Children and Young Persons Bill [Lords]

Public Bill Committee, 1 July 2008.

Clause 11

Greg Pope (Labour, Hyndburn)

I remind the Committee that with this we are taking the following amendments: No. 12, in clause 11, page 10, line 18, at end insert—

‘(5) A local authority must ensure that the independent reviewing officer appointed under this section is sufficiently independent.

(6) In this section ‘sufficiently independent’ means—

(a) having minimal connection to the local authority in question;

(b) having not worked for the local authority in question in the last 10 years;

(c) being previously unconnected to the particular child in question; and

(d) having no conflict of interest.’.

No. 33, in clause 11, page 10, line 18, at end insert—

‘(5) In carrying out his functions in relation to subsection (1)(c) above the independent reviewing officer must—

(a) give information to the child about independent advocacy;

(b) where the need for independent advocacy is identified, require the local authority to make arrangements for the provision of independent advocacy for the child.

(6) For the purposes of this section—

(a) “advocacy” means the provision of independent and confidential information, advice, representation and support to a child;

(b) “independent” means that the person appointed is not connected with the local authority by virtue of being—

(i) a member of the local authority or any of their committees or sub-committees, whether elected or co-opted; or

(ii) an officer of the local authority employed by the Children’s Services Department of that authority; or

(iii) a spouse or civil partner of any such person.’.

No. 36, in clause 11, page 10, line 18, at end insert—

‘(5) In carrying out his functions in relation to subsection (1)(c) above the independent reviewing officer must—

(a) give information to the child about independent advocacy; and

(b) where the need for independent advocacy is identified, require the local authority to make arrangements for the provision of independent advocacy for the child.

(6) For the purposes of this section—

(a) “advocacy” means the provisions of independent and confidential information, advice, representations and support to a child;

(b) “independent” means that the local authority has arrangements in place to ensure that the child is protected from any conflict of interest on the part of the advocate appointed.’.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

It is a pleasure to see you back in charge of our proceedings, Mr. Pope. Hon. Members will recall that I introduced the amendments on Thursday, albeit briefly. I shall now move on to the specifics.

Amendment No. 35 is a probing amendment to tease out the Government’s thinking on what an independent reviewing officer’s independence means and how they believe that the reviewing officer will be able to do their job independent of the local authority that they are helping. Independent reviewing officers are registered social workers; the local authority for which they carry out their work may employ them or they may be self-employed. In the context of the amendment, that work is participating in the statutory reviews of looked-after children cases, monitoring progress made in accordance with the child’s care plan and reporting their concerns to the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service.

Clause 11 alters those duties by adding more responsibilities. First, each child will know who their independent reviewing officer is. Secondly, the independent reviewing officer will be charged with assessing the child’s views and wishes and with ensuring that they are taken into account at the statutory reviews.

The amendment relates to the proposed new subsection 25B(4) to the Children Act 1989, which begins:

“If the independent reviewing officer is not an officer of the local authority, it is the duty of the authority”.

It goes on to say what those responsibilities are, which include co-operating with the independent reviewing officer. With those words, the Government draw a distinction between a self-employed independent reviewing officer who is engaged to do the work and one whom the local authority employs. Why does that authority not have a duty to co-operate with an independent reviewing officer who is an officer of the local authority? Surely, our job as Parliament is to ensure that, whoever the independent reviewing officer is, they do their job independently, since it has “independent” in the title. An independent reviewing officer employed by a council could be put in a compromising position if we do not say that the local authority is under a duty to co-operate with them as much as it is required to co-operate with outside officers.

The Family Rights Group has trained 250 independent reviewing officers. It has found that the pressures on independent reviewing officers from the local authorities are equally intense, whether they are an officer of the council or self-employed. If they are independent they worry about whether they will get more contracts if they give the local authority a hard time, and if they are an employee they worry about whether it will affect their career progression and future job with the local authority if they give their employer a hard time.

The amendment’s purpose is to ensure that it is the authority’s duty to co-operate with the independent reviewing officer, whether or not they are an officer of the local authority. I shall be interested to hear the Government’s response. I am reminded by my tenuous knowledge of employment law, which goes back to when I practised as a lawyer more then 11 years ago, that it is an employee’s duty to obey “reasonable and lawful instructions” from their employer. A local authority could say to its employee who is going to take part in a statutory review, “You will have regard to the parlous state of our finances when you take part in the review, won’t you?” If they are under that kind of pressure from their local authority and a child is saying to that independent reviewing officer that they want an outcome that is expensive for the local authority, how is an independent reviewing officer to advocate for the child in the statutory review? If the law of the land says it is the duty of the authority to co-operate with its employee in that situation, at least the independent reviewing officer would be able to turn round to the council and say, “Excuse me, but in this situation you have the duty to co-operate with me. I shall therefore do my job independently, as the law requires.” That is the outcome that all in this room would hope to happen on every occasion. That was my purpose in tabling the amendment.

The group of amendments includes No. 12, which is about the independence of independent reviewing officers, and amendment No. 33, which is about independent advocacy for children who are in contact with the independent reviewing officer. I did not table those amendments and will leave it to those who did to explain them.

I did table amendment No. 36 so I will speak briefly to it. It is very similar to amendment No. 33. I must declare a slight interest because some years ago I was a founder member of a citizen advocacy scheme in Staffordshire called ASIST, which is an acronym for Advocacy Services in Staffordshire. It successfully set up a scheme of advocates for adults covering the entire county and many different situations. It has a good combination of employees who are paid to do the work and volunteers who are trained to do it. They work as a team to provide advocacy across the county.

The first time I saw the advocates in action, having helped found the organisation, was when a large mental institution was closed down and people were moved to independent living in the community. Advocates from ASIST were contracted to carry out advocacy on behalf of the residents. I know that this is a bit of a diversion, Mr. Pope, but shockingly, I met a woman in her 80s in the mental institution who had been admitted because she had had a child out of wedlock when she was a young woman. That is amazing in this day and age.

The advocates provided superb skills to people who had been institutionalised for their entire lives. The advocates got to know them, understood their circumstances, learned what their points of view were and articulated their views and wishes to the reviews, which determined where they would live and what support they needed to live independently. I have seen advocacy at first hand through that tremendously successful scheme. To explain my interest further, I am still a patron of ASIST because it did not want to lose contact with me when I was elected to Parliament.

Amendment No. 36 proposes that when an independent reviewing officer seeks the wishes and views of a child, they should tell the child about the availability of independent advocacy services. If the child wanted somebody to speak for them in a statutory review, they could ask somebody to be their advocate and bat for them in front of the professionals in the review.

Some might argue, as did Lord Adonis in the other place, that if the independent review officer’s role is being strengthened and they will be charged with learning what the child thinks and wants, there is no need for an advocate because the independent review officer can do the necessary work on behalf of the child. I disagree with that because if the independent review officer is to stay true to that title, they will take account of the views of the child, the local authority, other professionals and the parents in deciding what is best for the welfare of the child. That might or might not be what the child wants. The point about an advocate is that they are never diverted from speaking up for what the child says the child wants. Ensuring that that voice is heard in the place where it matters the most is an important role.

Edward Timpson (Conservative, Crewe and Nantwich)

How does the hon. Gentleman’s scheme of independent advocacy for children through the independent review officer sit with the draft legislation, which is in line with the Adoption and Children Act 2002, and allows for an officer of CAFCASS to be referred by the independent review officer to take on the role as an advocate should the case arise?

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. He has offered a way forward on who could be an advocate for a child. A CAFCASS officer is a perfectly acceptable person—independent of everyone in the process—to step in and be that advocate if that is what the child wants. However, we should give the child a diversity of choice. My amendment differs from amendment No. 33, which was fully debated in the other place. That amendment seeks to ensure that the advocate chosen by the child is absolutely independent of the local authority. My amendment does not go that far. If, for example, there is a member of staff in a residential children’s home who has been trained to be an advocate and has gained the appropriate qualification, and a child wants that person to be their advocate, we should not say, “You cannot have that person because they are employed by the local authority so they are not independent.” If the child is confident that that person could speak for them, even against their employers, that is fine by me.

The hon. Gentleman mentions the 2006 Act. I would go back a little further to the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000, because that is when the big debate about advocacy first emerged in Parliament. We were given assurances during the passage of that Act—which came to fruition two years later, I think—that a child in care would have access to an advocate if they wanted to make a complaint or a representation about their care. Fortunately, the number of complaints is quite low, but not many youngsters appreciate that they could have an advocate to make their complaint for them, and they certainly do not know what a representation is. Roger Morgan, the children’s rights director, often has difficulty—even though it is his job—explaining to people that representation could be read widely, and that there could already be many situations where a child could access an advocate if they wanted to. Even wanting to have their voice heard at a statutory review could be classified as a representation. I argue that perhaps the Government have done a good thing in the past, but they have, through the kind of language used and the lack of publicity about representation, denied a lot of access to advocacy to children who already probably could have had recourse to it. Later, one or two new clauses that try to reassert the general access to an advocate that a child should have will be proposed.

I want to draw my comments to a close by referring to the recent report by Roger Morgan, the children’s rights director, on children’s views of advocacy. He gives helpful guidance based on his interviews with children. Children and young people regard the independence of the advocate as important, mainly because the advocate would not be involved with the issue at stake, they would be less judgmental than people closely involved, and the process of consulting with the advocate would be more private. On page 13 of the report it states:

“Many children and young people expressed very strong views about this. Some thought it was important that advocates did not work for the same organisation as the people looking after them. Others thought that advocates should not be people in the same home as themselves.”

That shows a healthy pragmatism on behalf of the children and young people: the advocate would be somebody they trusted and their status—whether or not they were an employee of the local authority—would not necessarily be important.

Roger Morgan asked children when they thought an advocate would be of use. These are some of their answers:

“When you feel like complaining”.

They could already access advocacy in that situation.

“When you’re in a meeting and you don’t understand it”.

It is frightening that the professional process can go on around somebody and they do not know what is happening. A good one is:

“When you’re locked up”.

That is an obvious reason for wanting somebody to say something on your behalf.

“When you have been arrested or in trouble at school or in any other bad situation”.

“When I’m too afraid to ask the council”.

The latter is an enlightening comment, which links to giving people the ability and the confidence to know that with someone’s help they would be able to say the right thing at the right time. The final situation quoted in the report was:

“Whenever you feel unable to speak for yourself”.

As a result, Roger Morgan made some recommendations, and I would like to refer to four of them.

Andrew Turner (Conservative, Isle of Wight)

That is interesting. Will the hon. Gentleman indicate whether those views differ across the country?

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I refer the hon. Gentleman to the documents and will happily lend him my copy in a moment.

Roger Morgan describes his methodology, which involves a number of interviews across the country and a number of open opportunities for people to make comments, such as through a website or by writing in. It covers the whole of England and so is drawn from across the country. However, he does not individualise the responses, so it is not possible to see where in the country each person made their comments.

Lastly, I want to refer to four of the seven recommendations that Roger Morgan made as a result of the views that he received from children. First, all children who have a right to help from an advocate need to be told about advocacy and how to contact an advocate. That comes back to the point I made earlier about some children not appreciating that they can have an advocate to make a complaint. They certainly do not understand what a representation means and that they can have an advocate for that reason.

Secondly, most advocates should be independent of the organisation looking after the child, although children should be able to choose an advocate they know from their own service if they wish to do so. That is why amendment No. 36 is different from amendment No. 33. Thirdly, children should have a choice of advocate and should be able to change their advocate if they do not get on with them. That is a matter of practice, but it requires a diversity of providers of advocacy services to be available. Fourthly, children should be able to have the help of an advocate if they need one to help get their views across and not only in relation to complaints.

That is another example of Roger Morgan using his experience to say that although the law perhaps intended a wider access to advocacy, it is mostly coming through in connection with the making of complaints. Therefore, I hope that the amendments can provoke a debate that leads us to see that some changes to advocacy services will definitely be needed in the future. Those could be achieved through changing the law or through the guidance and practice that comes next.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship again, Mr. Pope. Amendment No. 35 seems eminently sensible to me. I will wait to hear the Minister’s reassurance that it is not necessary, but I think that it addresses some important points. Indeed, I will perhaps inadvertently touch on some of the points addressed by amendment No. 12, because it seems that the way the position of independent reviewing officer is being set up will make swaps between local authorities more likely, which will be useful.

I live within a unitary authority that is adjacent to another unitary authority so I know from experience that, with regard to careers, there is a great deal of movement between the two unitary authorities. Because of their proximity, it is highly likely that someone in one authority will have worked for the other. People tend to stay in our area once they have moved down. It is important to ensure that we are covering all independent review officers.

The hon. Member for Stafford made the point about self-employed independent reviewing officers who might find it difficult to make challenges for fear that contracts might not be awarded in the future. My concern is about inhibitions or obstacles on the part of the local authority, which mean that the case cannot be strongly put for the child receiving the sort of services that they should receive. The amendment seeks to ensure that local authorities co-operate with independent reviewing officers, whatever their status. To my mind, that would ensure that we have effective challenges on behalf of all looked-after children, regardless of the independent reviewing officer’s employment status.

I made a note that on amendment No. 12 I would listen carefully to the arguments before pronouncing. I shall stick to that so the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham can be assured that I will be listening.

Amendment No. 33 was tabled in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Ceredigion. I have also supported amendment No. 36. As has already been said, there is a great similarity between the two amendments. There is a difference in that amendment No. 33 contains a more comprehensive interpretation of the term independent. There is probably a balance here: there should be confidence in the independence, but equally it is important that whoever the person is, they have the total trust of the child. The important point and the thrust of the two amendments is the aspect of the independence and the need for advocacy.

I have been impressed by just how many organisations and professionals from the whole spectrum believe there is a need for independent advocacy. Indeed, 30 different organisations have signed the joint statement on it. I have spoken to professionals right across the field and they all suggest that there is a need for more advocacy. Perhaps most important of all, the children themselves want independent advocacy.

Mark Williams (Liberal Democrat, Ceredigion)

My hon. Friend has mentioned the extensive number of organisations that support our amendment. Would she agree that it is also a question of practice across the United Kingdom and elsewhere? Wales is very much leading the way in terms of the development of independent advocacy. The Assembly’s Children and Young People’s Committee has recommended having an advocacy unit within the Assembly, as well as a national body to provide advocacy services for children.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I thank my hon. Friend. I hope that the Minister will be able to touch on that point about equality of service across the UK. Going back to the many supporters of independent advocacy, it would be remiss of me not to refer to the famous reference in 1997. Sir William Utting’s report “People like Us” concluded that looked-after children needed independent advocacy as a source of protection and a means of making their voice heard. There is certainly evidence to suggest that professional advocacy input leads to better decision making and that children’s outcomes are improved as a result.

Independent advocacy is made available now through local decision making and there is also the right to independent advocacy if we get to the complaints stage. But I believe that children and young people should have access to advocacy before something has gone wrong. The independent review officer should inform the child about independent advocacy, what it means, how it can help and how it differs from the roles of a social worker and an independent review officer before each review. Following that discussion, and where the child is clear that he wants an advocate or the independent review officer feels that the child would benefit from one, the local authority should be required to provide advocacy services to that child. Obviously not all children will need or want advocacy. It is a matter of its being available.

At a recent meeting of the Children, Schools and Families Committee, I asked the Minister about children with physical difficulties. If a child has such severe physical difficulties that they are placed quite a long way way from home in specialist residential accommodation, surely there is a need for advocacy. It has been drawn to my attention that that might be a situation where the relationship with the child is an important determinant of the choice of advocate at that point. Being able to interpret the wishes and feelings of children who perhaps cannot communicate fully themselves is such a delicate thing.

I also mentioned mental disabilities. Sadly, many children who are brought into care are likely to have been abused in some way or other. They may have the greatest difficulty expressing their views for that reason. I was heartened by the Minister’s response, which I interpreted to be that in such cases as I described, it would be difficult to think that advocacy would not be needed. I am looking for at least an acknowledgment that independent advocacy is necessary in a number of cases. Perhaps we will need a roll-out process, but surely we should start somewhere by making sure that there is an absolute right to it.

The independent review officer role has been strengthened and I welcome that, but I do not believe that the enhanced role meets the needs of more children to have access to professional independent advocacy. The expression of the child’s views in the decision-making process by an independent review officer who is responsible for facilitating its outcomes is quite distinct from the representation of those views by an advocate who is independent of the process. Review officers cannot practically be expected to enable the necessary participation of the child in the review process, despite the existing requirement in regulations to ensure that the voice of the child is conveyed to the review.

Children still tell the various children’s organisations that they do not feel they are listened to. The hon. Member for Stafford has just given us some examples. One child said of his experience, “I told the IRO that I wanted contact with my sister, but that did not come up at the meeting.” That sounds remarkably odd. Independent review officers have significant responsibilities in relation to chairing review meetings, which means that they do not have the capacity to give young people the dedicated support necessary to ensure that their views can be clearly represented. Chairing a meeting and putting views forward are clearly quite different roles. Moreover, the IRO has to act in the best interests of the child. It is possible that they concluded that what the child wanted was contrary to the child’s best interests. In that situation, would an IRO be able to represent the views of the child as well?

Better decision making can save money in the end. I urge the Ministers to think again and to give further consideration to a statutory right to independent advocacy whenever significant decisions are being made in the lives of looked-after children, and not just when they have cause to complain. That would be integral to the whole Government policy of improving outcomes for children in the care system.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

May I welcome you back to the Chair, Mr. Pope? I want to speak primarily to amendment No. 12. I agree with much of what has been said by the hon. Members for Stafford and for Mid-Dorset and North Poole and I will touch on the subject of advocacy at the end of my comments. I agree that there is a case for a greater use of advocacy before things reach the crisis stage and something has gone wrong. I certainly agree with the method behind the hon. Gentleman’s amendment in trying to tease out the independence of the IRO and argue for greater independence. I am approaching the matter from that same angle.

I went back over the Committee proceedings of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, back in those heady days of 2001-02 when I was in the same role as today, leading for the Opposition. The current Home Secretary was leading for the Government. Great things happen to some people and not to others. That was the piece of legislation that set up the IROs. They came in on an statutory basis in 2004. In another place, Lord Adonis made it clear that the primary role of the IRO was to ensure that the child’s wishes and feelings are listened to. He said:

“The role of the IRO is central to ensuring that the voice of the child is heard. Therefore, Clause 11 introduces a specific duty on the IRO to ensure that the wishes and feelings of the child are given due consideration in care planning.”

He went on:

“The IRO will support children’s active engagement with the care planning process, ensuring that there is greater scrutiny of the care plan for each child in care and making sure that children and young people are informed about their rights if they consider that they have been treated unfairly.”—[Official Report, House of Lords,17 January 2008; Vol. 697, c. GC581.]

None of us would disagree with that.

I challenged the then Health Minister, who is now the Home Secretary, about the independence of the IRO when debating the Adoption and Children Act 2002. That was an important consideration for many of us when the legislation first came in. She said:

“It is vital that reviewing officers are independent of the case management and perhaps the social services department in the authority.”—[Official Report, 20 May 2002; Vol. 386, c. 61.]

I was making the case for an IRO being completely disconnected in terms of previous employment and engagement from the responsible social services department, which would now be the children’s services department. That is what lies behind amendment No. 12.

Since the independent reviewing officers became statutory in September 2004, their functions have been set out. They are there to monitor the local authority’s plans for a looked-after child and, where appropriate, to refer the case to CAFCASS. Will the Minister say how many referrals there have been to CAFCASS, whether that has put a lot of pressure on it and whether it has been able to deal with it? Has that even been a consideration?

The amendment is designed to get around a potential conflict of interests. I made this point during the passage of the 2002 Act and other hon. Members expressed similar concerns. There are obviously difficulties for officers who are employed by the authority and who, in effect, have to challenge their employers, to whom they are contractually accountable; whereas officers who are self-employed risk not being given any further work if they are too challenging and are perceived to be a thorn in the local authority’s side. There is clear potential for a conflict of interests and for an IRO “dumbing down” any criticism of a local authority because it might think that that officer is a bit of a pain and will think again about whether to keep on or give him future case work.

Edward Timpson (Conservative, Crewe and Nantwich)

Does my hon. Friend agree that in the strengthening and widening of the IRO’s role, the perception of the independence of that role on the part of parents and children is important? In the current system, particularly as part of the care planning process in the court arena, we see parents challenging the work of social workers. The court then has to employ an independent social worker from outside the local authority to carry out a further piece of work, thereby adding to the cost of the process. Is there not a danger that with the strengthening and widening of the role of the IRO, the perception of independence will decrease rather than increase?

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

My hon. Friend is absolutely right and has clearly seen that happen in his former job. It is crucial that the independence of the reviewing officer is seen in practice, particularly by the family so that they have confidence in the whole system. The burden of proof is on the Government and the authorities operating the system to show that the IRO is absolutely independent and makes decisions based entirely on the welfare and interests of the child and his family, rather than on any subsidiary interests of the employing authority, for which it might be rather inconvenient if a decision went the wrong way. It is therefore crucial that we get it right.

