Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what funding his Department has allocated to support the establishment and operation of child contact centres in England in each of the last five years.

The Government has no overall responsibility for funding child contact centre provision. However, the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) procures contact sessions at supervised child contact centres for families involved in family proceedings. The level of funding is dependent on demand but has remained broadly stable since 2014/15. Cafcass also provides small value grants of up to £3,000 per annum to assist child contact centres run by the voluntary sector (supported centres), where such organisations seek financial assistance. The value of these grants decreased in 2013/14 due to additional top-up funding for these centres provided in 2012/13 before increasing in 2014/15. Funding since 2015/16 has remained broadly stable.

The Ministry of Justice, and previously the Department for Education, has provided core grant funding to the National Association of Child Contact Centres (NACCC) to help it set standards and run an accreditation scheme for child contact centres in England, supported by training. The value of this grant has increased in each of the last three years.

Funding for the financial years 2013/14 to 2017/18 are shown in the table below. Unit cost efficiencies, changes in demand volume and changes to the ways suppliers are paid mean that figures are not directly comparable across all financial years.

Core grant funding of child contact centres: financial years 2013/14 to 2017/18