need at what is, we can all agree, a particularly vulnerable time.

The Government are committed to ensuring that employers have access to the right advice and information to facilitate good employment relationships with all their employees. When this issue was debated during Grand Committee, I gave a commitment that the Government would bring forward comprehensive guidance to support employers in meeting the needs of bereaved employees in the workplace. I am pleased to be able to announce today that ACAS has agreed to draw on its wealth of experience in workplace relations to develop guidance that will support employers in delivering their approach to bereavement. It is, of course, essential that we harness the knowledge and experience of expert organisations to get this guidance right so that it can support employers and employees in the most effective way. For this reason, ACAS will work in close partnership with Cruse, the leading national charity for bereaved people in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and other expert organisations during the development and refinement of the guidance. The first round-table meeting with these organisations is scheduled for as soon as 5 February.

ACAS intends to road-test the draft guidance in a series of seminars with employers around the regions to ensure that the guidance is relevant and adds value. We expect the guidance to be published this summer and I encourage noble Lords who are in touch with organisations that have experience of these issues, and who would like to be involved in reviewing the draft guidance, to get in touch with my officials. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Knight, and I had conversations about this last week. This guidance will be comprehensive, covering the existing statutory entitlement to time off for dependants as well as providing advice and support about what is best practice in this area. It is essential that employers, as well as employees, are aware of the statutory provisions that are available. This will be made clear in the guidance.

As I mentioned, I recently met the noble Lord, Lord Knight, to discuss the Government’s approach to this issue and to understand better whether there is additional support that we could offer. I felt that we had a very productive discussion, during which he brought to my attention the fact that many of the parents who had reported being treated unsympathetically by their employers were, in fact, employed in the public sector. Since then, my department has made contact with employer groups in this sector, including NHS Employers and those in Civil Service employee policy, as the noble Lord, Lord Knight, will be pleased to hear. We plan to work with them to develop and find ways of promoting the best practice guidance that ACAS will produce. We also intend to work with business stakeholders such as the CBI and the CIPD to ensure that this guidance reaches businesses and to encourage them to review their company policies accordingly.

Bereavement is a particularly sensitive issue and to be comprehensive, this guidance will need to cover a broad range of issues and situations. I am confident that the guidance produced by ACAS will be of excellent quality. I hope that this is some reassurance to the noble Lord, Lord Knight, and the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth. It is, however, essential that we keep the effectiveness of guidance and how it is being applied in the workplace under review. This is what the Government fully intend to do. I understand the sentiment behind this amendment, and I believe that it is important that all individuals are able to take time off to grieve when they suffer the loss of a loved one. However, I think that a flexible and sensitive approach, tailored to the needs of individual employees, is what is needed at such a difficult time. It is not feasible to legislate to accommodate the vastly different needs of individuals, which are often the result of different personal circumstances, family relationships and religious observations. For this reason I believe that guidance, combined with working with our key partners to encourage employers to adopt best practice in their workplaces, is the best approach.

The noble Lord, Lord Knight, raised a number of questions and I will endeavour to write to him with answers, including the question that he raised on the linkage with the DWP. In the mean time, I hope that noble Lords are reassured by these commitments and will agree to withdraw their amendment.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

My Lords, I believe we are deeply reassured and very grateful to the Minister. I am only sorry that I was not able to take part in the earlier discussions. As he knows, there were clashes with other discussions about other parts of the children Bill at which I had to be present. I have been in close touch with the noble Lord, Lord Knight. We are very reassured, indeed grateful, that this matter has moved at such speed. I am just grateful that I will be able to take back the news to the families I work with that something will happen and that we will not hear such tragic stories about families receiving no compassion at some of the most difficult times of their lives. I beg to withdraw the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch]

My Lords, very briefly, I thought that both my noble friends made very coherent arguments in favour of this and raised some very important issues. We heard yesterday from the noble Lord, Lord Nash, that he was going to do some more work on parent carers, so obviously some of these issues around carers are already going to come back at Third Reading. There will be ongoing discussions around those issues and I therefore urge the Minister, perhaps in the context of those discussions, to widen it out a little more and consider the issues that have been raised in this amendment at the same time, so that we can bring all these issues back at Third Reading and have a full debate at that stage. I hope that he will consider that seriously.

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

My Lords, I appreciated the interesting and moving speeches by the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister and Lady Pitkeathley, and the brief intervention by my noble friend Lady Tyler focusing on the challenges that parents of disabled children and carers of disabled adults face in balancing their care responsibilities with their working lives.

Being a carer can have a significant impact on an individual’s life. The Government recognise that caring for an individual with a disability can be both physically and emotionally draining. Flexible and supportive working arrangements can make a significant difference to a carer’s life by ensuring that work does not add to the carer’s stress levels. This is why it is important that carers are able to adjust the way they work to allow them to stay in work, because work can be important for a carer’s well-being and income and for maintaining social contacts. As a nation, we cannot afford to lose the talent and skills of carers from the workplace. The Government recognise that caring for disabled people can be a sudden change for an individual. It may be challenging and take a great deal of commitment from an individual to deliver the care and support that is needed.

I reassure noble Lords that my department regularly collects and reviews data on carers to ensure that we are providing the right framework to allow them to participate and thrive in the labour market. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills conducts the workplace employment relations survey and the work-life balance series of surveys which look at the effectiveness of labour market participation policies, such as the right to request flexible working, in supporting carers. The Office for National Statistics also uses the census to analyse carers’ labour market experiences.

These surveys and the evidence they provide informed the recent report on carers from the cross-government task and finish group on carers. This report highlighted the importance of flexible working and recommended that government should continue to promote the benefits of flexible working to employers. All the recommendations of this report have been accepted and are currently being implemented. An additional duty on government to conduct this research and review the provisions for carers is unnecessary because this work is already under way and government regularly collects and reviews this information.

The Government’s approach is to create a fair, flexible and efficient labour market which supports and encourages participation from all. The strategy for carers is to ensure that we create the right framework to allow them to balance their work and caring responsibilities. Clause 113 requires the Government to review the effectiveness of the right to request flexible working against the policy objectives. Supporting carers to remain in work is a key objective of the policy, and I can confirm that this review will include assessing the effectiveness of the right to request flexible working in supporting carers to participate in the labour market.

I understand the noble Baronesses’ intentions behind this amendment, and I hope I have reassured them that the Government are acting to support carers of disabled children and adults to remain in work and are continually reviewing this support to ensure that it meets the needs of carers.

Just before I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment, I wish to change the tone slightly by stating that we have almost reached the end of Report, and on behalf of my noble friend Lord Nash, I will take this opportunity to thank everyone who has spoken today and during earlier sessions on Report. We have had many thoughtful, well informed and constructive debates on a very broad range of issues, and I have welcomed the thorough approach that noble Lords have taken to scrutinising each part of this wide-ranging Bill. I hope that we can address the very few outstanding issues. I also thank the Bill team and all the officials who have supported me, my noble friend Lord Nash and colleagues across different departments for their work.

In the mean time, I ask the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett]

My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend and to the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, for speaking in support of this amendment at this extremely late hour. I am grateful to the Minister. I thought he made a rather compelling case for my amendment when he spoke about the importance of supporting carers. He talked about enabling them to participate and thrive, but the trouble is that the present situation does not enable them to participate and thrive. I was ultimately very disappointed by the Minister’s response because it is not about simply collecting statistics, but about having a formal, structured review of the case that other countries have now accepted. Therefore I will, of course, withdraw the amendment, but I suspect that it will not be the last amendment which tries to make this case; we will table such an amendment to any legislation that offers the opportunity to do so. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.