When the IRO was first established, I welcomed it, and we welcome the widening of that role, but it will not have the necessary effect unless the IRO’s independence and integrity are kept sacrosanct.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

Is it not difficult to pursue independence to the state of perfection? The hon. Gentleman’s amendment seeks to make authorities pay for outsiders in every case. Clause 12 is about perhaps setting up a completely independent body, just to do the job. Does it not get more and more expensive but never achieve what he might call the perfection of independence? Is not the better solution the sort of independent reviewing officer that we have now as well as decent advocacy services for children? That would save us all this expense and worry.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I am grateful that the hon. Gentleman described my amendments as near perfection—he has certainly not done that before. I may return to the exact terminology of the amendments and explain why they are practical rather than idealistic.

In its brief, the General Social Care Council raises points about the qualifications and training of the IRO, and reasserts that it is essential that GSCC registration is a requirement. The council wishes to be involved in the development of the regulations, and it believes that IROs should have appropriate training and accreditation. It would be useful if the Minister commented on that. Clearly, part of the confidence in the role of the IRO is linked to their qualifications and ability to do the job.

The hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole touched on, albeit more in relation to the advocate, the particular needs of children with disabilities in communicating their wishes. During the debate in the Lords, Lord Adonis said that he will

“ensure through statutory guidance that children with communication difficulties or complex needs are supported either by an IRO with the skills necessary to facilitate care planning and to elicit the views of children with communication difficulties or complex needs, or through an IRO who has access to specialist input from someone who has these skills to ensure that the child’s views are elicited and put forward effectively.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 16 January 2008; Vol. 697, c. GC530.]

That is reassuring, but I am concerned though whether that will happen in practice and whether there are people capable of performing that role.

We know how short of skilled social workers we are. We will be even more short of skilled social workers if more of them are hived off to be IROs and to do other specialist jobs for which a social work qualification is needed. We desperately need more social workers—that is the solution. I would appreciate a comment from the Minister on how the capacity of the system can cope with the particular communication skills required, as described by her noble friend Lord Adonis. If that capacity is not satisfactory at the moment, how will it become so, and how soon will we be at that stage?

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

Will the hon. Gentleman also consider that a severely disabled child, many miles from the local authority that is providing the services, may have formed a relationship with a visitor to the residential home? It may be easier for somebody who has a close relationship with that child to interpret what they want, rather than a distant independent reviewing officer, however skilled they might be.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

The hon. Lady makes a good point. The issue of children with disabilities is also relevant to the role of an advocate, as she touched on. One of the consortium papers states:

“Disabled children placed away from home urgently need a right to advocacy.”

The same applies to specialist access to IROs. The paper goes on:

“Disabled children are at least three times more likely to be abused or subjected to demeaning treatment than other children and those living away from home are especially vulnerable. Many children in this situation have little or no contact with their families and are very isolated. Advocates can help these children stay safe.”

Similarly, the whole role of the position is also relevant.

The amendment cites four criteria. It is a probing amendment, and no doubt the Minister will shoot it to pieces when referring to the practicalities of putting it in the Bill, but we think that certain benchmarks are needed to assure the independence of the IRO. IROs should have a minimal connection to the local authority in question. Clearly, it is not sufficient for someone who has long been an officer of an authority to give a judgment on former close colleagues, as their judgment might be coloured by that, rather than the underlying needs and welfare of the child. That is why the amendment proposes that the IROs should not have worked for that authority.

When we debated that during the passage of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, six and a half years ago, we looked at the possibility of the officers coming from neighbouring authorities, but as we know, many social workers who work for local authorities, as with many other officers in children’s services departments, can move around quite a lot, particularly among London boroughs and between the home counties. We therefore propose that the officer should not have worked for the local authority in question in the previous 10 years, as that would ensure a good degree of independence.

Andrew Turner (Conservative, Isle of Wight)

I am listening with some care to what my hon. Friend is saying. I have a problem, which is that I live on the Isle of Wight. I am sure that he is familiar with that in relation to other issues. If the officer has not worked in 10 years, the problem is that they are likely to have left employment for that time if they lived locally, or they have retired. There is also the question of how up to date their knowledge is. Could my hon. Friend give some indication of how many people we are talking about—one in 10 years, or 20 in 10 years? I know that it is difficult, but that would help make my thoughts clearer.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

My hon. Friend makes a helpful and probing intervention. The more the Committee’s proceedings continue, the clearer it has become that the Isle of Wight is a separate universe with a microclimate of its own, and that poses all sorts of problems. The narrow stretch of water between Hampshire and the Isle of Wight has much to answer for.

We are not looking at retired social workers, but social workers move around the system a great deal. With the addition of these new practices for social workers, that flow is likely to be greater. We do not want people who are out of date and lack the necessary training, which is why I quoted from the GSCC earlier and commented that IROs would absolutely need to be capable of doing the job, to be registered and to meet all the standards expected of them. In no way are we trying to have a sort of “Dad’s Army” of IROs—I hasten to add, lest I start to get complaints about that analogy, that the Home Guard did a fine job. There is no question of the individuals in question not being trained. My primary concern is that the IRO is not too close to the people who are effectively paying them or giving them the business, and that their absolute primary concern is the welfare of the child.

The amendment’s third requirement is that the IRO should be previously unconnected with the child in question. They should have an entirely dispassionate view of the child’s circumstances and the experiences leading up to the event on which they are required to make the report. They should not be coloured at all by the fact that they might have heard of that child when working as a social worker some years before, if it was a child who had been in the care system for many years. As a sort of catch-all addition to the amendment, we have said that there should be no conflict of interests. I am sure that the Minister will point to the difficulty in defining that, but this is a probing amendment. The key point is that there should be no conflict of interests that would hinder the IRO’s capacity to make an independent report.

I should like to touch briefly on the comments about advocacy. I have in the past supported greater advocacy as applied to certain groups of vulnerable people. I am sympathetic to what the hon. Members for Mid-Dorset and North Poole and for Stafford have said. We may have more of a debate on that when we come to new clause 31, which deals with the subject of advocates. Certainly, the report from the children’s rights director cited by the hon. Gentleman is excellent, as so many of them are. I agree with his comments. I certainly endorse the responses of children who said that it is essential that they can associate and identify with the IROs, and they need to be able talk with them privately and to be assured of their independence.

A costing has been placed on the availability of advocacy for children’s services. An estimate by the National Children’s Advocacy Consortium showed that on the basis of a 15 per cent. take-up, introducing such a service would cost what it described as a relatively modest £3 million, excluding on-costs. Is that an entirely unrealistic figure? Have the Government done their own costing? Whatever the Minister may say, there is a cost element to the reason why advocacy has not been included in the Bill. The Government set an interesting precedent in the Mental Health Act 2007, and I challenge them to say why it was done for that group of people but they do not propose to include it in this Bill.

The hon. Member for Stafford, who also sat on the Committee on that Bill, will remember that well. Advocacy services for people with mental health problems were included in the draft Bill that was first produced in 2004 and they had mysteriously disappeared from the Bill that was introduced after the Queen’s Speech of 2006. After the pre-legislative scrutiny Committee report, the Government put advocacy back in the Bill and are greatly to be congratulated for doing so.

Advocacy was deemed to be essential for people with mental health problems for three main reasons. The first was to ensure a statutory right to an independent mental health advocate for all patients subject to compulsory powers, for which we can substitute “for all children subject to care orders”, in a perfectly legitimate parallel. The second reason was to make patients aware of that right; making children aware would be perfectly legitimate. The third was to ensure that patients have a right to meet their advocate in private. Again, we could substitute “children” and we have already touched on the importance of meeting in private.

The structure and the rationale behind introducing an advocacy entitlement for mental health patients subject to compulsion sits quite easily with a similar entitlement for children subject to care orders. The pre-legislative scrutiny Committee estimated that the whole-time equivalent of 140 advocates, which was the number deemed to be required, would cost approximately £5 million. There was debate about whether those advocates were physically available or not, so there is question of capacity. Although it is early days for that legislation, has that turned out to have been a realistic estimate and how would a similar measure pan out for children?

The Government still do not see that it is appropriate to introduce similar provisions, for perhaps a lower cost, for children subject to the care system. Given that the criteria for mental health patients could easily be transposed to children in the care system, why does the Minister think that the Government were right to make that provision for mental health patients? They were subjected to close scrutiny and a lot of lobbying, and I did not think that they would but, to give them their due, they did. I am keen to push amendment No. 12 as a probing amendment. I have some constructive questions in support of the principle of advocacy and I will be grateful for the Minister’s response on why the same principles could not be applied here.

Andrew Turner (Conservative, Isle of Wight)

I would like to look at clause 11, to which the hon. Member for Stafford has tabled amendments. I am concerned: that is not to say that I am opposed to the provision but I would like to consider it further. Do the advocates have to give continued and repeated help, or is someone else to do that? My concern is that the advocates will deal with one person one day, another person another day and a third person on a third day. It would be much better if a youngster had continuous help. The problem with these youngsters is that they are likely to be moved from one person to another. Can the Minister ensure that these youngsters have continuous help?

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

We have had an interesting debate and there is very little difference between the views of Ministers and of hon. Members on both sides of the Committee about what the amendments are trying to achieve and the assurances that they are designed to elicit from me.

Before turning to the specifics of the amendments, I shall reiterate what we were trying to do when we developed the White Paper around four key underpinning principles, one of which was the centrality of the voice of the child. That is why “Care Matters” set out a vision for a care system that systematically and consistently promotes the voice of children and ensures that their voice is heard. Taken together—it is important to see them together—the whole thrust of the proposals is systemic change, with the entire care system being child focused and decisions being made in the best interests of the child after having considered properly the child’s views and needs, just as any parent would. That is the intention of the proposals.

The people who are best placed to ensure that children are actively engaged in decisions that affect them are those who already have a professional responsibility for the child’s day-to-day care, and who therefore have practical experience of involving the child in day-to-day decisions. We agree completely that advocacy can have an important role to play for looked-after children. As hon. Members have noted, under the current statutory framework, all looked-after children should already have access to advocacy services to help them to pursue complaints and make representations about the services that they receive. I accept that the latter has not happened as much as it could have or as much as it needs to, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford said. However we believe that our proposed changes, particularly in clause 11, will address that.

Statutory guidance makes it clear that we expect children to have access to advocates beyond the formal complaints procedure: for example, a child should be able to get the support of an advocate in making representations about changes that may be required to the service that they receive. I therefore say to the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole that I do not think this is a matter of law, but a matter of changing practice through the new statutory guidance. I am not persuaded that providing more advocates for all looked-after children in other circumstances would necessarily achieve what we are all trying to achieve.

To the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham I say that cost was not the primary consideration. Looking at the subject in the round, as we did when developing the policy, we see that there are already many professionals—sometimes a whole plethora—who are involved with and interact with looked-after children. Increasing advocacy for every single child and adding an additional person into that mix can result in more confusion between the adults’ roles and even greater complication of relationships.

We are doing two things. First, to improve children’s participation in decisions about their care, we want to equip all those people who are working closely with them on a day-to-day basis—particularly carers, social workers and designated teachers—with the right skills to ensure that they really are listening to and understanding and taking account of children’s wishes. In particular, in clause 11, we are strengthening the role of the independent reviewing officer.

We also want to improve the practice of social workers who have day-to-day responsibility for children’s cases by setting out in guidance clear expectations for visiting looked-after children wherever they are placed. We are revising the statutory guidance on care planning to make it clear that social workers, too, have a responsibility to communicate properly with children and to record information systematically in the care plans so that care plans are comprehensive and up to date. For the first time, we also provide for new statutory guidance on the role of the independent reviewing officers responsible for monitoring the case as a whole and overseeing regular reviews of the care plan.

I will go through the various elements of how we want to strengthen that role, and I ask Members to think about them as a whole. We will require local authorities to appoint a named IRO for each child to enhance the personal accountability and individual responsibilities of each IRO. We will require IROs to spend time individually with each child before any review, so that that IRO personally establishes the child’s wishes and feelings about the issues that will be covered at the care planning meeting. The example the hon. Lady gave about the child who wanted contact with her sister should simply not happen, and we are going to make that clear.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I am anxious to know whether the word “representation” is deliberate a restriction on the right to advocacy. In the example that the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole gave, if, at a case review, a child wanted it to be made known that he or she wanted to have contact with a brother or sister, would that entitle the child to an advocate to make sure it was said in the meeting?

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

That is an interesting question. I take “representation” in the terms in which we describe it here, potentially including any aspect of the services the child is receiving. The first and preferred option is to ensure that it is the IRO who raises the issues that are germane to a child’s future. If that is not done, there may be room for advocacy or for some other means of ensuring that it is done.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

Is it not too late the day after the case review if it has not been done, and should not my right hon. Friend give a commitment to the Committee that in the new guidance it will be made clear that “representation” should be read very widely and might include the example we have just discussed?

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

Yes, I am happy to give the assurance that we want “representation” to be read widely, and to put that on the record.

We also want to introduce a duty on the IRO to monitor the local authority’s performance of its functions in relation to the case. It is important to understand that this duty will extend the IRO’s existing monitoring role, which is confined to the authority’s functions in respect of the review. It gives the reviewing officer a much broader scrutiny and monitoring role of the local authority’s functions in the whole of that child’s case.

Edward Timpson (Conservative, Crewe and Nantwich)

Will the Minister clarify what consideration is being given to a sibling group? The way the legislation is drafted, each child will have its own independent reviewing officer but there may be circumstances—we see it already in the current system—where two or more siblings have the same independent reviewing officer. Whether that is done for convenience or cost or is really necessary is still unclear. Will there be a commitment to ensure that each child’s case is looked at individually rather than a sibling group being looked at in the round and given the same independent reviewing officer, even if each sibling’s needs are different?

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

It is very important that those decisions are made in relation both to the needs of each child and the needs of children as a group. If each child has their own independent reviewing officer for reasons to do with their particular circumstances, it is clearly very important in those circumstances that all the independent reviewing officers talk together about the needs of the individual versus the needs of the children as a group, and communicate about decisions that are often very difficult. The bottom line is that if each individual child needs to have an independent reviewing officer, that should be done. We must ensure that each individual child’s needs are catered for.

We will also introduce a requirement for the IRO to ensure that the local authority gives due consideration to any views expressed by the child. We will strengthen the guidance on the role of IROs by defining a significant event when a review must take place before any proposed change affecting the child can occur. We will update the guidance so that a referral by the IRO to CAFCASS is no longer seen as the last resort, but considered as a real option to ensure proper scrutiny of local authority decisions in any cases where the individual IRO believes it is appropriate to escalate any well founded professional concerns.

We will amend guidance to specify optimum case loads for IROs because, at present, we know that one of the factors in the failure of the IROs to fulfil the promise that we felt they had in the original legislation is the variability between local authorities in the size of IRO case loads. As I mentioned, that is impeding effectiveness in some services.

We will address statutory guidance to the IROs themselves on the importance of maintaining their independent voice in care planning, and on how to perform their role more effectively. It will be the first time that statutory guidance of that sort, on how to perform their role, will have been issued.

Finally, we will set out in regulations a description of the IRO similar to that in the Review of Children's Cases (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2004 that specifies the qualifications and experience the IRO must have that requires him or her to be independent of the management of the case. That is a point raised by the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham. To clarify, regulations already require that the IRO must be registered as a social worker with the General Social Care Council and must have sufficient experience to undertake the functions. We will set out that description more fully in regulations.

Further, we will also expect IROs either to have the skills or to be able to access the specialist input necessary to elicit the views of children with communication difficulties or complex needs, and to do that effectively. Again, to answer a question raised by the hon. Gentleman, in developing the guidance around this expectation, we will undertake research on the type of support and skills that are required. That will include where advocacy, particularly specialist advocacy, might provide useful additional support to children. Through that research, we will look at any capacity problems in relation to that specialist expertise.

Amendments Nos. 33 and 36 would require the independent reviewing officer to give information to the child about independent advocacy. I am happy to commit to address that point in the new statutory guidance that will be issued directly to IROs for the first time following this Bill. We will ensure that the guidance makes it clear that the IRO should seek the assistance of a professional independent advocate if they are unable to ascertain the child’s wishes and feelings. The members of the National Children’s Advocacy Consortium have already discussed this with us and they will be consulted closely during the development of the guidance.

Those amendments also seek to require the local authority to make arrangements for the provision of an advocate when the need for one is identified. That is not necessary, as it would simply duplicate existing law. The Advocacy Services and Representations Procedure (Children) (Amendment) Regulations 2004 already require that when a local authority becomes aware that a child or young person wishes to exercise their right to make a complaint or other representation about services they receive, the authority must provide them with information about advocacy services and offer help in obtaining an advocate. Our reforms both to practice and to the legislative framework will mean that we can deliver a system that puts the voice of the child at the centre. I hope that on that basis, and given our commitment to address those points in the new guidance issued directly to IROs, my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford will be satisfied and feel able to withdraw the amendment.

Turning to some of the specific questions raised by amendments Nos. 12 and 35, regarding IRO independence and the duty of a local authority to co-operate whether or not they are officers of the authority, I completely understand the concern about IROs independence. In developing the policy, I grappled with that over a long period. My inclination initially was to go for a completely independent national service. However, when we looked at it in detail, my view changed.

In consulting a very wide range of people, we found little consensus on why IROs have in some areas failed to have the impact on improving professional practice that we had hoped for. The evidence was insufficient to enable us to determine whether perceived shortcomings in case review processes were attributable, for example, to weakness in training and support or the variation in caseloads, or whether there was a more fundamental problem with the whole structure. It is also worth saying that the statutory framework for IROs only came into force in September 2004.

I was persuaded in the end, not least by the views of some key stakeholders, including the Family Justice Council, which told me:

“The drastic step of relocating responsibility for IROs outside local authorities, for example within CAFCASS or some other independent organisation, demands serious consideration. However, the level of disruption and expense and the unlikelihood of any, or any sufficient increase in CAFCASS resources...is a strong argument against. Moreover, the issue of independence from the local authority, perceived or actual, is not, in the view of the Council, the central issue.”

What I think that means is that, in all these cases, there is an important balance to be struck—as my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford said—between independence and feeling sufficiently strong and having the authority to be independent, and needing to co-operate with the local authority in the interests of the child. What we are asking IROs is to have not only the force of law behind them—what we are doing today—but their own sense of authority in striking that balance in the best possible way for each child.

We also commissioned a survey of IROs and, of the 70 responses, only three cited concerns about potential conflicts of interest in their role. Even in those cases, the concern was more about which part of the local authority they sat in—which department—rather a fundamental conflict of interest per se.

In implementing the measures, we will monitor progress very closely. If, as we hope, the desired changes in the effectiveness of IROs can be achieved through the new framework in clause 11, it may not be necessary to go further. If they cannot, we include the powers in clause 12 to establish a new national IRO service, entirely independent, if that is necessary.

Edward Timpson (Conservative, Crewe and Nantwich)

After the 2004 Act, we saw the introduction and recruitment of regional networks of IROs, monitored by the regional network group, as I understand it. Can the Minister confirm that that is still an ongoing network group and will it be extended as part of this reorganisation of the IRO system?

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

We have no plans to change that—indeed, as I think the hon. Gentleman is saying, there is a case for making sure that those regional networks are as strong as they need to be. The force of the Bill and the guidance we issue to IROs will give a greater impetus to those networks, so that IROs can work together, talk together and work out how to maximise the potential of the changes in legislation that we are talking about today.

Turning specifically to amendment No. 35, the purpose behind new section 25B(1)(4) of the 1989 Act, inserted by clause 11, is to ensure that, in those local authorities where the independent reviewing officer is not a salaried member of staff, the IRO is not in any way put at a disadvantage in carrying out their functions. We expect those IROs to have the full co-operation of the local authority. We believe that the amendment is unnecessary, because it would make legislative provision requiring an authority to work reasonably with its own employees.

Hon. Members raised the concern that those IROs employed by a local authority might have their arms twisted because of other pressures on the local authority, extraneous to the case. We are clear that employees have a duty only to co-operate with lawful and reasonable instructions from their local authority, so I do not think there is a need to change the law.

I hope that hon. Members will recognise our commitment to finding the right way forward on these important and complex questions, and that what we have in the Bill is a very considerable strengthening of IROs’ independence. Nobody—IROs, local authorities, other agencies—can be in any doubt about the role we want the IROs to play. We are enshrining that in the Bill, and it will supported by statutory guidance, for the first time, on how IROs are to undertake their role in practice, day-to-day, in protecting both the voice of the child and their own independence.

I hope, with those assurances arising from the various probing questions Members have asked, the Committee will feel that we have a good regime in the Bill and that what we need to do is make sure it is put into practice.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I hope you will agree, Mr Pope, that we have had an important and interesting debate and in just 75 minutes, we have covered two very important subjects—the strength and role of the independent reviewing officer and access for children in care to independent advocacy. All hon. Members, and my right hon. Friend the Minister, have made concise contributions and have deployed a strong set of arguments for and against each position we have been discussing. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole for saying that amendment No. 35 is “eminently sensible” and to the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham for saying he agreed with much of what I said in support of that amendment.

If we can move on to the Minister’s response to their points, as the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole said, the thrust of amendments Nos. 33 and 36 is the need for independence of advocacy. I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Minister for taking a lot of time to deal with the matter of advocacy. I think she is right to some extent that existing law would be fine if it operated properly. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham suggested using the precedent of advocates in mental health services for children in care. I would say that children in care provided the precedent for mental health service advocates, because the entitlement to advocacy for complaints and representations was introduced for children in care before it was ever used for mental health patients.

