Children in Care
(asked on 13th October 2014) - View Source
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many cases in the family courts resulted in removed children being returned to their parents in each of the last five years.
The table below shows, for each of the last five years:
The number of children taken into care.
The number of children who are subsequently ceased to be looked after and returned home to live with parents or relatives,
The number of children who have not returned home to live with parents or relatives but were subsequently placed with parents whilst still looked after.
Year ending
| Of which: | ||
Have subsequently ceased to be looked after to return home to live with parents or relatives2,[3] | Have subsequently been placed with parents and have either remained in care or have since ceased to be looked after for some other reason than returning home to live with parents or relatives2,[4] | ||
31 March 2010 | 9,580 | 2,960 | 1,470 |
31 March 2011 | 9,560 | 2,860 | 1,500 |
31 March 2012 | 10,140 | 2,750 | 1,340 |
31 March 2013 | 11,140 | 2,680 | 1,380 |
31 March 2014 | 10,920 | 2,120 | 1,070 |
Source: SSDA903 children looked after return 2014
[1] Children who were taken into care are children who started to be looked after under a care order, police protection, emergency protection order or child assessment order. Only the first occasion on which a child was taken into care in the year has been counted, but a child may appear more than once if they started to be looked after in one year, left care and then returned to care in a subsequent year.
[2] Numbers have been rounded to the nearest 10.
[3] The child may have ceased to be looked after at any subsequent point in time and it is possible the child could have returned to care since ceasing to be looked after. This includes children who, prior to ceasing care, were placed with parents at some point during their period of care.
[4] The child was placed with parents at some point during the period of care, however, the child may have changed placements subsequently. This excludes children who ceased to be looked after to return home to live with parents or relatives.