The role and purpose of advocacy has been developed and refined since the child’s right to an advocate was introduced. We therefore have quite a good model in mental health: there is an entitlement to the service, there is a right to be told about the entitlement, and there is a right to private access to the advocate. That should be the model in every area. I am sure the Minister is correct in saying that, through guidance, we can get to the same position for children in care. I hope that we will all be consulted later on the wording of the guidance to ensure that that is done.

On amendment No. 35, my right hon. Friend made the point that I thought she would make, that an employee of a local authority will have all the rights and access to resources to do their job without the need to specify in legislation that there is a duty on the employer to co-operate with their employee. I think we would all expect an employer to co-operate with an employee who has an important statutory role to fulfil. As she rightly assumed, I am concerned about arm twisting—perhaps not physical arm twisting, but the sort of subtle pressure that I described when introducing the amendment.

My right hon. Friend reminds us, as I said in my speech, that an employer is entitled to expect an employee to obey a lawful and reasonable instruction. She said it would not be reasonable and lawful for the local authority to tell the independent reviewing officer to have regard to something outside the case review, such as the financial situation of the council, when making their decision in their role as independent reviewing officer. I am a little more sanguine than she is in thinking that those pressures will not be there and will not tell in the outcome, provided that we are careful. Again, I ask her to ensure that that point is dealt with when guidance on the strengthened role is produced to protect employees.

Finally, I am glad that the Chairman agreed to group the amendments dealing with independent reviewing officers and advocacy, because I believe that the two issues go together very well. To expect the independent reviewing officer to be absolutely independent, to stand up for children and to deal with the plethora of professionals, as my right hon. Friend described them, but still come to the right solution in representing the child’s views and wishes is expecting too much, whoever provides the role. Even if we end up implementing clause 12 and creating a new body specifically to do the job, I still think that it is flawed because of the intellectual construct of that role.

With the benefit of many years of experience with the ASIST advocacy scheme in Staffordshire, whose work I have seen at first hand more than once, I believe that the advocate’s role is a special and dedicated one that should be separate from anybody who is going to make a decision about the welfare of the child. This is about ensuring that the views of the child are expressed properly at the right time and to the right people.

Andrew Turner (Conservative, Isle of Wight)

Before the hon. Gentleman sits down, will he deal with the importance of continuing representation of people? It should not seem like, “Bang! Here is one decision. Bang! Here is another decision.”

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I assure the hon. Gentleman that I was saving dealing with his contribution to the debate until last, because that is a point that I agree with. I think that we can be relaxed about who becomes the IRO. We are strengthening the law relating to the role of that post, and we are doing fine. If we listen to the representations from the General Social Care Council and always ensure that IROs are registered social workers who have adequate training and accreditation, whether they work for the council, a separate body or are self-employed, we can rely on them to fulfil their role. My point is that that role is not to express the wishes of the child and ensure that someone persists in giving those views at the right time to the right people, which I think ought to be the role of the advocate. That meets the hon. Gentleman’s point. A plethora of professionals may come and go, such as social workers, consultant psychiatrists and head teachers. One of the complaints that young people make is that they can constantly be allocated a new social worker, so a new face appears. Equally, an IRO will have a case load in their day job and the case load for their IRO responsibilities might be for more than one child.

The advocate would be the person by the child’s side, in private and in the place where they live, talking about their wishes and desires and going with them to the meetings. They would speak on the child’s behalf against the sea of faces of professional people, who might have changed since the last time they all got together. The advocate would be the one person the child trusts and knows speaks for them. Having had their voice heard, the decision might not go the way the child had hoped, but they would at least have the satisfaction of knowing that they had had a fair hearing and that their point of view was stated. That is probably one of the greatest benefits of advocacy: what matters is not whether the case succeeds, but that it was made at the right time and to the right people.

That combination of the position of the IRO and the availability of an advocate, if the child wants one, to make those representations at the right time will be the best solution for improving the circumstances of children in care. Having listened to the Minister’s explanation of how she thinks the present law satisfactorily covers my concerns, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

I shall speak briefly to the clause. I hope that hon. Members on both sides of the Committee appreciate that the measures in the clause, taken together, represent a significant strengthening of the role of the IRO. There is an important difference between the position of looked-after children and that of other categories of people, such as mental health users, for example, precisely because we have an IRO for each and every child. I intend to use the statutory guidance that we issue to those officers to ensure that they are able to fulfil the roles of representing the child’s wishes and independently scrutinising and monitoring the local authorities in the way we all want them to.

Clause 12

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

I shall not speak at great length on this clause. It is important because it sends a signal that we are absolutely serious about maximising the potential of the provisions in clause 11. If we do not, we will move within a specified period to establish a completely independent national service. That should make it absolutely clear that we are serious, so it is important to have that power set out in the clause.

Clause 13

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

The powers outlined in this clause simply mirror those set out in clause 12 for England and would be used to establish a national IRO service in Wales, if necessary.

Clause 14

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

I beg to move amendment No. 24, in clause 14, page 12, line 8, leave out ‘this section’ and insert ‘section 12 or 13’.

Greg Pope (Labour, Hyndburn)

With this it will be convenient to discuss Government amendment No. 25.

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

These are simply minor and technical amendments, and I hope that the Committee will be happy to accept them. Amendment. No. 24 amends clause 14 to correct a minor drafting error, and ensures that subsection (2) correctly cross-refers to an order made under sections 12 and 13.

Clause 15

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

The clause provides for the powers exercisable under clause 12 in relation to England or clause 13 in relation to Wales to establish a national IRO service to expire, if they are not used within seven years of Royal Assent.

Clause 16

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I beg to move amendment No. 13, in clause 16, page 13, line 6, leave out ‘representative of the authority’ and insert

‘a registered social worker or equivalent appropriate professional representing the authority’.

Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 14, in clause 16, page 13, leave out lines 23 to 25.

No. 16, in clause 19, page 15, line 24, leave out ‘representative of the authority’ and insert

‘a registered social worker or equivalent appropriate professional representing the authority.’.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

Mr. Pope has transmogrified into you, Mr. Williams, and we are delighted that you are here overseeing our proceedings again.

These are probing amendments, and I would be grateful for the Minister’s response to them. They are particularly concerned with the quality and continuity of the visiting and monitoring of children who are placed away from the responsible local authority area. We will return to that subject under clauses 18 and 19.

The purpose of the amendments is to put in the Bill a more detailed requirement that it should be a registered social worker or equivalent appropriate professional representing the authority, rather than simply “a representative of the authority”, which can cover a multitude of sins. Indeed, I would be grateful for the Minister’s thoughts on to what exactly the terminology “a representative” might extend.

We are talking in many cases about children with complex requirements, particularly if they are placed in children’s homes with specialist facilities. For all the reasons we have been debating with regard to the Bill, it is absolutely essential that the most appropriate person—an appropriately qualified person—is responsible for the child, and provides a key link between that child and the placing authority when decisions are made about that child’s future. It is therefore reasonable to expect that the person who is making the visits, and who will be the direct contact with the child in the care system, should be of significant status—they should be a registered social worker or equivalent—not just a trainee or somebody from a different department who is nominated as the authority’s representative. It should be somebody who is completely au fait with the procedures that put that child in the care system in the first place; with the procedures that may ultimately get the child out of the system; and with the level of care and facilities available to that child to assist their progress and ensure, for example, that the child gets access to the sort of schooling that to which we want them to have access. There are further measures in the Bill to ensure the continuity of the school placement and so forth. It is perfectly realistic that that person should be a registered social worker or an equivalent professional.

A point I made, and which I will make again under clause 18, concerns the large number of children who are placed out of area. Kent estimates that it has 1,250 children in care who were placed in the county by other authorities, and the latest estimate I have for my own authority in West Sussex is some 700. It is therefore essential that children who are placed at a distance have the same standard of visitor as they would expect, and to which they would be entitled, if they were placed within the local authority’s area.

I raised the issue of the use and attraction of volunteer social workers, particularly as a preventive measure, for liaison with families. I am not trying to row back and exclude the use of volunteer social workers, but the responsible person who makes the decisions and will have the contact should primarily be a registered social worker or someone of an equivalent professional standard. However, that does not exclude volunteer social workers from performing the role of visitors.

The amendments are probing, but the underlying reason for tabling them is to ensure that children are not “dumped” and get a worse service and less monitoring than they would if they were placed in the local authority area. That is particularly important, given that many children who are placed away from home are there because they need a more specialist placement. They inevitably have greater needs, which may change, and therefore we require someone of that status who is in regular contact with them and can make decisions based on first-hand experience.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

May I say croeso and welcome, Mr. Williams? Thank you for joining us midway through this morning’s proceedings. As you ghosted into the room so will I ghost in for the first half of the clause and deal with the amendments, and my right hon. Friend the Minister for Children, Young People and Families will deal with clause stand part and new clause 7.

I agree with the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham that as a general policy it is desirable that the visits should be conducted by a social worker. However, I am concerned that the visits could give rise to problems, and that is why new section 23ZA(5) of the Children Act 1989 requires the local authority to ensure that the visitor has the necessary skills and experience. The supply of social workers has an impact on the extent to which local authorities can comply with that sort of duty, and we have to take account of such practical issues in regulations on the frequency of visits. It would be irresponsible to do otherwise. However, unless the visits are regular and frequent they are unlikely to deliver the policy objective of providing effective long-term supervision of the child’s placement, and of enabling the local authority to respond quickly to any change of circumstances. That means that local authorities must be given more discretion as to who they can appoint to visit the children. We will set out in regulations further details about the functions of the local authority representative and the frequency and circumstances in which the visits should take place. Further details will be provided by statutory guidance.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

New section 23ZA(5) is all about ensuring that the person who is chosen has the necessary skills and experience to perform the functions of representative. Different local authorities could interpret that in many different ways. Will the Minister consider that point in the regulations that he issues?

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Yes, indeed. It is important that we make that clear, but that is not an attempt to dilute the importance of the necessary skills and experience. It is simply that there are circumstances where it may not be either practical or in the interests of the child for the person visiting to be a qualified social worker. For example, the relationship that an individual has with a child may be vital, and the child may have expressed a wish to be visited by a particular individual who is not a qualified social worker but with whom they have established an excellent relationship. It is also possible there will be times when a visit from somebody with a particular specialism is appropriate, for example, regarding the child’s transition to independent living. That person might not be a qualified social worker, but they would have the particular skills or experience relevant to the child’s circumstances.

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

With reference to the move to independent living, does the Minister expect that one circumstance in which a visitor would need to visit a looked-after child would be to look at the accommodation into which they had moved to ensure that it was suitable and met their needs fully, and to discuss whether they were coping with the accommodation and other circumstances?

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Yes, I would. That is an important point. We discussed earlier the fact that sometimes a young person’s understandable enthusiasm for a place of their own in that transitional period to independent living can quickly pale when they find themselves living alone and paying bills and, sometimes having to cope with the sheer loneliness. At that point, they might be at their most vulnerable, and we have to take such matters into account. We will make it clear that it is vital that children should be visited by local authority representatives who have a good knowledge and understanding of the issues relevant to them.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

A further concern is whether that person, if he or she is not a social worker, can access the wide range of services that may be needed for the child and contribute to the relevant multidisciplinary teams.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Yes, they will be able to do so. Rather then set that out in primary legislation, we believe that it is more appropriate to set out in the statutory guidance the detail on what skills and attributes the visitor should have. Obviously, one of them is the ability to access such resources, as the hon. Lady said. We expect that in most circumstances the visitor would be a qualified social worker—we will make that clear—but there may be cases in which that is neither possible nor appropriate.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

On that point, under what circumstances does he think that that visits from a registered social worker or an equivalent professional would be appropriate?

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

To repeat what I said earlier, there might be circumstances in which a young person would prefer to be visited by an individual who is not necessarily a qualified social worker, but with whom they have established a particularly good relationship. If a person was suitably qualified, it would be wrong for them not to be able to visit a young person if that young person had expressed such a preference or where a particular specialism was needed, as in the circumstances that I discussed with my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington, South, including the child’s transition to independent living.

We all accept that resource issues come into play, and we have to be realistic about that. Under certain circumstances, for example, an urgent safeguarding issue involving a child might have to take priority over a routine visit to another child who is settled in a long-term placement and making good progress. In such cases, it would be wrong for a visit not to be undertaken simply because someone was not available as a result of having to deal with an urgent safeguarding problem involving another young person. There are circumstances in which such decisions have to be made, but we would expect a qualified social worker to undertake visits under normal circumstances: that would be the norm. For those reasons, it is important that the visitor has the right skills and experience both to provide the support and advice that the child needs and to establish an effective relationship with the child.

Edward Timpson (Conservative, Crewe and Nantwich)

There are circumstances in which a child has developed a relationship with an individual, and hopefully they have been involved in the process to select that individual to assist them. We know from experience, however, that that person sometimes has to move on, so consideration has to be given to who will take on that role. Will the statutory guidance make provision to assist that process to ensure that the visits do not dry up and that a new person is appointed to take on that role?

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Yes, we will make it absolutely clear what the frequency of the visits should be. We will also make it clear that the visits should not dry up under the circumstances outlined by the hon. Gentleman and that their frequency and regularity—this is an important part of the principle behind the clause—should not decline.

For the reasons that I have outlined, it is important that visitors have the right skills and experience to provide the support and advice that the child needs and to establish an effective relationship with the child. The Bill seeks to ensure that that is the case by giving local authorities a limited degree of flexibility, but we will also ensure that the regulations and guidance support local authorities in achieving that aim. On that basis, I hope that the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham will withdraw his probing amendment.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I began by saying that these were probing amendments, and I was heartened by the Minister’s opening comment that it was essential that visits should be conducted by the social worker. That is a useful starting point.

The hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole talked about qualifying new section 23ZA(5), and the amendment would strike it out on the basis that we define who an appropriate person is. If we keep new section 23ZA(5), and the Government do not accept the amendments, I hope that the regulations will define a visitor’s necessary skills and experience. The Minister said that the child might have formed a relationship with somebody who is not a registered social worker. Although it might be decided that it is in the child’s best interests for that person to be a link person, a responsible social worker clearly needs to make the decisions. If a non-registered social worker is performing the visiting duty, that role should be subcontracted out by the responsible social worker. Although the person doing the visiting may have formed a helpful bond with the child, they may not necessarily be qualified to make or advise on the decisions that must be made about the child. A fully registered social worker must be the lead individual. If the visitor is someone below that level of qualification, the regulations should set out how the reporting mechanism is supposed to work.

I am also heartened to hear that the regularity, frequency and circumstances of the visits will be set out. Again, my experience when I go round some of the homes and speak to children in the care system is that there is an enormous postcode lottery in the way in which their social workers visit them, depending on which authorities they come from.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

To expedite matters, I can confirm that the registered social worker would supervise the visitor if the visitor is not qualified as a registered social worker.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

That is very helpful. That also provides a role for a volunteer social worker as well, according to the criteria that I have set out. I note the Minister’s comments about giving a limited degree of flexibility to authorities. There will be exceptional circumstances in which an urgent visit is required, and a registered social worker is not immediately available. Again, if it is to be done in regulations we are, as usual, talking slightly in the dark. We have not seen the regulations, but it must be made clear that it is in exceptional circumstances that it will not be a registered social worker performing this role.

I have seen different children in the same children’s home receiving quite a wide disparity of service from their responsible placing authority regarding social worker visits. It is a key requirement to ensure that that child does not feel neglected and detached from the person who is making decisions about their future. If we can get some regularity now, it is greatly to be welcomed. I am grateful for the Minister’s clarification. On the basis that he will take up some of those points in the guidance, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 7—Assistance for looked after children in custody—

‘(1) The 1989 Act is amended as follows.

(2) After section 23ZB (which is inserted by section 17) insert—

“23ZC Assistance for looked after children in custody

(1) This section applies to—

(a) a child looked after by a local authority who is taken into custody;

(b) a child or young person being held in custody who was previously being looked after by a local authority;

(c) a child or young person who has been released from custody but who was, prior to his or her detention, being looked after by a local authority; and

(d) a child or young person—

(i) who is of a description prescribed by regulations made by the appropriate national authority; and

(ii) in relation to whom the regulations impose the duties in this section on a local authority.

(2) It is the duty of the local authority—

(a) to ensure that a person to whom this section applies is visited by a representative of the authority (“a representative”);

(b) to arrange for appropriate advice, support and assistance to be available to a person to whom this section applies.

(3) The duty contained in subsection (2)(b) only applies to a young person aged 18 years or over if that person seeks the relevant advice, support or assistance.

(4) The duties imposed by subsection (2)—

(a) are to be discharged in accordance with any regulations made for the purposes of this section by the appropriate national authority;

(b) are subject to any requirement imposed by or under an enactment applicable to the place in which the person to whom this section applies is held in custody.

(5) Regulations under this section for the purposes of subsection (4)(a) may make provision about—

(a) the frequency of visits;

(b) circumstances in which a person to whom this section applies must be visited by a representative; and

(c) the functions of a representative.

(6) In choosing a representative, the local authority must satisfy themselves that the person chosen has the necessary skills and experience to perform the functions of a representative under this section.

(7) In this section—

“held in custody” means held in detention by the police, prison service or other court authority and “taken into custody” and “released from custody” shall be construed accordingly;

“the appropriate national authority” means—

(a) in relation to England, the Secretary of State; and

(b) in relation to Wales, the Welsh Ministers.”’.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

New clause 7 stands in my name and those of my hon. Friends. I do not want to dwell on it. It was tabled and debated in another place, where it was moved by the noble Lord Ramsbotham, who has great expertise in this subject. It was supported by other noble Friends and noble Lords. Lord Ramsbotham received some assurances from Lord Adonis, but it would be useful to have further clarification from the Minister about what happens to children in the care system who go into the custody system. We should ensure that some continuity of care is available for them, because there is a perverse incentive to consider.

I do not suggest that this happens, but hypothetically there is an incentive for a children’s services authority to offload a child in care into the custody system. All of a sudden that child is no longer a financial burden on the children’s services department, but becomes the responsibility of the custody system, be it in a young offenders institution or whatever. We know that the number of young people in young offenders institutions has risen enormously. Around 3,000 young people are effectively in prison at the moment. We also know that the recidivism rate for inmates of young offenders institutions, particularly those who are sent there on sentences of less than 12 months, is 92 per cent. That is alarming. Basically, sending young people into young offenders institutions is a rapid escalator to a career of crime. The recidivism rate for alternative forms of justice is substantially lower. We have to be a lot smarter in our thinking about how we deal with many of those young people.

Angela Watkinson (Conservative, Upminster)

We all know that there is a wide range of reasons why young people are looked after—they have not all suffered ill treatment or neglect, for example. It occurred to me when I looked at new section 23ZA (2)(b), which places a duty on the local authority

“to arrange for appropriate advice, support and assistance to be available”,

that there may be occasions on which a family member—a mother, for example—might be well placed to give support. If a family member could not give “advice...and assistance”, he or she could at least give emotional support to a young person in custody, which would help to alleviate feelings of abandonment or rejection and to maintain those essential family ties whenever possible. Of course, that would have to be done when it was felt to be appropriate and beneficial to the young person, and when they were anxious for it to happen.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

My hon. Friend makes a good point. She will know as well as I do about the experiences of young men in young offenders institutions. I visited Feltham a few months ago, which was fascinating if rather depressing, and some of the young offenders shared their experiences with me. Interestingly, the worst possible offence that one can commit against a fellow inmate is to “diss” their mother—I shall not repeat the fairly graphic terms in which one can “diss” someone’s mother that were relayed to me. The staff say that 90 per cent. or so of the visitors will be mothers or girlfriends, and there is an almost complete absence of fathers and father figures who keep in contact with, or keep a watching eye over, their children. That is the harsh reality of where many of the offenders come from.

We also know that up to 50 per cent. of the people in young offenders institutions are products of the care system. It is relevant to the sort of people whom we are talking about that they have the right sort of support if they have to go into the custody system. Those people also need the right sort of continuity of support. They might have been making some progress with the support outside, and they will need to re-engage with it when they leave the custody system to alleviate the possibility of becoming one of the 92 per cent. who go back into a more severe form of the system in due course.

Those are shocking figures and stopping young people getting on that escalator into the justice system is a real challenge facing all of us, as is putting the escalator in reverse for those who are already on it. To mix metaphors, we do not want it to be a slippery slope—I think that the Committee gets what I mean. That is the challenge facing us.

The new clause, the argument for which was better articulated by Lord Ramsbotham in another place, with fewer mixed metaphors than I would use, seeks to specify that the person in the care system who is responsible for the child in care retains and continues contact and support if that child goes into the custody system. It is crucial that the parents—meaning, more often than not, the mother, as my hon. Friend said—should be part of that. The Youth Justice Board could tell us that in about 60 per cent. of cases, a parent attends the case conference and keeps in touch regarding what will happen to the young offender. Of course, there is another important conference before release takes place. Parents should be fully engaged in the process, as should the person outside the family—that could also go for extended family members, depending on the young person’s circumstances.

From the response of the Government in the Lords, I do not anticipate that the Minister will suddenly say that the new clause is great.

Kerry McCarthy (Labour, Bristol East)

I am interested in what the hon. Gentleman says about young offenders. I have visited Ashfield young offenders institution, which is fairly close to my constituency, on a number of occasions. I cannot recall the figure offhand for the number of parents who get involved in case conferences, but it is certainly very low—10 per cent. comes to mind, but I would not want to put that on the record because I am not sure that it is correct. One problem is that, geographically, the institution covers a huge area, so it is very difficult for parents to maintain contact with the young people. Talking to some young lads due for release, I found that those who had lost contact with their families did not know what was going to happen to them when they were about to be released, and the idea of having somebody who is—

Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

Order. The hon. Lady should put her question.

Kerry McCarthy (Labour, Bristol East)

Yes, Mr. Williams. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that having that link, whereby somebody maintains contact with the young person when they are released from the system, is the right way to make progress because it cannot be assumed that they will go back into the bosom of their family and friends?

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I completely agree. The hon. Lady has obviously had the same experiences as me when visiting her local youth offenders institute. The figures that I had were much higher than 60 per cent., but again there is a postcode lottery, and of course there is a postcode lottery given that young people can be placed well away from home.

I am talking about the pure practicalities of family members being able to maintain contact with the child. That is why it is even more important that there is a responsible officer from the children’s services department and that there is continuity of responsibility, particularly when the young person is about to come out. Too often, not enough good work goes on in prison, but we know that some good work takes place there—depending on how long the young person is inside—on drug treatment, alcohol abuse, learning disabilities and so on, which improves the chances of young people being able to get back on their feet, only for all those support mechanisms to be taken away when they are on the outside. They fall off a cliff, in effect, and revert to where they were before they went into prison.

It is essential to have a responsible officer who sees the young person before they go into the custody system, if that is where they are going to end up and they cannot be kept out of it, who monitors their progress, the treatments that they might be receiving, the developments that take place and their achievements while they are in the custody system, and who then takes them on when they are outside the custody system. The new clause is designed to achieve that. I think that the Minister will agree with the principle of it; it is just a question of how we bring it about in practice. This new clause, championed by Lord Ramsbotham, would be one way of ensuring that children in the care system who go into custody receive the assistance that they need to keep them out of the custody system in the future and to give them a decent chance of getting back on their feet when they come out. It would allow them to have all the other things that other children in care might expect and, we hope, because of this Bill are more likely to achieve.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

We are having a very important discussion on the clause and new clause. This has to be one of the most critical things that we need to address given the very high percentage of young people in custody who were in care at some point. Correspondingly, there may be very low literacy levels and mental health conditions among that group of people. I heard the other day that data are not routinely collected on looked-after children in custody. I ask the Minister whether that is the case. I presume that some data must be collected, but surely we should have quite detailed work on this if we are to provide the level of support that young people need.

I agree that there is a need for a qualified social worker following through and keeping in contact with the young person. In this case, it is a question not just of visiting but of the ability to make ongoing assessments of the young person’s needs. It is very important that it is an holistic assessment, considering all the issues that might apply to a young person in custody.

In conjunction with the Youth Justice Board, there are now some social workers based in young offenders institutions, but I still think that we need a continuity of contact with the social worker, as described by the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham. If a care order is attached to a young person in custody, there is a responsibility to keep track of them to some degree, but if the care placement is voluntary, I am not sure that the same provisions apply. Nevertheless, it is an important situation in which we particularly need to give greater support to children and young people. I would like some clarification on that point.

Over the past few years, we seem to have progressed quite a lot in getting social services even to be responsible for young people in custody. It has taken High Court judgments to move the agenda on, and the Howard League for Penal Reform has been very much involved. We have moved on, but the outcomes for young people who enter the custody system are still very poor. The Bill offers an opportunity to address every possible issue.

I agree that however a child enters the care system, it is important to work with all the other services to ensure that that young person is supported when they come out. I spoke to a local youth offending team early last year. They explained the difficulty of housing young people who have come out of custody. Because family accommodation is not available, the traditional route is YMCA accommodation. However, I understand that such accommodation carries out risk assessments. I discovered that our local youth offending team has had to place young people coming out of custody in bed and breakfasts, which I suggest is undesirable. My plea—there are so many strands to the problem—is for continuity and an holistic approach. That approach should include social services, local youth offending teams and housing services into the bargain and see the process as a whole.

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

I certainly agree with Opposition Members that looked-after children who then go into custody are a vulnerable group, and that they can face many serious practical problems getting back on their feet and establishing themselves again in their local communities when released. I agree that they are at high risk of reoffending, although I did not recognise the figure of 92 per cent. given by the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham. The one-year reconviction rate for young people who have been in custody is about 77 per cent., which is still very high.

Because of that, the Government will publish a youth crime action plan before the recess. One of its central themes will be strengthening the resettlement process. In terms of that special group of young people who have been looked after in one way or another, I recognise absolutely that we need to take the opportunity in the Bill to ensure and strengthen continuity of contact and what follows from that contact—it should not just be a social visit but a visit with a purpose.

I recognise that the amendment is intended to improve how such young people are supported. I do not think that there is a problem with the spirit of the amendment, but there is a problem with some of the detail, and I shall explain that. The hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole asked me about information on children in care who are in custody. Hitherto, that has been limited. We have established a system that tells us how many placements of children in care cease because they are admitted to custody. The first year’s figures, for 2006-07, will be released in the not too distant future. That will be the first time that we have had authoritative figures on the number of children who went into custody from care whose placements have ceased.

Clause 16 provides a clear statutory framework to ensure that local authorities maintain contact with all looked-after children, wherever they live. That includes all the children referred to in section 23ZC(1)(a) of the 1989 Act, proposed in new clause 7. Clause 16 also enables us to ensure through regulations that the duty to visit is extended to include children that are provided with voluntary accommodation by the authority but who lose their looked-after status when sentenced to custody in a secure training centre or a youth offenders institution, because they are no longer accommodated by the local authority. That is all the children referred to in section 23ZB(1)(b) of the 1989 Act, proposed in the new clause.

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

Will the Minister address something that is of particular concern to me and which we have talked about a number of times? The clause will be beneficial in many ways. Will she confirm that it will not do away with the right of young people in custody, determined through the courts, to have access to a trained social worker under their entitlement to stay safe? The Minister is well aware of the successes at Thorn Cross young offenders institute in my constituency, which for three years has had a social worker based there. It has seen a radical reduction in the self-harm of young people, but it has also been working as part of a team to ensure that young people have good and effective training while there and good opportunities for effective resettlement when leaving custody?

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

My Department, jointly with the Home Office, is funding a pilot scheme on the provision of dedicated social workers on-site in a number of young offender institutions, with a view to local authorities taking up the provision nationally. I shall certainly correct myself if I am found to be wrong, but I am not aware that a right of access to a social worker has been declared and enforced by the courts for young people in custody. However, if my hon. Friend is thinking of the pilot, then yes it is showing some beneficial results.

The entitlement of care leavers to local authority services should be unaffected by a custodial sentence, and I think that it would be impossible for a local authority properly to discharge its duties to care leavers in relation to the preparation and maintenance of the pathway plan, the appointment of the personal adviser and the maintenance of contact unless the care leaver is regularly visited by a representative of the authority. As I said to the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole, that is not a social visit. It is a visit for a purpose—to assess and to ensure that things that need to be done for that young person are mobilised and put in place.

We made a commitment in the other place to use existing powers in relation to care leavers to require visits to relevant children—that is, those aged 16 or 17 wherever they may be living—and that will include the children referred to in proposed section 23ZB(1)(c) of the 1989 Act. We plan to do the same in relation to former relevant children in due course, as and when resources allow.

The difficulty with the new clause is that the regulation-making power that it contemplates is drafted in extraordinarily wide terms. Potentially, it allows the Government to require visits to be made to any group of children in any circumstances—for example, those living in their family home—and because “young person” is not defined it could similarly permit regulations to require adults to be visited in specified circumstances. It would put on the statute book an almost untrammelled power, with the potential to ride roughshod over the rights of children and young persons and their families. For instance, it could allow a local authority to visit someone who may have been in voluntary care for a few weeks when a baby, only for that youngster to be in custody at the age of 15. One may still want to visit that youngster, but we need to think carefully about the boundaries.

Not only does new clause 7 add nothing substantive to the duties and powers already proposed in clause 16, but it has some significant gaps. For instance, it would not require local authorities to visit those children who acquire looked-after status by virtue of being taken into custody of section 21 of the 1989 Act, for example, if they are remanded to a children’s home. This group of children, on the other hand, will benefit from the new mandatory requirement on local authorities to arrange visits to all its looked-after children. So it has some very wide powers in one sense but also some significant gaps in others.

Referring to other aspects of the amendment, we intend that the person responsible for visiting a formerly looked-after child in custody will be an officer of the local authority’s children’s services and, where possible, a qualified social worker known to the child and familiar with his or her background. That support will be in addition to the role of the separate youth offending team worker responsible for planning how the child will serve the rest of the sentence in the community.

There has to be effective co-ordination for this group of children with the shared support from children’s services and the youth offending teams. The new visiting requirement now provides a mechanism to ensure that this happens and puts an essential safeguard in place, so that they are not allowed to be forgotten by local authority children’s services.

The Youth Justice Board and the Prison Service support our intention to achieve a step change in the quality of support provided to looked-after children in custody by children’s services and for local authorities to do for a child in custody what any reasonable parent would do—visit them and make plans for their release. That is what we expect local authorities to do and how we expect them to behave when they have a looked-after child who goes into custody. Clause 16 allows for that, it requires it to happen. Having heard our approach, I hope hon. Members will not press the new clause.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I said that this was a probing new clause to try to tease out some further detail which the Minister has given us.

The right hon. Lady said that it would be impossible in her view for a local authority to discharge its duties without the responsible social worker visiting, keeping contact and developing the care plan while the child was in custody. That sends out a strong message because at the moment that does not happen. It is important that that expectation is rammed home loud and clear, that simply because a child is effectively off the local authority’s patch in the custody and responsibility of someone else, that the responsibility of the local authority is not diminished. In many cases it becomes more important to make sure that they are fully aware of what is happening to that young person within the young offenders institution, or wherever it may be, and that their care plan can be adapted to take care of them when they come out.

Given the greater cross-departmental working between the DCSF, the Ministry of Justice and the Home Office—she and I were at the reception last night for the Youth Justice Board—I hope that in practice that there will be greater joined-up working between the youth justice system and the children’s services departments of local authorities, as I know is her intention. I heard the encouraging words of the Secretary of State who spoke last night. Unless that message is sent out loud and clear, that in practice local authorities are expected to keep a watch on their charges as much when they are behind bars as when they are in their authority area then it is not going to happen. It is a useful discussion. We have teased out further detail than we had in the House of Lords, so on that basis I am happy to ask to beg leave to withdraw the new clause.

Clause 17

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Even though no amendments to the clause have been tabled, I should explain the purpose of clause 17 to the Committee.

Local authorities must already appoint an independent visitor for looked-after children who have no contact with their birth parents or those who have parental responsibility. In responding to the consultation on the Green Paper last year, children and young people made it clear that they wanted greater access to the support of an independent visitor. They have told us that they value having someone from outside the system to befriend them, to take them out, to be a source of advice and support, and independent visitors can potentially benefit a much wider group of looked-after children than currently have access to one.

Their potential in helping to support placement stability, enabling young people to build constructive relationships and encouraging aspirations and ambitions is considerable, and that is why we want to extend the opportunity to have an independent visitor to all looked-after children where they would benefit significantly from such a relationship. Clause 17 will place a duty on a local authority to appoint an independent visitor where it appears to them that it would be in the child’s best interest to do so, and where the child wants one. We want those who are currently eligible to maintain their right to an independent visitor and will use regulations to ensure under new section 23ZB subsection (1)(a) that these groups continue to be automatically eligible for an independent visitor on that basis.

Clause 18

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I beg to move amendment No. 15, in clause 18, page 14, line 27, at end insert—

‘(2A) In each of subsections (1) and (2), after ‘responsible authority’ insert ‘within one working day.’.

We now come to the subject of out-of-area placements, which has arisen already during the Committee, and reflects a concern which I and the my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster mentioned previously—what happens with children who are placed out of area in terms of notification of responsible agencies in that area

A child would typically be placed in a children’s home and somewhere around 11 to 13 per cent. of children in the care system are in a residential home, but it also involves care homes, independent hospitals, NHS hospitals or residential schools, including maintained boarding schools, non-maintained specialist schools, independent boarding schools and colleges, as set out in the guidance. What this amendment is seeking to do is tighten up the notification process.

What happens at the moment is that if Stoke, for example, places a child in a residential home in my own authority of West Sussex, for example—I have already mentioned some 700 children in my county are estimated to be there having been placed by an outside authority—then good guidance, reinforced by Lord Warner some years ago when he was the responsible Minister, is that the authority where that child is placed should be notified that that child is placed there. That must be good practice on the basis that there is a child with particular needs who finds him or herself out of a familiar area.

In Worthing we now have at least 10 independent children’s homes, many including children who are from completely different environments and from quite a long way away. I have to say that things are getting better and inspection regimes for some of these children’s homes are improving, but if something goes wrong, it is usually the local children’s services department who gets put in the frame, even though that child is not their responsibility, or the local police have to pick up the pieces, or the local magistrates then deal with a child who has committed some offence if it has gone really wrong.

I think I cited earlier in the Committee today, and on Second Reading, the response from the probation service union, giving an extraordinary figure of something like over 80 per cent. of children who had appeared in the magistrates court had been in the care system but placed out of authority area, and the first the probation service union had heard about it was when the probation service officers were in court.

That cannot be any good for all of the local agencies involved who then have to come forward and step into the breach for somebody who is not strictly speaking their responsibility. It is not good for people living in the vicinity of some of these residential homes when things go wrong, as happened to us in Worthing but, ultimately, it is not good for the child as well. The child is being let down.

The purpose of amendment No. 15 is to tighten up the reporting mechanisms so that when a child is placed in an authority area outside the placing authority, there is a strict, defined duty of the placing authority to notify the authority area in which that child is placed—nominally, the director of children’s services would be the contact point—that that child has been placed there and we have suggested that it should be within one working day.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

I have been listening very carefully to what the hon. Gentleman said. It seemed that he was talking about out-of-area placements in relation to clause 18, which is what is covered by clause 9, new section 22C. That deals with out-of-area placements in terms of a new duty to place within an area. Clause 18 concerns placements by education or health, which is a mechanism to involve children’s social services in those placements.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I quoted the list of different agencies that this will require. The principle is the same as we discussed in clause 9, that whichever the likely agency dealing with something when it goes wrong should be notified. At the moment, they are just not being notified, either at all or until after a long period of time. The purpose of this probing amendment is to specify that they should be notified and ordinarily, it should be done the following day, or within a day of that child being placed in that area. It may have been more appropriate to have discussed it under clause 9 as well, although I think we touched on it in the debate we had around that. Whether it goes in the Bill or whether it will be tightened up in guidance, it should be the normal practice that a receiving authority is notified about a child from the care system within their area as a matter of course, simultaneously, if not in advance of that child being placed there so that they are aware in case anything goes wrong and they are hauled out all of a sudden to pick up the pieces.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

The amendment was designed to further tie down the exiting duties, as modified by the Bill, to notify the director of children’s services of the responsible local authority where a child is provided with accommodation for health or education reasons for more than three months. I am sure we will get into the wider debate about the needs of this group of children and the services they should receive when we debate the new clauses towards the end of the Bill. I know a number of hon. Members are interested in those matters, but for the purposes of the present debate, I shall confine my comments to the subject of this clause and this amendment.

We do accept that some evidence suggests that children’s social care teams are not always notified when children are provided with long-term accommodation by health authorities or education departments. In other cases, accommodating authorities have claimed that the notification was made, but the responsible local authority took no action. We do not have any evidence that effective multi-agency working and appropriate involvement of social service professionals is inhibited by any lack of time limits on these notifications. Whether notifications are made within one working day, or any other particular time, is not really the issue here. The real issue is whether the existing notification mechanism is an effective means of ensuring that children’s services authorities consider the child’s social care needs. The amendment does not address that issue.

As children’s trusts embed further joint working and multi-disciplinary teams become the norm across the country, we would expect problems with notifications to become a thing of the past. In the short term, however, we agree that more needs to be done. That is why we have introduced clause 18, which will help ensure that the notifications are made. It will ensure that they are made specifically to the director of children’s services of the responsible authority. That reflects their importance and will ensure that the responsible authority responds appropriately to the notification.

We are going further in clause 19 by requiring the local authority to take specific action in response to a notification. That means that there is a new duty to visit all such children. We will ensure through regulations that the visit is not a one-off but is regularly repeated to provide an ongoing supervision of placements by the children’s social care team. We have not stopped there. We are working with health colleagues by using the proposed new framework for children with continuing care needs to provide practical guidance to help bodies and local authorities work together to address the social care needs of children who are placed in long-term residential care.

I understand completely the sentiment behind the amendment. It is important that all agencies and all parts of a local authority are involved in and aware of children with complex needs at the right time. However, I do not think that the amendment is necessary. On that basis, I hope the hon. Gentleman will withdraw it.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I am grateful for the Minister’s clarification. This process was not deemed to be necessary before, but clearly the system was not working before. That is why he sent out additional guidance, not least after a delegation of colleagues from Worthing went to see him about the problems with notification. I hope that this situation will improve. He made it clear that he takes on the principle of what we are proposing. However, the situation must be properly monitored and chased up in practice.

West Sussex and Kent, the two authorities that I mentioned, still have to estimate roughly the numbers of children who are involved. They should have a much clearer handle on how many children from the care system are placed in their authorities and more importantly, exactly who those children are. The Minister is right that a senior responsible figure, such as the director of children’s services should know who is in his or her area and what requirements or needs they have.

I am happy not to pursue this matter at this stage. However, we will have to see the proof of the pudding in due course. That will be that local authorities are able, when asked, to account for the children in the care system within their authority area. Only when we get to that stage will we have some comfort that the joint and inter-agency working that we all support is happening in practice for the best interests of the child. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

It seems appropriate to use the opportunity of a brief clause stand part debate to clarify that clause 18 will make a minor change to section 85 of the Children Act 1989 to help improve the performance of the current notification arrangements. It will require placing authorities, that is those exercising education functions and health authorities, to address the notification to the director of children’s services. To reiterate, this is not about out-of-area placements as in clause 9. Clause 18 concerns placements by education or health authorities and it provides a mechanism to involve children’s services in relation to such a notification. It also picks up minor consequential amendments to section 86 of the 1989 Act that flow from amendments introduced in the Care Standards Act 2000.

Clause 19

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Children in long-term residential placements made by health or education authorities are obviously vulnerable. The child’s needs and the involvement of the child’s parents are likely to change over time.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

I appreciate that we will probably have further discussions about the topics relating to clause 19 when we get to the new clauses. I am sure that no one on the Committee has any particular problem with this clause and, therefore, propose that it stand part of the Bill.

Clause 20

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I beg to move amendment No. 17, in clause 20, page 16, line 4, leave out from ‘designate’ to ‘as’ in line 5 and insert—

‘(i) at least one member of the teaching staff at the school (“the designated person”); and, additionally and separately,

(ii) at least one member of the governing body who is not a teacher’.

Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 28, in clause 20, page 16, line 5, after ‘school’, insert ‘who is a qualified teacher’.

No. 18, in clause 20, page 16, line 6, after ‘achievement’, insert

‘, and for reporting the educational progress to the foster carer or other appropriate carer,’.

No. 29, in clause 20, page 16, line 6, after ‘achievement’, insert ‘and well-being’.

No. 30, in clause 20, page 16, line 11, at end insert—

‘( ) The governing body must designate a member of the governing body (“the designated governor”) as having responsibility for oversight of the provision made under subsection (1).

( ) The governing body must ensure that the designated governor is provided with all relevant information to assist him in the discharge of his functions.’.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

Here we are dealing with an old bugbear regarding schooling and the relationship of children in care to their teachers. Many of us have said for some time that there are two main groups of children for whom special provisions need to be made, aside from those who have learning disabilities and obvious requirements like that, and they are children in the care system and young carers. The hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole and I have slaved our way down to the Southampton to the annual young carers festival for some time.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

While the hon. Gentleman is on that point he might like to know that last Saturday I went as well.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

We were delighted to hear that because, as we have pointed out, we had not had a Labour Minister or MP down there for some time—I am not trying to be critical—although we used to when the hon. Member and the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole I started doing the MPs’ question time at the children’s request. It was great to hear. I am sure that the Under-Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, the hon. Member for Cardiff, West was appreciated and that he enjoyed it as well because it is always extraordinary. That is entirely out of order, Mr. Williams, because it is not the question in hand.

There are two groups of pupils for whom special attention and recognition by a key member of staff is essential. The group germane to the Bill are looked-after children. Clause 20 includes designating a member of staff to be the key link for looked-after children. My problem is that subsection (1) refers only to

“a member of the staff at the school”

being the designated person. The intention and direction of the clause is right but it is not good enough because the designated person could be a school caretaker, a games assistant or somebody like that—perfectly worthy individuals though they may be. To take the problems seriously, we think that a properly qualified member of the teaching staff must become the designated person. It needs to be somebody who understands the educational requirements of that child, who can communicate with other teachers, the head teacher and governors on an equal basis and who has authority.

Children in the care system obviously have particular educational needs. As we have heard from the statistics that have been bandied about, they are much more likely to do badly at school, not least because of the lack of continuity in their education. There are also problems with the image of looked-after children’s poor achievement and outcomes, so some schools would prefer not to have them because it may bring down their averages. Those are considerations that looked-after children have to face. It is therefore absolutely right that special provisions be made by a school to ensure that the special needs of looked-after children are recognised and taken on board at the highest level within those schools.

That may mean that the school must chase the responsible social worker, if that responsible social worker is not performing the role of a “pushy parent” that I would like to see them play. A child who happens to be in the care system is entitled to no lesser degree of attention from the responsible person or body, which could be a social worker, as he or she would get from a responsible parent. That could mean turning up to parents evenings demanding to know why the child is lagging behind, for example, or expressing concerns about bullying or liaising with the school on a whole host of matters. Clearly, because of the pressures on social workers, which we have previously discussed, a social worker may not be in a position to play as active a role in overseeing a child’s education as one might like.

I have mentioned innovative authorities such as Barnet that have introduced a buddy system, whereby an officer of the authority will buddy up with a looked-after child. One of their roles will be to look at their school report and to monitor their educational progress and, if necessary, ring up the school and say “What is going wrong here?” It would be helpful if there is a designated teacher who will be their first point of call, be that for a social worker or an extended family member whom one wants to encourage to have an interest in the child’s progress.

Therefore, the clause is to be welcomed, but it needs to be beefed up, hence amendment No. 17 states that a member of the teaching staff must be the designated person. However, the amendment goes further: the second part of it would provide for a responsible governor. The measure applies to young carers and many of us have argued for it before. Recognising the teacher so that they feel that they have the clout to argue the case for looked-after children would be greatly improved and enhanced by introducing a separate, responsible governor, someone other than the teacher—as it stands the designated person could be the teaching representative on the governing body—to oversee the provisions for looked-after children. They would be the line manager, as it were, for the designated teacher. That would send out a clear signal to schools that the special requirements of looked-after children, which result from the fact that educational outcomes for looked-after children have been a scandal for too many years, are a priority and that schools need to have a structure in place that can cope with that and make it a reality. Amendment No. 17 would ensure that a properly qualified teacher, in partnership with a governor, are directly responsible for overseeing the fortunes of children in the care system who attend their schools.

Amendment No. 18 specifies that there should also be a responsibility for both those individuals to report

“the educational progress to the foster carer or other appropriate carer”.

Another flaw in the system is that, too often, it is difficult to get information out of the school on how a child is actually doing, particularly foster carers. If a foster carer is doing his or her job properly, as the vast majority of them fortunately do, and if we expect a foster carer to be as close to a natural parent as possible and to play the role of a birth parent, which could include being a “pushy parent” when it comes to asking questions about whether a child is doing well at school, we should ensure that they automatically have an entitlement to know about the performance of the child at school, receive reports and hold a conversation with the relevant teachers or whoever on an established basis, so that they are fully informed about the child’s school progress. They will then be able to ask all the right questions. At the moment that does not happen in many cases.

Amendments Nos. 17 and 18 would require that there be designated teachers who know about the requirements of looked-after children, a governor to oversee that and that foster carers should have access to educational information about the child. They would then be able to ensure that they were doing well and ask the right questions if they were not. Such requirements would add some real beef to the well intentioned clause. They would make its provisions a reality rather than the wish list that they might become. I have some sympathy for the amendments that are being advocated by the Liberal Democrats in a similar vein. On that basis, I commend amendments Nos. 17 and 18 to the Committee.

Angela Watkinson (Conservative, Upminster)

I wish to speak briefly in support of amendments Nos. 17 and 18. The two secondary schools for which I am governor have extremely good pastoral care departments. I have asked a number of head teachers in my constituency how many looked-after children they have on their rolls. Most of them said none, but they did not say they did not know. I am assuming that there is a very good process between social services and education departments so that schools are always aware if they have looked-after children on their rolls.

It is important that somebody is available for a looked-after child. When they arrive in school, they are more likely to be having a crisis day than the average pupil. There are more opportunities for stress and more things that will concern them. If only one teacher is designated to be a friend, adviser and mentor to a looked-after child, it is not possible for them to be available at every moment. It is not possible for them to be available when the child arrives in school every morning. If two teachers are designated, it is more likely that somebody will be available to take control of a crisis. If a governor is also designated, although they are in school only from time to time, there is an extra option for that child.

It is important that children have an adult to whom they can relate. Personality and character come into that. If they relate to one of the three designated people and feel more comfortable opening up and disclosing personal problems to them, they are likely to disclose more than if only one of the other designated people was available. It is therefore a very good idea that there be two or even three people available to a looked-after child if they are having a bad day or if there is an ongoing problem that the school needs to be aware of.

Amendment No. 18 includes reporting educational progress. With most children, parents will come to the school on parents’ evening, which is an annual occasion. If they have problems in between those events, they will get in contact with the class teacher or the head teacher. With looked-after children, there is more potential for social problems that could affect their educational progress so more frequent access to the school is a huge advantage. More frequent access to school, more discussion and more reporting on their educational progress could head off other social problems that are brewing up in the background that adults are not aware of.

My understanding is that the number of such pupils in any one school will be very small so this will not be an onerous task in addition to the great number of functions that teachers have to perform. Most of my schools had good pastoral care departments and would be only too pleased to take on this role. It will be hugely advantageous to the looked-after children in our schools. It will not only maximise their aspiration and their ambition to succeed, and give them the best possible future and opportunities for training, further education and a productive career, it will safeguard their emotional well-being.

Mark Williams (Liberal Democrat, Ceredigion)

I very much want to endorse what the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham said and the practical case studies highlighted by the hon. Member for Upminster. The first point I want to make concerns clarity. I welcome the thrust of the clause, but, as has already been said, does it go far enough? On Second Reading, the Minister for Children, Young People and Families, the right hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston said:

“Clause 20 will make sure that there is a designated teacher in every school to give children in care the encouragement and personal support they need to realise their talents.”—[Official Report, 16 June 2008; Vol. 477, c. 727.]

Yet, here we are talking about a designated member of staff. That could be the caretaker, a games assistant and a range of individuals who work within the school community. Amendment Nos. 17 and 28 specify that it must be a member of the teaching staff or a qualified teacher. That is essential because it gives status to looked-after children. It is also about the practicalities of delivering those expectations of educational achievement and the needs of pastoral care, the child’s well-being, which amendment No. 29 seeks to pursue.

Amendment No. 29 seeks to build into the Bill the obvious point about holistic care and support for looked-after children. The Barnardo’s 2006 report, “Failed By The System”, revealed that 79 per cent. of young people who have been in care have no GCSEs or other educational qualifications when they leave school. But academic achievement and pastoral needs within the school community go hand in hand. One cannot separate the two.

Half of the young people in the Barnardo’s survey revealed that they had been bullied. Half the group had attended six or more schools; 11 per cent had attended more than 10 schools; 39 per cent. said that no one had attended a school parents’ evening; 48 per cent. said that nobody attended their sports days or school events. Educational achievement and self esteem go hand in hand. With the visitor provisions we talked about this morning, with a designated teacher clearly undertaking that pastoral role and with a link to foster carers, social workers or whoever, we can meet some of those challenges. If we get to the root of the self esteem issue educationally, we can move on and tackle many of the educational challenges.

Edward Timpson (Conservative, Crewe and Nantwich)

I agree with everything that has just been said. It is important to emphasise that the partial aspect of the care plays a significant role in the general well-being of looked-after children within educational establishments. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the designated teacher also has the responsibility to ensure that the mental and behavioural well-being of the child in the school is part of their training? A growing number of looked-after children unfortunately suffer from an attachment disorder. Teachers should be aware of that and be trained to ensure that when they are dealing with each individual child they can assess those needs and feed that into their pastoral care. That will then improve their educational outcomes.

Mark Williams (Liberal Democrat, Ceredigion)

I thank the hon. Gentleman. I very much agree. As someone who endured a one-year course for a postgraduate certificate in education, I can testify to the limitations of teacher training in all areas of special needs and some of the behavioural problems that he has identified.

I hesitate to use the phrase “narrow educational achievement”, but I do not want the well-being of the child to be lost in a welter of percentages and academic targets. They go together. It should also be said that the needs of looked-after children are not always special educational needs. Yes, 28 per cent. of looked-after children have SEN statements, compared to 3 per cent. of the population, but we should not automatically assume, as the hon. Member for Buckingham (John Bercow) said on Second Reading, that the SENCO should necessarily assume the role of a co-ordinator for looked-after children.

I pay tribute to the fact that the Bill wisely mentions, under clause 20(3), that the governing body will ensure that the designated person—a teacher, I hope—has qualifications and experience, a point made by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich. If that role is to be effective, it requires a full awareness of the child’s background and circumstances as well as the operation of the care system. As a novice to these Committee proceedings, I find that the matter involves a welter of information of which I suspect many teachers are unaware, but which they need to be aware of when working with such children.

Amendment No. 30, in line with the provisions on SENCOs and special needs governors, would give looked-after children the same status by making a governor responsible for them. It is a chain of responsibilities: the teacher is responsible and accountable to the governor, and the governor is also equipped with appropriate training and advice. Although our names are not on amendment No. 18, I support its spirit. It is an acknowledgement that educational achievement cannot be viewed just within the confines of the classroom; it must be extended to the home environment and the person charged with care.

The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham raised the spectre of schools summoning social workers to hear about the educational progress or problems of particular children. It is important. Many of us have sat through countless special educational needs consultations with parents who refused to turn up, wishing that we had the capacity to bring them in. The amendment is laudable. It would build dialogue between carers and the children in school.

Above all else, the amendments are not about giving another member of staff or a governor a meaningless title. They are about acknowledging the needs of 60,000 children and young people and giving the school community the structure to support them educationally and—critically—pastorally, so that their educational and social entitlements can be met.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I shall be brief, as my hon. Friend and other hon. Members have made clear points. I refer to the situation discovered by the Education Select Committee. In some schools, SENCOs were teaching assistants. The Education and Inspections Act 2006 or resulting regulations stated that SENCOs should be qualified teachers; personally, I feel that they should also be members of the senior management team.

It is important that we understand why the Bill does not say “a member of the teaching staff”. I suspect that there is a reason for that, but it is important to understand why. I want particularly to specify that it should be a fully qualified teacher. As my hon. Friend explained, it is such an important job. It involves a mix of guiding through academic routes and trying to improve academic performance, but it also involves looking after the welfare of the child and addressing the various other needs that must be addressed before academic achievement can be attained.

I shall refer briefly to some good practice in Dorset. I attended a Dorset awards day for foster carers and children a couple of weeks ago at which I was involved in presenting certificates. It demonstrated a close working between the teachers in school, the local authority and foster carers. The latter were there with the children, and the certificates that I handed out were varied. One was for 100 per cent. attendance at the learning support centre. Another was for 100 per cent. attendance over the previous term. Some were for academic achievements in their GCSEs; others were for behaving well at home and helping around the house. It was a complete mix, but awarding and celebrating progress in the lives of those foster children brought all the services together quite beautifully and skilfully. A good day was had by all, as the rest of the day was a fun day with lots of entertainment. I mention that practice because it is worthy of being adapted by other local authorities.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

We are heaping praise on Dorset. I seem to recall that Dorset piloted the giving of bursaries to children in the care system for particular education-related studies—for instance, more music lessons. That gave the authority control over its budget that it would not normally have had to allow pupils to pursue a subject in which they showed artistic, musical or educational promise. That was another example of good practice by Dorset.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I was very pleased that Dorset was selected for the 18-to-21 pilots. It is obviously is good practice, and we should share it whenever we can. I support all the amendments.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

I agree with the hon. Lady on the importance of having fun days, with lots of entertainment —which is obviously what we are having today.

The intention behind this small flourish of amendments to clause 20 is to ensure that the role of the designated person specified for children in a maintained school has the maximum impact. I sympathise with that intention. We should consider our history in trying to improve educational outcomes for looked-after children when discussing the amendments.

The clause goes back to the Quality Protects initiative of 1998, which started our focus on improving the educational outcomes for looked-after children both locally and nationally. We know much more about the subject than we did before introducing the national data collection in 2000. Before that, no one even checked to see how they were doing in school.

I shall be confessional for a moment. I have said publicly that during my career—I was in the teaching profession until 1994—my awareness of those children that might have had looked-after status in the classroom and the school was minimal. There was none of the focus that has rightly been introduced over the past few years, which has led to an improvement in outcomes. However, I think that we would all agree that that still is not good enough.

At first, we found that only 7 per cent. of looked-after children achieved five good GCSEs; by 2006, that figure had increased to 13 per cent. However, we should not exaggerate. The hon. Member for Ceredigion suggested that 79 per cent. of looked-after children had no GCSEs, but that is not quite true. In 2000, 49 per cent. had one GCSE, and the figure rose to 64 per cent. by 2007. Again, it is not good enough, but we should not exaggerate the problem.

In the Children Act 2004, we introduced a duty for local authorities to promote the educational achievement of looked-after children. Building on that duty, as part of the “Care Matters” agenda, we are introducing an annual personal education allowance of £500 for all looked-after children who are at risk of not reaching the nationally expected standards of attainment. It is intended to meet the costs of the sort of activities or resources needed to support looked-after children’s learning and development, in the same way that a good parent would seek to enrich their child’s education by making extra things available.

As it stands, subsection (1) requires the governing body of a maintained school to designate a member of staff as having a particular role in

“promoting the educational achievement of registered pupils ...who...are looked after by a local authority”.

I take the point made by the hon. Member for Upminster about having a significant adult in school whom a young person can turn to, but that will not necessarily be the designated teacher for looked-after children. It might be a trusted subject teacher or form teacher. Specifically, the designated teacher’s job is to promote the educational achievement of registered pupils who are looked after by the local authority.

As the hon. Lady said, most schools have a small number of looked-after children on their roll, but we know that when there is someone in the school whose job it is to champion the educational needs of looked-after children, that can have a real impact on individual outcomes. Most schools already have a designated teacher for looked-after children, in line with the current good practice guidance, but although we have come quite a long way in raising awareness in schools of the needs of looked-after children, not all schools make specific provision for their needs.

The hon. Member for Ceredigion was right to point out that we should not assume that all looked-after children have special educational needs. I met a young man in Birmingham who told me that he never told anyone that he was in care until quite some time into the acquaintance because he felt that he would be judged immediately in exactly that fashion when in fact he fully intended—and I completely believed him—to qualify as a doctor in the next few years and was obviously a very bright and academically able young man. As the hon. Gentleman said, we should not make such assumptions.

However, because schools do not always make specific provision, it came out quite clearly in the “Care Matters” consultation that we need to take action to put the requirement on a statutory footing and to make it a requirement for all governing bodies of all maintained schools to appoint a designated teacher to ensure that the role is given the status and recognition that it deserves. I say “teacher” because the intention is—I have said this publicly previously—that it should be a teacher. I shall say more about that in a moment. This is a very effective way significantly to improve educational outcomes for looked-after children. We will use the regulation-making power in subsection (3) to require the governing body to ensure that the designated person has the necessary qualifications and experience—in particular, qualified teacher status. There may be examples, which I shall come to, in which that does not necessarily need to be the case, but it will be the norm.

In addition, we will issue statutory guidance to governing bodies, setting out in some detail the role and responsibilities of the designated teacher. I am referring to the role of the designated teacher in assessing the child’s educational needs and in making arrangements for co-operating with the local authority, especially in relation to the development of the child’s personal education plan. Guidance will also stress the sorts of administrative task that could be undertaken by non-teaching staff acting in support, as well as the importance of ensuring that the school’s policy on pastoral care is effective for looked-after children.

Under amendments Nos. 18 and 30, a designated governor would be appointed to promote the educational achievement of looked-after children. That would be in addition to the designated teacher. The amendments would also ensure that the governor had the necessary information to discharge that role effectively. I agree with the hon. Members for East Worthing and Shoreham and for Upminster about the significant role that school governors can and should play. It is right that they pay proper attention to promoting the educational achievement of looked-after children on their roll, and certainly governors and staff need to understand that school can often be a particular haven of consistency and continuity in the lives of looked-after children. That has implications for the way in which schools work to support their educational achievement.

However, clause 20, supported by the appropriate statutory guidance, will ensure that that happens and, indeed, will make it clear that the governing body should expect to receive a regular report on the work of the designated teacher and on outcomes for looked-after children who are pupils at the school. Governing bodies have a legal duty to promote high standards of educational achievement and well-being for all pupils at the school, including looked-after children. The governing body’s role is and should be essentially a strategic one. Of course, there is nothing to prevent a governing body from identifying a link governor to lead on issues relating to looked-after children, but the governing body overall remains responsible for any decisions taken. We will make that absolutely clear when we issue governing bodies with statutory guidance on the role and responsibilities of the designated teacher.

It is encouraging that awareness among school governors of the needs of looked-after children has increased significantly in recent years. We are committed to ensuring that school governors are provided with training to help them understand the needs of looked-after child and effectively hold schools to account. We expect to use the statutory guidance on the role and responsibilities of the designated teacher to set out clearly what governors need to put in place.

The guidance will build on that produced in 2005 by the former Department for Education and Skills, in partnership with the Who Cares? Trust and the Advisory Centre for Education. The 2005 guidance, which was called “Supporting Looked After Learners—A Practical Guide for School Governors”, was designed to help individual governors gain an understanding of the experiences of looked-after children in schools and of the challenges that they need to overcome if they are to succeed.

Amendment No. 18 seeks to ensure that foster carers and others who care for looked-after children are informed of their educational progress. It goes without saying that it is vital that those who are responsible for a looked-after child—whether as a foster carer or in a residential setting—receive regular and comprehensive information about the child’s educational progress. Indeed, we would expect all those who are responsible for the care of a looked-after child to help them meet their full potential. For a number of reasons, however, amendment No. 18 is not necessary to achieve that aim.

Under the Education (Pupil Information) (England) Regulations 2005, schools are already required to provide an annual report to the parent of every child who is a registered pupil at the school, and that includes looked-after children. For the purposes of education law, a parent includes anyone who has parental responsibility or who has care of the child. That includes foster carers and a child’s key residential worker in a children’s home. Schedule 1 of the regulations clearly lists what information the report should contain, including brief particulars of achievements in all subjects and activities that form part of the school curriculum, plus comments on the child’s general progress and details of the arrangements for discussing their reports with their teacher.

The intention behind the duty that clause 20 places on the governing body is very precise. The governing body must appoint a designated person whose specific role it will be to promote the educational achievement of registered pupils at the school who are looked after by a local authority. A key aspect of that role will be to ensure that the school works closely with the child’s carers and the local authority, which will also have a particular duty to promote the child’s educational achievement, as I said.

As I indicated, we will issue statutory guidance to governing bodies setting out in detail what we expect the designated teacher to do to promote the educational achievement of looked-after children at their school. Among other things, the guidance will cover helping the child’s carers to get involved in supporting the child’s education, regularly assessing the child’s progress, identifying any additional needs and participating in the development of the child’s personal education plan and in the regular six-monthly reviews of that plan.

The personal education plan forms part of the child’s care plan, and we have made it clear in statutory guidance that social workers should fully involve the child’s carers and, where appropriate, their parents in drawing up the child’s personal education plan. Social workers should also work in partnership with the designated teacher to ensure that the plan sets clear objectives and targets and clearly identifies the additional support that the child will need to achieve those targets. The regulations that apply to the regular reviews of the child’s case require the child’s educational needs, progress and development to be considered at the six-monthly review. Through statutory guidance, we make it clear that the child’s carers should be involved in that review in addition to the child’s parents.

Amendment No. 28 makes provision for the designated person to be a qualified teacher. We would not disagree with that; indeed we made that intention clear in the “Care Matters” White Paper and in debate on similar amendments in the other place. Although I understand the reasons for wanting to ensure that the role of the designated person is performed by a teacher, the best way of dealing with the issue is to set out in regulations precisely who is qualified for the job. In most cases, we would expect the role to be filled by a teacher with qualified teacher status, but there might be some exceptions to that. Some teachers can practise without qualified teacher status, such as overseas-trained teachers, as members of the Committee will know. Of course, there are also those who started their careers before the current training requirements came into force.

The key point is that it is better to specify that in regulation, rather than doing so rigidly through primary legislation, because that will allow for changes to be made more easily in line with changes in teacher training without the need for further primary legislation. To have the necessary flexibility, it is much better that that is done through regulation. The power to prescribe qualifications through legislation will enable us to update the qualifications of the designated person, if there is any change in the framework of teacher qualifications, without the delay of amending primary legislation.

Amendment No. 29 would make the designated person responsible for promoting the well-being of looked-after children and championing their educational achievement. On Second Reading, the hon. Members for Mid-Dorset and North Poole and for Ceredigion spoke about the need to ensure that the designated teacher takes sufficient account of pastoral needs as well as academic achievement. Again, we do not disagree that an holistic approach is required. The designated teacher should discharge his or her responsibilities for looked-after children registered in the school in that holistic way, but the amendment is not needed for that to be achieved. The Education and Inspections Act 2006 already places the governing body of a maintained school under a duty to promote the well-being of all pupils in a school, including looked-after children, and that is in addition to their duty under the Education Act 2002 to ensure that they promote the welfare of all the children on their roll. Since 2005, Ofsted has been under a duty to report on the contribution that schools make to their pupils’ well-being. The well-being duty on schools ensures that they focus specifically on the five “Every Child Matters” outcomes, as defined in section 10 of the Children Act 2004—I will not go into the detail because I know that members of the Committee are familiar with them.

The designated teacher will therefore have an important role in championing the well-being of looked-after children and raising awareness of their particular needs. We want the primary focus of that role to be on raising expectations about teaching and learning for looked-after children and supporting them to achieve their full potential. Given the significant attainment gap between looked-after children and children generally, which we all know about, we need make no apology for having that at the forefront I hope that I have offered reassurance on how seriously we take the role of designated teachers and of school governors in ensuring that looked-after children have the support that they need to reach their potential. I hope that hon. Members will, on that basis, feel that they can withdraw their amendments.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I am a bit disappointed, which I have not been much in the Committee so far. The Minister seems to be moving into a position in which it would be easy for him to accept at least one of the amendments in this small flourish of amendments, as he described it earlier. He made all the right noises and pointed to the problems with the educational achievement gap, which we all know about and which has been widening. He pointed out that the 7 per cent. achievement on the O-level criteria has improved to around 12 or 13 per cent. The achievement by children who are not in care has improved rather more, so that last year the gap worsened. Children in care are being left behind, and more so than their cohort as a whole. That is also an important consideration for children in care, because some 80 per cent. of the 61,000 children in the care system in England and Wales are of school age.

This goes to the heart of what is essential for improving conditions for looked-after children in the education system. It was not therefore a surprise to me that the Minister agreed with everything that we said. He also said that the Government will set out in guidance the role of the designated teacher—I think that he said “teacher” and not “member of staff”. He agreed with the significant role of governors in promoting educational achievement, and said that that there would be regular reports to governors. Everything he said seemed to agree with what we had said, but then he ruined it by saying that the amendments were not necessary because the issues could be set down in guidance. Clearly, the Minister has got confused as to what is a designated member of staff and what is a designated teacher; he slipped seamlessly from one term to the other, without realising that the Bill does not say “designated teacher”. I could not find in any of his comments any downside to putting “designated teacher” rather than “designated member of staff” in the Bill. He gave lots of good reasons why the amendments were well intentioned and appropriate, and no good reasons why the Committee should not adopt them, at least those relating to a designated teacher and a designated governor.

The hon. Member for Ceredigion made some good points in support of his amendment, which is based on the same principle as the amendments in my name and those of my hon. Friends. He showed from his experience how much more attention needs to be given to the issue by teaching staff. As he said, it is not a question of meaningless titles, but of proper titles being given to the right people along with the right tools to do the job, backed up in statute. That is what the amendment is about. He quoted my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham, who said that this should not be another job that gets piled automatically on the SENCO—the general repository of all things slightly odd. The job needs to be done by somebody who is focused on looked-after children and who has the appropriate training, overseen by the governors. There will also be a governor with the responsibility of ensuring that that training has taken place, and that reports on the progress of looked-after children and the school’s policy towards such children are discussed at governors’ meetings, that they are not just another little box that you have to get around to ticking. The hon. Gentleman rightly says that the governing body is responsible for overseeing that, but it would be so much better if there was a designated governor who was responsible for ensuring that the governing body was doing everything that it should be—not just the minimum—to ensure that the policy was implemented. It is not the designated teacher who will be responsible for that, but the head and the senior staff severally, on the same basis that it will be the governing body jointly and severally. Again, I could not see a downside to a designated governor in what the Minister said.

I take the Minister’s point that the information that I called for should, under the Education (Pupil Information) (England) Regulations 2005, be made available to every person with parental responsibility for a child. He gave a satisfactory answer on that matter, and also regarding amendment No. 30 on promoting well-being, in that that is catered for elsewhere. The Minister did not make a case for why having a designated teacher and a designated governor would in any way damage the Bill or hamper—beyond what is intended by forthcoming regulations—the role of the school in doing what we want it to do. On that basis and to ensure that the Committee is awake, I will push the amendment to a vote. I ask the Committee to support the lead amendment, which is about having a designated teacher and a designated governor.

Clause 21

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I beg to move amendment No. 31, in clause 21, page 17, line 3, after ‘higher education’, insert

‘or further education and training, including apprenticeships’.

Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 32, in clause 21, page 17, line 8, after ‘higher education’, insert

‘or further education and training, including apprenticeships’.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I had better say at the outset that this is a probing amendment because I rather suspect that I have applied my thoughts to the wrong clause. However, I hope that the Minister will accept the argument that I put forward even if the amendment is tabled in a highly technically inefficient way.

The amendment is about parity of treatment for care leavers in their future education. I welcome the support that is offered in the clause to previously looked-after people who decide to go to university. Ministers have pointed out that only 6 per cent. of looked-after children go on to university. There is a massive discrepancy between that figure and that for the rest of the population. I therefore appreciate the bursary. However, it is also important to appreciate that 30 per cent. of care leavers aged 19 are not in education, employment or training. While the gap is not quite as large as with the university figure, it is still highly significant that a third of care leavers are not in education, employment or training. When the Children, Schools and Families Committee looked at this issue, it recommended that a broader bursary system be introduced for looked-after children in post-16 education and training.

I recognise that the Government are putting forward support in clause 22 in the way of a personal adviser in certain circumstances. The Government have responded in other arenas by saying that they have measures to support young people who are not in education, employment or training, such as by not charging fees for courses. If we want to ensure that we put as much emphasis on carrying on in training as on going to university, we must give a little more financial assistance to care leavers. I have deliberately included apprenticeships in the amendment because that could be an area where just that little bit of extra support is needed.

I hope that the Minister will respond to the general principle rather than the adequacy of the amendment and say why there should not be more assistance for the important proportion of care leavers who are not in education, employment or training and will not immediately take a university route, but who need support at this vital time.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

The hon. Lady is as candid as ever in her charming way on the amendments. I will try to answer in the spirit in which she has invited me to respond. “Care Matters” set out an ambitious and wide-ranging programme of work to support the education and training of looked-after children and to ensure that they are supported in making a successful transition into adult life. Ensuring that they are able to pursue their chosen path post-18 depends on high quality support earlier on. To ensure that they have the best quality education possible, we have given them the highest priority in school admissions, we have put the role of the designated teacher—I am happy to say that again on the record—for looked-after children on a statutory footing, we have introduced an annual personal allowance of up to £500 for looked-after children at risk of not reaching the expected national targets and we are changing the way that local authorities support the education of looked-after children by piloting virtual school heads. There are therefore a lot of initiatives.

Support to enable looked-after children and care leavers to thrive in education goes wider than schools, as the hon. Lady said. That is why we have had the right to be cared for pilots, which give looked-after children greater involvement in deciding when they move to independence. Similarly, as we debated earlier, the “Staying Put” 18-plus family placement pilots give young adults the chance to remain with their former foster carers post-18 to provide additional stability.

We will come to provisions of the Bill that extend the entitlement to a personal adviser up to the age of 25 for all care leavers in education or training, or who want to return to education or training. That will be defined in the widest possible way. Access to a personal adviser will mean that care leavers have access to a pathway plan to set out their education and training needs and how they will be met. The support of the local authority will enable them to meet their ambitions.

We are committed across the piece to enable all care leavers, not just those going to university, to make the choices about education and training that are right for them, as we are for all young people. Leaving care services should ensure that young people are supported in the choices that they make and should help them to maximise the assistance that is available to support their learning, particularly through the provision of the personal adviser and the maintenance of the pathway plan.

The Government have also introduced a range of other support to help young people entering education, including care leavers. It includes fee remission and help with other costs, such as books and travel, for all young people. Tuition costs for first level 2 or 3 qualifications will be met in full for all young people up to the age of 25. Financial help is available through adult learning grants, and learner support is offered based on the needs of the individual. Priority is given to the most disadvantaged, and those in care are identified as one of the priority groups for that learner support. In addition, where a former relevant child is in full-time further or higher education, sections 23C and 24B of the Children Act 1989 enable local authorities to provide suitable accommodation during the vacation or pay the young person enough to enable them to secure their own accommodation.

I understand and appreciate the hon. Lady’s concerns and the sentiment behind the amendments. I hope that the Committee will understand that the Government are committed to providing support for care leavers in a range of education and training, but we must also recognise the situation regarding care leavers’ access to higher education. Only 6 per cent. of care leavers aged 19, as the hon. Lady said, are in higher education, and that figure has remained largely unchanged for a number of years. I think that we would all agree that that is not acceptable.

The work undertaken on the “Care Matters” Green and White Papers revealed clear evidence that looked-after children face significant additional barriers to higher education. For example, they finish higher education with an average of £2,000 more debt than their peers. During the consultation, children and young people said that many care leavers are put off higher education by the belief that they will not be able to meet the additional costs involved. Some 83 per cent. of young people at consultation events for the National Children’s Bureau “What Makes the Difference?” Green Paper thought that the £2,000 bursary for higher education was a very good idea, and I am sure that Committee members agree. Some 73 per cent. thought that it would encourage more young people in care to go on to higher education.

Although I understand the hon. Lady’s motivation, I hope that she will accept my reassurance that we are committed to supporting care leavers in further education and training, including apprenticeships; and that that she will recognise that the clause acknowledges the unique position of care leavers who enter higher education. The evidence is clear about the specific support that they need to encourage them to take up higher education without incurring additional debt. I hope that she will agree to withdraw her amendment and support the clause.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I certainly support the clause. It is important. I am, of course, rather disappointed by the Minister’s reply, because it is important to identify additional areas where care leavers need support. I appreciate the point about the personal adviser. We hope that the many measures to support young people as they go through school will help to improve the situation, and that the percentage of looked-after children who are not in education, employment or training will be monitored. With that comment, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Clause 24

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I wish to ask the Minister a few questions about the clause. In previous discussions, some of us have voiced our concern that kinship care is not always given enough cash support when it is most needed. The clause is important because it opens the door to more payments. The problem is that I can see that there will be great variation in local authorities’ use of the removal from section 17(6) of the 1989 Act of “in exceptional circumstances”. I would be worried if there were to be no regulations and guidance on the provision, to ensure that we are truly promoting kinship care.

I seem to hear more and more from professionals that there are barriers to kinship care because money is not available at the vital time. Although I appreciate that the clause offers more, I would like an assurance that it will make a difference and will support what everybody wants, which is that that where kinship care is appropriate, it is given every support and encouragement possible.

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

I thank the hon. Lady for that question. She is right: the intention in clarifying the provision is to alleviate local authorities’ confusion about how much flexibility they have in providing financial support to promote children’s welfare and their upbringing by members of their family or friends. It is important to say that that does not mean that local authorities can be expected to provide income maintenance for families—I made that point earlier in our discussions. It is important that the lines are clear on where families need to go for that sort of income maintenance and on whom the additional costs for taking in a child, who is perhaps a member of the family, lie. It is important that it is clear that those costs are appropriate for local authorities to consider meeting.

We will produce guidance, which will make it plain that families are expected to take full advantage of the sources of financial support available to them. The guidance will also set out examples of additional costs that families will incur. Obviously we expect families to apply for child benefit and other state benefits that relate to caring for children, but the clause will enable local authorities to meet the transitional costs of taking in children.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I am going for belt and braces here, because I am sure that there will be consultation on that guidance, but may I have assurances that there will be consultation on that guidance, because I think that the input of bodies that have made representations to us would be helpful in ensuring that we have coverage. I appreciate the point made in our previous debate about not supporting general family costs.

Beverley Hughes (Labour, Stretford and Urmston)

We will consult on all the guidance that we produce, so we will consult on that as well. We want to remove local authorities’ confusion and to enable them to make payments to families and kinship carers in a way that they have felt constrained from doing in the past. I hope that the hon. Lady is happy with my assurance.

Clause 25

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I beg to move amendment No. 20, in clause 25, page 19, line 38, at end insert ‘appropriate’.

The amendment is probing and is intended to give the Committee the opportunity to ask questions about the clause. We welcome the clause and the work that has gone into it. The measure originated with the Secretary of State who, when he was a Back Bencher, did some good work on the role of carers for disabled children and the need to give better support for carers, who are often parents or other family members, and who do a remarkable job caring for disabled children day in, day out. Many of them do so in challenging conditions, with little recognition and not nearly enough support from the state.

Without the work of those carers, the bill that would fall on the state would be considerable, let alone the additional hardship for the disabled children themselves. We owe an enormous debt of gratitude to carers, who take upon themselves, often unasked and without demurring from the challenge, the enormous role of looking after disabled children and giving them as much love and attention as they possibly can within a home environment. That is to be applauded, and we should be putting every service at their disposal, rather than putting obstacles in their way, which happens too often. It is always a great frustration to me when I am told about yet another piece of bureaucracy or yet more form filling that a carer will have to go through to get a basic entitlement for the person for whom they care.

It is welcome that the Bill includes a provision for carers to take breaks from their duties, that it recognises them in that way, and that the Government have given a sum of money for that purpose. We hope that that is only the first instalment, because this is a huge enterprise and we are talking about a large number of children and their carers. I have seen carers in my constituency for whom the odd bit of respite—it could be a weekend off or a week away, just to regain their sanity and to spend time with their partners, husbands, wives or whatever—can make all the difference. It can help them to recharge their batteries and allow them to get on with what would otherwise be the 365-day-a-year job of looking after somebody with a disability. That could provide an enormous boost and would be great for allowing people to recharge their batteries to enable them physically to be able to do the job. It is also a positive recognition that the job that they do is greatly appreciated. We should be doing more to make it easier for them to carry out their job.

The Opposition welcome the extra provisions that will enable carers to have breaks. Subsection (3) is about assisting

“individuals who provide care for such children to continue to do so, or to do so more effectively, by giving them breaks from caring”.

The amendment would simply add a rider that the breaks should be “appropriate”. Usually, people do not ask for much, but they ask for breaks at appropriate times—when pressure has built up, for example, or when they can take a whole week off. We are not talking about a couple of hours here and a couple of hours there, although some carers need such breaks. Carers simply want to know that they are entitled to breaks and that they can rely on the provision, so that they can take every Friday evening off or one Friday evening a month or whatever it might be. In any case, it must be “appropriate”. It is no good the local authority saying, “We can provide respite care for you between 2 o’clock and 6 o’clock on a Wednesday afternoon every fifth week,” or such like if that does not fit in with what the carer needs and can use.

Inserting the word “appropriate”, subject to definitions within regulations, would give that extra bit of strength to the clause. Carers would not simply get a token bit of respite, for which they are meant to be grateful, but “appropriate” respite, as far as practicably possible, so that it really makes a difference and they are in a better position to resume and continue their very important role as carers for disabled children.

Angela Watkinson (Conservative, Upminster)

I welcome the clause, which is a valuable part of the Bill, but I also support my hon. Friend in wishing to add the word “appropriate” towards the end of subsection (3). A break from caring for a child with special needs has to be free from worry; otherwise, it does not have the desired effect. That is especially important when the child has special needs that relate to behaviour or the way in which they respond to people and their surroundings. Children on the autistic disorder spectrum, in particular, are a good example: they do not respond well to change in either their environment or the people around them. They like things to be familiar and they enjoy their routine. They are also accomplished escapers, so it is very important that the provision for them is in a safe environment and that highly trained and appropriately trained people are looking after them.

“Appropriate” provision means provision of a safe environment and specially trained staff who understand the challenges that such children face. Most children’s services know very well what is needed and are highly sympathetic to the families caring for a child with profound needs, but often they do not have the funding to provide that very specific, appropriate accommodation.

There is an organisation in my constituency called RAGS—Romford Autistic Group Support. It is a group of parents who have children on the autistic spectrum. I happen to be patron of that charity, and when I meet the parents they tell me stories about their everyday lives that illustrate how difficult their lives are. They do not experience normality as we accept it. Lack of sleep is a recurring theme. One mother told me that her child can stay awake for a week and the only time she can get to sleep is when he is at school and she puts a “Do not disturb” notice on her front door. It is difficult to socialise. It is difficult to invite people to the home or to go out, even to the supermarket, because of the unpredictability of the children’s behaviour. There is great pressure on siblings, who are not able to invite friends home.

One mother told me last week at the organisation’s annual dinner that she has no off-street parking, and if there is no parking space outside her home when she gets back, the child will not get out of the car. If she stops outside an unfamiliar house, he will not get out because it is not his home, so she has to drive round for a while and then come back to their home and wait and hope that there will be a parking space outside it. Such things are taken for granted by those parents as part of their everyday life, but to us they seem an horrendous mountain to climb.

The challenge of coping with school holidays, when parents do not have that break when the child is at school, compounds the difficulties of everyday life. The challenge of just coping is enormous, and that is what makes respite care extremely important. I welcome the clause, but I think that the word “appropriate” is especially important when we are discussing provision for children with profound needs. The situation is unlike that of a child with, for example, mobility problems. It is relatively easy to make adaptations to buildings with ramps and low switches, so that children using wheelchairs can be accommodated. For children who have behavioural problems or who do not understand their surroundings, it is much more difficult to make proper provision and to have the staff who understand what they need, and there is a huge cost involved in that. I hope that the Minister will give some thought to how local authorities, with the best will in the world, will be able to provide what the Bill requires them to.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I would like to place it on the record that the Liberal Democrats strongly support the clause. We are pleased that it was included in the Bill, because there was considerable debate about whether it was necessary to place such a duty on the local authority. I am particularly pleased that Lord Adonis came to the view that it should be in the Bill.

I am not entirely convinced by the argument about the word “appropriate”, so I will listen to the Minister’s response to the amendment. I appreciate that the Government have put considerable financial resources into short breaks. It is very welcome, but it is such a huge area that almost unlimited demands could be placed upon that relatively small pot. As I understand it, for the most part that money will go to children with the most severe disabilities. I find it difficult to believe that a local authority would go out of its way to offer inappropriate respite care. I realise that the Minister may have more to say about that. There is no suggestion that I do not want disabled children to have appropriate care, but I am not convinced about this amendment.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

I am sorry to be so disappointing. It is part of the job sometimes. We all welcome the clause. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham was right to single out the Secretary of State for the work that he has done. Many other hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, North and Fleetwood (Mrs. Humble) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Mr. Clarke), had parliamentary hearings on this matter.

As the hon. Member for Upminster said, we all come across examples in our constituencies of parents who have these sorts of caring responsibilities, looking after children who are often severely disabled. One of my constituents, Nia Wyn, wrote a bestseller on the subject called “Blue Sky July”, which was the book of the week on Radio 4 and book of the month on Radio 5. It was published by my wife, incidentally, and I recommend it to all members of the Committee. That is not a plug; the book is very pertinent to this subject.

This is very serious matter and everybody welcomes this initiative. Without respite services, parents often have no relief from their caring responsibilities. I am in no doubt that without short-break provision, the care population would grow considerably. That would be a cost to the state and to society as a whole. We should not forget either the wider benefits of short-break provision beyond relieving parents. Any parent can testify that it is beneficial and healthy for children to gain positive experiences away from home, to develop wider social networks and be exposed to new influences, be that with another trusted adult or in leisure or youth work based activities, where disabled children and young people can mix with their peers. Such opportunities for children’s personal and social development are vital.

Members of the Committee will know that the Government are committed to transforming short-break services and have set aside, as the hon. Gentleman mentioned, significant additional funding for short-break services over the next three years: £359 million is to be provided to local authorities, alongside further funding to health care bodies to enable a combined approach. Clause 25 will ensure that short-break provision becomes a recognised part of local authority essential services, reflecting the importance that is attached to these services by families.

When I spoke to the young carers at Fairbourne manor last weekend, one of the things that they greatly welcomed was respite provision, because about a third of young carers look after a sibling rather than a parent. They welcomed the additional funds, as well as the broader measures in the carers strategy. The clause adds the provision of short breaks for parents and others caring for disabled children to the range of services that local authorities must provide for families, and in so doing puts the services on a statutory footing.

The new duty makes it clear that breaks should be provided not just for those carers who are struggling to maintain their caring role, but to those for whom a break would improve the quality of the care that they can offer. Short breaks should not only be used as crisis intervention, but should also help carers to maintain and improve the quality of care that they naturally wish to provide. I saw good examples of that in Cardiff a few months ago, when I visited an NCH home where respite care was provided for children. The children I saw there were at the severe end of the autistic spectrum. We cannot take a one-size-fits-all approach.

We are taking steps to ensure that the significant investment that the Government will be making over the next three years will result in transformed services that are responsive to individual needs. It will include the appointment of a national support body to assist local authorities and primary care trusts in delivering change. We will also use a combination of regulation and guidance to ensure that local authorities design and deliver a range and variety of short-break provision capable of fitting the often complex lives of disabled children and their carers.

Now for the disappointing bit. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham may not be surprised to hear that we believe that the amendment is unnecessary. Clause 25 adds provision for short breaks for parents and others caring for disabled children to the range of services that local authorities must provide. Part 1 of schedule 2 to the Children Act 1989, which the clause amends, provides for some of the specific services that the local authority must provide under its general duties under section 17 of that Act. The general duty is

“to safeguard and promote the welfare of children within their area who are in need”

and to

“promote the upbringing...by their families, by providing a range and level of services appropriate to those children’s needs.”

I thank hon. Members for their kind support for the clause and for their indulgence on the legal and technical point of substance. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will agree that the amendment is unnecessary, and I therefore ask him to withdraw it.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

It is a disappointment, but not a great surprise. It was a probing amendment. The Minister and all members of the Committee have the same intention. The proof of the pudding will be in the eating, particularly the extra £359 million that is being made available, and whether the provision will provide the sort of appropriate breaks that we know from our constituents are needed.

My hon. Friend the Member for Upminster was right to mention the carers of children with autistic spectrum disorder-type challenges. I would surmise that we all know of difficult constituency cases where particular requirements are involved. As with children with physical disabilities, breaks may often involve carers looking after the child in the home. It is not necessarily a question of the child being shipped off, leading to the problems caused by a lack of familiarity with the surroundings, because the facilities that are needed are often already to be found in the home. It is a question of getting someone to come to the house in place of the carers, while they go away for a few days.

We have had a useful debate. I think that we all agree that it would be slightly churlish of me—I do not want to be accused again of being churlish by the hon. Member for Stafford—not to beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Clause 26

Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: New clause 37—Duty to collect and provide information for inspections—

‘In section 22(7) of the 2000 Act (regulation of establishments and agencies) after paragraph (1) insert—

“(m) make provision requiring the person who carries on, or manages, a children’s home to collect statistics on—

(i) instances of children going missing from the home;

(ii) instances of anti-social or violent behaviour by children accommodated at the home of a serious nature; and

(iii) acts of criminal damage perpetrated by such children,

and to provide such information, upon request, to any person authorised by the registration authority to inspect the premises.”’.

New clause 38—Consultation prior to preparation of inspection reports—

‘In section 32 of the 2000 Act (inspections: supplementary) after subsection (5) insert—

“(5A) Before preparing a report in relation to the inspection of a children’s home under subsection (5)(a) the registration authority must—

(a) inform the local authorities which have placed children in the children’s home and, if different, the authorities in which children have been placed; and

(b) seek views on the performance of that home from—

(i) the Local Safeguarding Children Board established under the Children Act 2004 (c. 31) by the children’s services authority (within the meaning of that Act) in whose area the home is situated, and

(ii) the person designated under section 20 of the Children and Young Persons Act 2008 at any school attended by children in the home inspected.”’.

New clause 39—Provision of inspection reports—

‘In section 32 of the 2000 Act (inspections: supplementary) after subsection (6) insert—

“(6A) The registration authority shall provide copies of any report prepared in relation to a children’s home under subsection (5) to every children’s services authority within the meaning of the Children Act 2004 which has placed a child in the home and to each Local Safeguarding Children Board established by each of those authorities.”’.

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

I was motivated to table the new clauses because of concerns among a number of colleagues about evidence on the outcomes for some young people in care in children’s homes, and the difference between those outcomes and the inspection reports for those homes. We were motivated particularly by the concept, which is becoming commonly held, that parents share responsibility with their children for much of the children’s behaviour, and that parents should be held accountable to a degree when children engage in antisocial or criminal activities. That is because parents have a responsibility to guide and support their children and to ensure that they are aware of different ways of behaving and given chances to learn new and better ways of behaving. Most of all, children should be supported by their parents so that they do not travel down the paths that, unfortunately, far too many children have taken, which lead to criminal records and custodial sentences.

The purpose of the three new clauses is to get a virtuous circle, rather than a downward spiral, so that the different participants who support a child or young person in a children’s home work together effectively to ensure that the young person gets the support and intervention they need to achieve the sorts of successes that meet their potential.

New clause 37 would require children’s homes to keep records of specific activities that any good and responsible parent would notice, such as incidents of children going missing from the home. The current system of recording the reporting of a child going missing resulted in 23 children’s services departments being unable to tell the parliamentary all-party group for children who run away or go missing how many children in their own care had been reported missing to the police in 2005. Also, a significant number of children’s services departments that could give a response to that question gave a radically different response when asked the same question by their local police force. In many instances, the police forces had recorded a different number of young people who had been reported missing while in the care of the local authority than that local authority had.

When one looks at the pattern of who is responsible within a children’s services department, one will see that it is eminently possible for that sort of information not to be recorded effectively and passed to those who could do something about it. Indeed, one might say that some people have a vested interest in not recording it effectively, because it can draw attention to the fact that they are not parenting particularly effectively.

We need a proper, rigorous system for ensuring that those who are responsible for caring for children, ensuring that they have a safe and comfortable place to go and supporting them in that process are required to record instances when their children are reported missing to the police and make that information available on inspection so that they can be held accountable for it.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

Does my hon. Friend take the view that, in order to have the full picture, it should be a requirement to record young persons absconding or committing an offence? Is she aware that it used to be best practice for inspectors to ask for that information and that Ofsted, now that it is responsible, has told inspectors that they do not need to ask for it and that the home does not need to record it because that is no longer required by regulation? Does that not show the importance of what she is putting forward today?

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

Absolutely. We have had a number of discussions with the Commission for Social Care Inspection, when it was responsible, and with Ofsted, because in 2002 the Department of Health’s guidance made that an indicator. However, reports have consistently not used it when inspections of the home have been made. In fact, a degree of frustration has been expressed by inspectors because, although they have a duty to do that, they could not do so because people were not required to keep that information and make it available to them.

Angela Watkinson (Conservative, Upminster)

I am listening carefully to what the hon. Lady is saying and I am very supportive of it. She will know that most children who find themselves in care have experienced feckless parenting or disorganised households. They will not have learned all of the standards that we would expect children to experience during their childhood. Is it not quite shocking that on going into care they do not experience a far greater level of care and have greater values put in front of them? If they are absconding from the home, it indicates that things are failing very badly. That nobody is even recording their disappearance is quite shocking and is something that we must act on.

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

The hon. Lady raises something that has caused me a great deal of concern, especially when I tabled new clause 37. I felt that it was an unambitious new clause. I would have been far happier tabling a new clause requiring children’s homes to record and make available for inspection occasions of positive achievement by young people. It could have included how many young people are achieving high-quality GCSEs and A-levels and how many children are participating in school theatres of bands.

I found it very disappointing to put forward a requirement to record instances of children going missing, instances of antisocial or violent behaviour by children and acts of criminal damage perpetrated by children. That should not be what we are talking about. That is not what we expect for our children and these are our children. However, there comes a time when a baseline must be put down. We must say that these children have the right to expect minimum standards. These things should be included in those minimum standards.

The all-party group on runaway and missing children held evidence sessions towards the end of last year. Some very effective evidence was given to us by the police forces for Lancashire and Leicester, which had been doing intensive work in tracking why reports of missing children had been made to them. They looked at what had happened to the children and what the outcomes were. They used a very child-centred approach which was very effective.

Lancashire identified more than 300 children who went missing on at least three occasions in one year. Between them, they accounted for almost 3,200 of Lancashire’s missing persons investigations. The majority of those cases involved children in care, particularly those in residential care. Many of those children were prolific runaways. One child had been the subject of 78 missing person investigations in a single year. The police worked out that the cost of police services in investigating those reports was on average £1,000 each time. In one year, £78,000 was spent in addressing the problems of that young person.

That information is quite shocking when we consider our ambitions for supporting young people going into higher education and whether we can extend that to children who are going into apprenticeships or further education. Through failure, we can spend £78,000 in police time on not supporting effectively a young person in a local authority home. Local authority care homes should have to record these things and be accountable for the management of them. They must be open to intervention and support so that they can be more effective parents, rather than wait until the young people face the negative outcomes of being out on the street where they are subject to certain predators and likely to get involved in certain activities.

Leicester police said that the top 10 missing people for 2005 were responsible for 6 per cent. of the missing person reports for their police force. All of them were missing more than 10 times up to a maximum of 53. The top 10 had been the victims of 20 offences that were reported to the police and a total of 82 offences were linked to them, including 28 assaults and a variety of offences including burglary, theft and damage. They also commented that 70 per cent. of those offences were committed in the care home. They speculated whether, if those children had been in their homes rather than care homes, the police would have been involved, or whether proper intervention and decent parenting would have ensured that the children understood their actions and did not offend again. The purpose of new clause 37 is to ensure not that we record a downward spiral for young people but that we identify where early interventions are necessary in children’s homes to ensure effective support to give children in care a better outcome, not a worse one.

The virtuous circle involved in new clause 38 would ensure that the stakeholders responsible for the best interest of the child or young person placed in a children’s home are consulted and involved when an inspection report is being prepared. The designated teacher in the young person’s school, for example, would be able to give input on whether the relevant person from the home was attending parent-teacher meetings, whether the young person was getting help with their homework and bringing it in on time and whether they were attending school and participating effectively in school activities. Those are the kinds of thing that depend on parental support, or, in this case, the support of the person acting in loco parentis. Children and young people should not be expected to manage their own schooling, homework and environment.

The purpose of new clause 39 is to ensure that inspection reports return to the person with the most interest in ensuring that the child or young person has positive outcomes from their experience as a looked-after child. At the moment, Ofsted has no duty to provide reports to key stakeholders such as schools and agencies responsible for tackling crime and disorder. Reports are always sent to the registered individual as well as the registered manager, but that is it.

A placing authority, particularly if it is out of area, will not have the information that it needs to know whether a child or young person is having a positive experience in the home or whether they have absconded or run away—whatever word one wants to use; I do not like “absconding” very much—78 times in a year. That is absolutely essential information. None of us would allow our children to leave home if we did not know where they were going, what the reputation of the place was or how it was performing. We need to ensure that those reports are made available to the one person with that young person’s best interest at heart and the determining power over whether that young person remains in the placement or is given something more effective.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I agree with all that my hon. Friend has said, but I want to ask her a question. In Staffordshire, the county council, the police and the Crown Prosecution Service have an inter-agency protocol designed to reduce the number of looked-after children who become involved in the criminal justice system. The partners have said to me that they are concerned that when children arrive in Staffordshire from another authority and are placed in the independent sector, the partners do not necessarily receive sufficient information to be able to work their protocol and give the same level of service to those children. Would anything in the new clause help those partners in the work that they want to do?

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

There are two things that I can say to that. One is that my own children’s services department has said something similar to me: “We don’t know what we don’t know.” That is crucial. We must ensure that they have the necessary information to carry out their roles, particularly when they are trying to do so effectively.

Angela Watkinson (Conservative, Upminster)

In her investigations, has the hon. Lady found a wide variation across homes in the propensity of young people to abscond? Does she conclude from that that the quality of the staff has a big influence?

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

One of the problems that has been mentioned consistently by some of the excellent social workers and voluntary organisations working in this field, and by the police, are the push and pull factors. Young people can leave something that that they do not like, but they can also be enticed away by people with a vested interested. Young people in residential homes are particularly subject to such enticement. That is one of the reasons why there are so many young people coming into the criminal justice system, and there are some shocking examples of young women involved in prostitution—through people who have sought them out and groomed them—who have not had effective support in the residential homes.

The purpose of the new clauses is clear. It is to ensure that there is an underpinning framework that enables the purpose of the main clause—clause 26—to be achieved. Enforcement can then happen, but on an evidence base that is drawn from all the stakeholders involved in the young person’s well-being.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington, South for sparking an interesting debate, and I pay tribute—as I have done before—to her diligence in and around this subject. I also thank other hon. Members who participated. The debate has been useful for teasing out some of the issues on inspection—of children’s homes in particular—and what should and should not be reported. I replied not so long ago to an Adjournment debate on the subject, and I am aware of many of the issues that my hon. Friend raised.

On new clause 39, the Government agree very much that it is important that reports from Her Majesty’s chief inspector are available. We entirely agree that local authorities considering placing a child should consider all the available information in making such a decision, including recent inspection reports. As the hon. Lady said, the law currently provides that such reports should be made available. The chief inspector must send a copy of the report to each person who has registered in respect of the establishment, make copies of the report available for inspection at its offices by any person at any reasonable time and take other steps that she considers appropriate for publicising a report. Any person who asks Ofsted for a copy of a report is entitled to one. I know that hon. Members have encountered teething problems with that.

Ofsted is currently consulting on whether to publish its reports. That consultation, which runs until 16 September, seeks the views of the children and young people who live in children’s homes. That is important. Of course, it should also seek the views of hon. Members and I hope that they will give their views to it. The publication of inspection reports on children’s homes is sensitive, as I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington, South will acknowledge. Ofsted has not to date published such reports on its website for that reason. While reports do not name individual children, a significant number of homes care only for a small number of children and, in those circumstances, it may be harder to protect children if the reports are widely publicised.

It is essential that in seeking to improve communication between providers and commissioners, which I think is the purpose of her amendment, we do not place children at risk. While I strongly sympathise with my hon. Friend’s point and believe that should be taken onboard in the Ofsted’s consultation, we are not convinced that the requirement for Her Majesty’s chief inspector to circulate copies of inspections of children’s homes to every local authority placing children at such homes is the best way forward. Inspection reports on children’s homes are currently available on request by local authorities and local safeguarding children boards, and it would be inefficient to require Ofsted to create and maintain a new register of individual children at children’s homes or to collect that information on each individual inspection of a children’s home.

The Government are committed to ensuring that inspection is a fully rounded process, which takes account of all the relevant evidence, including the views of children and others with an interest, such as local authorities placing children in the home and the designated teacher at a school attended by children from the home. Primary legislation is too unwieldy to make that happen. It is essential that the inspectorate is able to tailor its approach within a broad framework to take account of individual and changing circumstances.

Ofsted’s current guidance on inspecting children’s homes is set out in its April 2007 document “Are you ready for your inspection? A guide to inspections of children’s services conducted by Ofsted.” That guidance explains to managers of establishments that they may sometimes be asked to help distribute surveys to stakeholders of their service, for example, to parents, teachers, social workers or health professionals. That is to ensure that as many people as possible linked to the service have the opportunity to express their views and to let Ofsted know what the service does well or could improve.

In practice, of course, Ofsted plans each inspection individually according to the circumstances in each children’s home using, among other sources, the children’s homes self-assessment and the inspection of children’s homes questionnaire, both of which the children’s home complete. They help the Ofsted inspectors to decide which partners should be consulted.

Regarding, for example, the designated teacher at the school attended by the children, we fully agree that it is vital that children’s homes support the education of children in their care effectively. Building strong links with the child’s school is an important part of that. Standard 14 of the “National Minimum Standards for children’s homes” says that the home should have

“an education policy that shows how the home intends to promote and support the education of children throughout the time that they live there”

and, as part of this, the child or young person’s personal education plan should

“set out which staff in the children's home have responsibility for liaising with schools.”

Ofsted’s practice means that a questionnaire on the children’s home may be sent to the designated person at the school, which would be taken into account when preparing an inspection report on the home. In addition, section 32(5) of the Care Standards Act provides that Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector must send a copy of the report to the registered person for an establishment without delay. Prompt reporting of inspection findings is of vital importance to maximise their value and impact.

New clause 38 may, by placing other formal duties on Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector before preparing every inspection report, inadvertently cause delay in reporting. In practice, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector would need to request contact details from the children’s home, request views from the specified organisation and person or persons, and take reasonable steps to seek such views. The current law allows for the seeking of views, and this is Ofsted’s general practice, but it also allows flexibility to balance seeking such views with the need for urgency.

New clause 38 would require Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector to inform local authorities placing children at a children’s home that she was preparing a report, but would not require her to seek their views. We are not persuaded of the value of such a provision. It would require Ofsted either to create and maintain a list of the placing authority for every child in every children’s home, or to seek this information in respect of each individual inspection, either of which would be administratively cumbersome. Every children’s home is inspected twice a year. Notifying local authorities twice a year before this happens would not serve any clear purpose.

The Government agree that inspections of children’s homes should seek and take account of the views of those with an interest in the effectiveness of the home, and believe that Ofsted takes steps to achieve this. Ofsted has made significant progress in terms of consulting children, parents, local authorities, providers and other key stakeholders. However, the details of how this is done in practice should not be for primary legislation. Within the broad framework set by the legislation, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector is best placed to ensure a flexible and appropriate balance between seeking views and reporting promptly.

New clause 37 requires children’s home providers to collate their statistics on the number of children who go missing from children’s homes and incidences of antisocial and criminal behaviour, and to make that information available on request to the inspectorate. I entirely understand the point that my hon. Friend is making because she raises an important issue. Notwithstanding her point about reporting positive things as well in relation to young people in children’s homes, I am very sympathetic to her reasons for tabling this amendment.

In making placement decisions, local authorities should take all necessary steps to satisfy themselves that the placement is appropriate and is able to meet the assessed needs of the individual child. At an earlier sitting we discussed the factors that may give rise to antisocial and even criminal behaviour by a small minority of children placed in children’s homes. We considered, for example, the effects of inappropriate placements, a long distance from home, and of children feeling “dumped”, as the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham put it. Clearly, we hope that these sorts of placements will become increasingly rare as a direct result of the Bill. While it is of course important for placing authorities to take account of a wide range of information in making placement decisions, that information must be meaningful and useful. It must obviously help local authorities to make the right placement decisions.

What matters most is that children’s homes take appropriate action to address the behaviour of the children placed there through well trained staff providing the right support and care. As we have discussed, there are steps that should be taken, and the Government are taking them to ensure that that happens.

I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington, South will be aware that provisions are in place to enable the chief inspector to consider the information sought by the amendment. The Care Standards Act 2000, which provides the legislative framework for the registration and regulation of children’s homes, includes a general power to make regulations requiring the keeping of records and the notification of events occurring in establishments and agencies. The Act also contains the power for the registration authority to require an establishment or agency to provide any information that it considers necessary when carrying out an inspection.

Regulations provide that the procedure for dealing with any unauthorised absence of a child from a children’s home must be supplied to Ofsted as part of the initial application to register the home. The national minimum standards for children’s homes also refer specifically to the need for the registered person to have such a procedure in place. In addition, there is a regulatory requirement that all incidents of absconding—or whatever term we use—must be noted on the child’s record, and the placing authority must be notified of the incident.

Where there are instances of criminal behaviour, the regulations and national minimum standards are also clear about procedures for making the consequences of unacceptable behaviour clear to staff and children. Any disciplinary measures taken must be appropriate to the incident. The home is required to notify specific serious incidents to Ofsted and to the placing authority.

My hon. Friend has raised some important issues relating to statistics, but for the reasons that I have given, I think that requiring collation from individual records in the way that she suggests is not the best solution. Those are matters for professional judgment in light of the regulatory requirements, the national minimum standards and guidance, rather than for primary legislation. The national minimum standards for children’s homes are to be reviewed this year as part of a review of all sets of national minimum standards for children, and I assure my hon. Friend that the review will consider how to strengthen existing requirements and expectations in the areas that she outlined.

On that basis, I ask my hon. Friend not to press her new clauses, with the assurance that as part of the review of national minimum standards, we will consider closely how we can strengthen existing requirements through those standards.

Helen Southworth (Labour, Warrington South)

I am of course disappointed in some ways by the Minister’s response, but I hope that it is only a temporary disappointment and that the review of minimum standards and the various regulations attached to the Bill will relieve my concerns and those of other Members. I am sure that both he and Ofsted have taken note of the fact that there is considerable interest in the House in the performance of inspectors, the transparency of inspection reports and, accepting absolutely what he said about respecting young people’s privacy in the process, the need to ensure that people making a decision about those young people have the evidence that they need to make a full and proper decision.

Clause 34

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I have a brief question, which I hope the Minister can answer by speaking to the clause. Not having served on the Committee that considered the Adoption and Children Act 2002, although I have served on most Committees considering that sort of Bill, I am not sure of the clause’s full significance.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

The amendments made by clause 34 are minor and are being made so that the review mechanisms for adoption and fostering are in line with each other. Subsection (2) clarifies that applications for a review of a qualifying determination are to be made to the appropriate Minister, not to the review panel. On receipt of an application, the appropriate Minister will constitute a review panel to review the qualifying determination. Subsections (3) to (7) remove from review panels the power to recover the cost of a review from the adoption agency that made the qualifying determination under review. Instead, it will be for the appropriate Minister to determine the sum that must be paid by the adoption agency. That will be based on the cost to the appropriate Minister of performing his independent review functions. In anticipation of this question, it will not and must not include any element of profit.

The only practical change for adoption agencies is that the review panel will not include in its written recommendations an order for payment of costs. Prospective adopters will not be affected by any of these changes and there will be no additional work for adoption agencies.

Clause 35

Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Caernarfon)

With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 15—Registration scheme—

‘(1) Section 45 of the Children Act 2004 (c. 31) (power to establish registration scheme in England) is amended as follows.

(2) In subsection (1) omit the word “may” and insert “will within one year”.

(3) Omit section 47 of the Children Act 2004.’.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

In rising to speak to the clause and the new clause that I tabled, a deep sense of dÃ(c)jà vu descends on me. With various hon. Members, I have debated the private fostering registration scheme on countless occasions over the past seven or eight years.

Before I state the reasons behind new clause 15, I wish to explain that we originally tabled amendment No. 22, which is one of those amendments that seeks to strike out the whole of the clause and which never get selected. Instead, it has become an adaptation new clause. Essentially, we do not want to give the Government the power to extend the sunset clause provisions relating to a possible private fostering registration scheme that were inserted into the Children Act 2004, and which expire or set in November this year. We felt that striking out the clause would have done the job, but apparently that must be put in the form of a new clause.

I do not want to go into vast detail. I simply refer the Committee to countless speeches that various hon. Members have made over the last few years on the need for a private fostering registration scheme. I refer the Committee to the 1997 Utting report, “People Like Us”, which made recommendations for a private fostering registration scheme. I refer hon. Members to the work of the joint working party on foster care in 1999, which revealed the high potential for abuse and neglect and urged regulation of private fostering in a public awareness campaign. I refer hon. Members to the Laming report in the wake of the Victoria ClimbiÃ(c) tragedy, which recommended a review of the private fostering system. I refer hon. Members to my modest ten-minute Bill, introduced on 19 March 2003, which contained three provisions, one of which was to institute a private fostering registration scheme.

It is inexplicable to many of us that the Government have avoided supporting a measure that a broad consensus of people involved in children’s issues and adoption and fostering have been saying for some time is necessary. We are confounded as to why the Government have still not gone along with it. Throughout all the years of calling for such a scheme, we have seen extensive regulation of child minding—the registration scheme has enjoyed a degree of success—and all sorts of care standards for inspection of care homes and fostering agencies, some of which we have discussed today. Numerous new adoption rights and requirements have been introduced, and hundreds of thousands of people who deal with young people have been subjected to Criminal Records Bureau checks, including me. After enormous hassle, I managed to get myself CRB checked—it is no easy feat. Nobody wants to take responsibility for that, but I thought it appropriate that the shadow Minister for Children got a CRB check, which I eventually did. We have even had legislation to clamp down on puppy farming, but still we have not had a registration scheme for private fostering.

Incredibly, people who offer their services as private foster carers, often as complete strangers, have no real compunction about not registering their services, although there are local authority registers and the notification scheme was supposedly bolstered in the 2004 Act. I shall come back in a moment to some of the words of the then Minister for Children, Young People and Families, the right hon. Member for Barking (Margaret Hodge), and some of the undertakings that she gave us when the 2004 Act was being passed. For people who are unknown to local social services departments, there can be no guarantees of quality of care or that they are accessing appropriate training, support and benefits, and no control over the number of different placements that the child will experience, which all have ramifications for the safety, welfare and well-being of children in private fostering arrangements.

We have no accurate measure of the extent of such arrangements, although some years ago, it was estimated that there are in excess of 10,000 private foster care arrangements in this country, disproportionately involving children coming from west Africa, particularly Nigeria, Sierra Leone and the Ivory Coast—Victoria ClimbiÃ(c) came from the latter via France. I am sure that a large majority of private foster carers do a good job and pose no threat to their charges, but we simply do not know. We have no idea of the extent of the problem because the Department of Health stopped collecting data back in 1991, so inaccurate were the figures. Since 1991, regulations have brought in local registers of foster carers, but there is no real legal penalty for not registering, and many people are ignorant of the requirements.

We could look at some of the undertakings that the then Minister gave during some lively debates on the 2004 Act. The hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole was present, and the then hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre, Hilton Dawson, who was a great advocate of a private registration scheme, voted with the Opposition in defiance of the Government to introduce it. It was pointed out that

“every report that the Government have commissioned over the past five years confirms that privately fostered children”—[Official Report, 2 November 2004; Vol. 426, c. 186.]

can be “very vulnerable”. Hilton Dawson said that he could not

“honestly believe that the Government are proposing such an inadequate scheme as that expressed in clause 37”—

section 37 of the 2004 Act—

“and introducing the possibility of a registration scheme only in a sunset clause.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee B, 21 October 2004; c. 282.]

The Government introduced enabling legislation for a private fostering registration scheme that would come into force after a certain period unless a good reason why not was found, hence a sunset clause.

What the Government intend in this Bill is to extend the sunset clause. What has changed in the intervening period such that the term of the sunset clause has to be extended? What have the Government found out in that period that has convinced them to extend the sunset clause that denies the coming into force of a private fostering registration scheme? What do we need to know in order to clear the hurdle and trigger that scheme coming into force?

The sunset clause was a sop, and the fact that the Government are now seeking to extend it without a good reason just goes to prove that it was a sop. It is a sop to mention the issue when one has no real inclination to do something about it, as I charged the then Children’s Minister with doing in 2004, and quite honestly I do not think that anything has changed to negate the charge that I made then.

In 2004, the right hon. Member for Barking, when saying that she wanted to beef up the notification scheme, admitted:

“I think that the notification scheme is not working well.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee B, 21 October 2004; c. 285.]

I think that we all agreed with that. She went on to say, in support of the sunset clause:

“The clause is in the Bill because we want to strengthen the scheme and give it one last chance to work.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee B, 21 October 2004; c. 288.]

That, in 2004, was the last chance, but now, apparently, there is another last chance. The Government need to make a case and justify why this is proving to be a very long sunset indeed. Will we ever see the dawn of a private fostering registration scheme, which so many of us have wanted for so many years?

I am at a loss to see how the notification scheme can have been deemed a success. As at 31 March 2007—the last year for which we have figures—1,250 children were reported as being cared for and accommodated in private fostering arrangements in England, and 1,010 private fostering arrangements ended during the previous year, so we are still well short of the 10,000 private fostering arrangements that are estimated to exist. We still do not know who is involved in those arrangements.

Another reason for beefing up the provision in 2004 was to publicise the existence of notification schemes and the legal requirement to register with them. A survey was carried out back in 2005 by The Voice newspaper; it was particularly focused on black private fostering arrangements in London, where we know there has been a problem, of which the Victoria ClimbiÃ(c) case was just one example. That survey found that of the respondents, about 35 per cent.—just one third—knew about private fostering. Twenty-one per cent. of the respondents were from Africa and of those, although 31 per cent. said that they knew about private fostering, only half of them actually knew what it meant. Thirty-five per cent. of respondents said that they knew about private fostering, but when probed further, it was found that only 15 per cent. actually did know what it was about. There was a pretty low recognition level, particularly among a key target client group.

Part of the raison d’être behind the changes made by the Minister in charge of the Children Bill in 2004 was to promote better awareness. Local authorities were charged with making potential or existing private fosterers in their area aware of the requirement to register under the scheme. However, three or four years on, in January this year, the British Association for Adoption and Fostering carried out a further survey of Londoners and came up with an even worse result, showing that few professionals working with children understand what private fostering is. In a YouGov survey, using an even bigger sample than the original survey, adults living in London were asked what they thought it meant for a child to be privately fostered and they were offered a series of possible answers. Only 18 per cent. picked the correct definition. Furthermore, only 16 per cent. knew that the parent and carer, when making private fostering arrangements, must notify the local authority in the area where the child will live and that failure to do so is an offence. Two hundred professionals who come into regular contact with children were surveyed, including teachers, teaching assistants, doctors and nurses, and what is really worrying is that only 18 per cent. of them knew the correct definition of private fostering, despite the fact that professionals working with children obviously play a vital role in identifying privately fostered children. It would appear from that evidence that the publicity and promotion of the existing notification process has been an abysmal failure. How much money was spent on it and what results do the Government think have been gained? The surveying of key target audiences has shown that if it has had any impact, it has been a negative one.

I also asked at that time how many people have been prosecuted for not registering with the notification scheme. The Minister did not know the figure but admitted that it was probably very low. I would like to know how many have now been prosecuted for failing to register. I hazard a guess that the number remains very low. That scheme was supposedly beefed up and bolstered by the Children Act 2004 and the intention was to initiate a promotion and awareness campaign. That campaign has singularly failed to promote awareness, to attract the sizeable number of those likely to be involved in private fostering arrangements in this country to register, or to bring any increase in the number of prosecutions of those not complying with the supposedly beefed-up legislation.

Kerry McCarthy (Labour, Bristol East)

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that children who are parked with friends or relatives because their parents have gone into custody are particularly at risk in that situation?

Kerry McCarthy (Labour, Bristol East)

As I was saying, I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman agrees that children whose parents are serving custodial sentences could be at risk if they were placed with friends or family for the duration of those sentences. Does he think that we should have better local monitoring and recording of children who fall into that category, particularly as it would allow schools to keep an eye on their welfare?

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

The hon. Lady makes an interesting point. She may not realise it, but that is the subject of a campaign being run by the Catholic diocese of Liverpool on the vulnerability of children whose parents find themselves in the custody system. It is a fair point, but I shall not let it take us down a completely separate byway. However, it is another aspect of the issue that requires attention.

I have slightly forgotten where I was before the Division and before the hon. Lady’s intervention. Rather than start again, I shall begin my conclusion. The point that I have been trying to make—I am sure that other Opposition Members concur—is that the time has surely come for a proper, formal registration scheme for private fostering arrangements. I do not claim that it will be a universal panacea. It will not be easy to police, and it will not be foolproof. I certainly do not want to play the nanny state card, having the state interfere with children who legitimately attend boarding schools or language schools, or children on holiday exchanges and so on, who have often been set up as the problem.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

I said when I started speaking to the new clause that I had a sense of dÃ(c)jà vu—this is the third wave of dÃ(c)jà vu this sitting. I will try to bring my comments to a speedy conclusion before the House divides again and I again have to try to pick up where I left off.

The point is that we need a private fostering registration scheme, which the un-sunsetted clause would provide. That national register of private foster carers would be available to birth parents who wished to pursue a private fostering arrangement, and it would enable local authorities to ensure that standards of care were suitable and appropriate help and support was offered. Such a scheme could also deter private foster carers who had fallen foul of local authority or authorised foster agency inspections, but had not committed offences sufficiently serious for them to be put on the Department for Children, Schools and Families watch list.

In conclusion, the Government have not made the case for why the scheme should not now come into force. In our deliberations on the Children Bill in 2004, the then Minister for Children, Young People and Families said that

“we will require the local safeguarding boards to have regard to how well or otherwise private fostering arrangements are being implemented.”

I would very much like to hear whether the findings of the local safeguarding children boards have coloured the Government’s thinking regarding not going ahead with the scheme. The then Children’s Minister clearly said that

“the notification scheme has not worked—there has not been compliance with the regulatory framework.”

She went on to say that

“if this final attempt to get the notification scheme to work is not successful, we would have to examine an alternative, despite the many concerns that we have about the alternatives.”

She described the positive disincentive of the scheme as it then stood. Finally, she said that

“if we fail in our endeavours to make the notification scheme work, we will not need to return to the House with primary legislation and we will implement the registration scheme, despite our concerns about whether it will work as well as everyone would like it to.”—[Official Report, Standing Committee B, 21 October 2004; c. 289-91.]

It was quite clear four years ago that unless there was overwhelming evidence to show that the notification scheme was working, this section of the Children Act 2004 would come into force. Why are the Government seeking to extend the sunset clause again? When is a sunset not a sunset? How many more chances will they give to show that the notification scheme works, or as we think, that it simply does not work, before we have the private fostering registration scheme for which a wide cross-section of people have been calling for many years? On that basis, I commend new clause 15 to the Committee.

Annette Brooke (Liberal Democrat, Mid Dorset and North Poole)

I support the new clause wholeheartedly. We have discussed this issue on many occasions. The speeches were getting more and more polished, but I will be brief tonight.

We discussed this issue under the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006 because we were concerned that if we did not know about private fostering arrangements, there were children who effectively were not being safeguarded. That is quite a serious point. We are talking about potentially vulnerable children, perhaps with limited or no contact with their parents. There is a real need to prevent such vulnerable children from slipping through the net.

I am staggered at how low the notifications are. Have the Government have made their own assessment of numbers in private fostering? It would be interesting to hear that. We work on the basis of the estimate of 10,000. How do the Government intend to do better than they have done over the last four years? In other words, what more are they going to do to increase the level of notifications? The Government indicated when discussing the Children Act 2004 that there would be monitoring and reporting back from local authorities. Do we have any idea if some local authorities are progressing with the notifications better than others?

Thirdly, what will be the criteria for assessing whether voluntary schemes are working? All we know is that there is a judgment that two years is not long enough. I am not convinced that we need another three years. There is no movement of any significance in the numbers of notifications. It could be dangerous to allow this process to hang on for another three years. I agree with the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham that this is something that we should just get on and do.

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

The new clause would require the Secretary of State to make regulations within one year to establish a registration scheme for private foster carers. It does not specify when that year would begin, but I presume that it would be the date on which the Bill is passed. It does not make any provision regarding the establishment of a registration scheme in Wales. We have heard that the intention in tabling the new clause was based on the concern over how well children are protected under the current private fostering arrangements as well as to press for an early implementation of the registration scheme.

Having sat on the Committee for the Adoption and Children Act 2002 and discussed the matter on the other occasions that the hon. Gentleman mentioned, I understand the point that he is making. We have a common aim of trying to ensure that the right safeguards are in place to protect privately fostered children and help place them on a more equal footing with other children, and a number of things have been achieved. I want to make it absolutely clear to the Committee that we have not abandoned the idea of a registration scheme. Because of the progress of the notification scheme so far, we feel that we simply do not have the evidence to justify the move right now.

I want to be clear about the progress that has been achieved over the past three years. To develop our evidence base, we have successfully established mechanisms for the collection of more robust baseline data. We have also instituted a three year inspection process, which began in April 2006 when the CSCI had responsibility for inspecting local authorities’ procedures for checking and monitoring private fostering arrangements. That responsibility was passed to Ofsted in April 2007. At the same time, the local authorities had been working hard to raise awareness of the notification requirements, implement them more effectively and build more trust in the relationships with local communities.

Raising awareness cannot simply be achieved through disseminating leaflets and other publicity material, important though that is. It requires building stronger relationships with communities, and it will take time to embed the practice of notification in all areas. Next January, the Department for Children, Schools and Families is making available £50,000 for the British Association of Adoption and Fostering to fund a national awareness-raising week in January 2009 on the notification arrangements.

I acknowledge hon. Members’ concerns, and clearly it will take time for the practice of notification in all areas to improve, even with the measures that we have taken. It is perhaps fair to say that it was over-optimistic to predict when we were passing the 2004 Act that we would have got as far by now as the hon. Gentleman would like, but I make no apology for wanting to get that right. Our evidence so far tells us that there is scope to improve the implementation of the current arrangements and points to some good examples of good practice. The first year’s inspection evidence revealed that 50 local authorities showed some very good and improving practice as well as some other areas where there was a lot of room for improvement.

Andrew Turner (Conservative, Isle of Wight)

Why is the Minister prepared to go so slowly in the case of private fostering arrangements when others were happy to be in favour of fast legislation, such as that relating to fox hunting?

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

Because in acknowledging that the Government have by no means abandoned the idea of a registration scheme, we also acknowledge that there are also difficulties with a registration scheme—I think that the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham went some way towards acknowledging that in his remarks. It is right to first gather further evidence on the notification scheme before proceeding to a registration scheme that could and would catch many families—the hon. Gentleman often raises the point of the state intrusion in family life. We do not necessarily want to insist on a registration scheme, and yet we have not abandoned it. We want to give the changes that have been made the correct amount of time so that we can collect the evidence that is necessary to make that judgment.

Therefore, we are not yet convinced of the need to move into a registration scheme, and how best to safeguard children in private fostering is simply not that clear cut. The hon. Gentleman acknowledged that a registration scheme might not be a panacea for all the difficulties with private fostering and that a rushed and heavy-handed implementation of the scheme might deter some people from private fostering who might otherwise be able to offer support in difficult family situations.

Edward Timpson (Conservative, Crewe and Nantwich)

Will the Minister give us an assurance that he supports the principle that private fostering arrangements are there to protect vulnerable children? Is the only barrier to moving to that scheme a lack of the evidence that he requires to bring that principle to bear?

Kevin Brennan (Labour, Cardiff West)

I think that the hon. Gentleman meant the principle of a registration scheme for private fostering. That is how I interpreted his remarks. I have made it clear that the Government are not yet convinced that that is the best way to deal with private fostering. On the other hand, we have not abandoned the idea that registration might be the best way. We simply want to ensure that the evidence on the notification scheme is full and clear.

I stress that we are supported in that view by the British Agencies for Adoption and Fostering, which works extensively on private fostering. The BAAF agrees that we should seek to ensure that the current arrangements operate effectively and evaluate them more fully before deciding whether to introduce a registration scheme. In my view, it would not be in the interest of children or those who work with them to do otherwise.

The intended effect of the new clause seems to be that within the next year, the Secretary of State would have to make regulations in respect of England to establish a registration scheme for private foster carers. We believe that before moving to that scheme, we need to evaluate the existing notification scheme, having taken the measures that I outlined to make it more effective. Then we need to consider whether such a regime would be more effective than what we have at present and what its added value would be.

If we then decide to move to registration, we will have to draft and consult on the regulations. All of that would take more than the year proposed in the new clause anyway. We must ensure enough time to gather the necessary evidence, analyse it and make a sound, evidence-based decision. The key problem is that we have only one full year’s data on the number of private fostering arrangements under the strengthened notification scheme. By 2010, we will have three full years of data as well as the results of three years of inspection by Ofsted, and we will know the impact of further activity to raise notification levels.

We are determined to improve the current arrangements and explore to what extent they might be improved. We are writing to local authorities to remind them of their duties in relation to private fostering, and Government offices are working with local authorities, particularly poor performers, to improve notification rates. We are also exploring links with other related policies, such as those concerning missing children, to ensure that information about private fostering is included in the relevant guidance.

We mentioned BAAF’s awareness-raising week in January 2009. It is right to retain the option to introduce a registration scheme for the further years envisaged in the Bill so that we can ensure that if the case for it is compelling, a registration scheme can be introduced at the right time, after the assessment of the strengthened notification scheme.

I know that the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham does not want us to go any further on our journey down Sunset Boulevard in relation to the clause, but it is appropriate, having strengthened the notification scheme, to give it an opportunity to provide evidence whether it can work. That is a practical and pragmatic way forward, and I propose that he should withdraw his amendment.

Tim Loughton (Conservative, East Worthing and Shoreham)

The Minister has succeeded in driving disappointment to new heights. That was pretty weak. I am a big fan of sunset clauses in legislation, but the point of sunset clauses is that the sun must set some time, and this is proving to be a long, protracted sunset.

The Minister prayed in aid BAAF, for which another £50,000 will be made available for an awareness scheme. BAAF’s position when we last discussed the matter was this:

“The British Association for Adoption and Fostering (BAAF) believes the best way to protect and safeguard privately fostered children is by implementing a registration and approval system for the most vulnerable children”.

BAAF, along with so many other agencies and organisations involved with vulnerable children, thinks that a private fostering registration scheme is the way ahead. I do not get why the Government want to prevaricate on this one.

I quote from the closing comments of the then Minister for Children, Young People and Families, the right hon. Member for Barking:

“if we fail in our endeavours to make the notification scheme work, we will not need to return to the House with primary legislation and we will implement the registration scheme”.——[Official Report, Children Public Bill [Lords] Committee, 19 October 2004; c. 291.]

This Minister also used the language, “We haven’t abandoned it yet.”

The Minister has produced absolutely no evidence why the Government should have gone lukewarm on the scheme after all our considerations in 2004. I asked him for evidence from the local safeguarding children boards, as he did not mention them once. Where did that evidence come from? There is anecdotal evidence of a few examples of best practice. Great. But it still produced only a small number of adherents to the existing notification scheme. He said that there is no evidence right now after a further three years. What further evidence will it take? He said—another get-out—that they had just established a mechanism for the collection of more robust data. How long does it take before they have the systems to collect sufficiently robust data?

He said—yet another get-out—that it is about building stronger relationships with communities. It has always been about building stronger relationships with communities but they have singularly failed to get that message across to those highest target communities. He then said that it was perhaps an over-optimistic prediction. This really is very weak. He also said that there would be difficulties setting up a scheme. I acknowledge that, but it does not mean that those difficulties are insurmountable. They have had 11 years since Sir William Utting first mentioned this whole registration scheme. That is 11 years to get round those difficulties and still they need more time.

They are not going to have much more time. The sun is about to set on the Government. They will not be in a position to do anything about this sunset clause. So I offer the Minister a deal: will he reconsider his comments so we can re-examine this on Report in the light of what Opposition Members have said? We have urged him just to get on and do it. We will table a more comprehensive amendment on Report which will take in Wales and make it clear that a registration scheme will be triggered within a year of the Bill becoming law. On that basis, we offer him one last chance to trigger the sunset clause or, I fear, he will succumb to the inevitable. A new day will dawn for the private foster registration, just as a new day will dawn for the electorate as a whole in the not too distant future.

So on that basis, I urge the Minister to think again. The feelings on this are deeply held. They have been widely canvassed. I was deeply disappointed that yet again he came back with not a shred of new evidence for why the Minister of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the right hon. Member for Barking (Margaret Hodge) should not have been taken at her word four years ago. This sunset clause should now trigger the implementation of this registration scheme. On the basis of giving him notification that I intend to bring this back in an amended form on Report, I will not press the new clause.

Clause 45