My Lords, I thank the Minister for his remarks in moving the Bill. For too many children in care, the state does not carry out its parenting functions adequately. Life chances for children in care are poorer than for their peers, and too often time spent in care is a prelude to a life of mental health problems, unemployment and time spent in the criminal justice system. The role of the state as a corporate parent is vitally important. We must ensure the highest standards of support for children in care, the best opportunities and access to the services which will reduce the inequalities they face and set them on a positive path for the future.
In some respects, this Bill is due a welcome, focusing as it does on improving the outcomes and support for looked-after children. The introduction of detailed principles of corporate parenting provides much-needed recognition of the need to reconsider the support offered to the most vulnerable children in our society, and the extension of the personal adviser role to care leavers up to the age of 25 is a step forward. But, mirroring the Government’s track record with education, where teacher shortages continue to be denied, here we have a Bill that fails to tackle the fundamental issues facing children’s social work: case load levels that are too high, high staff turnover rates, a reliance on agency workers, and unqualified social work assistants taking on the role of social workers. When framing the Bill, the Government’s eye was not fully on the ball.
In social work, the Government are on course to repeat the mistakes they made with the teaching profession. Social workers play a vital role in society, yet under
this Government many are demoralised through a narrative which blames them for failings in the system. Six in 10 English regions have seen a fall in the number of social workers working in children’s services, while there has been a 50% increase in the amount spent on agency social workers.
As with the Education and Adoption Bill last year, adoption is once more the only destination from care that, it seems, the Government value. Only one in 20 children in the care system are adopted. Where are the measures to cater for those in foster care, special guardianship and kinship care? Although there is a brief allusion to kinship care in Clause 8, no other forms of care merit even a mention there or in Clause 9. I mentioned this issue on the previous Bill and was given assurances by the noble Baroness, Lady Evans, that all forms of care were equally valued and would be treated as such. I have to say that there is scant evidence in this Bill that the Government take that view. I invite Ministers to explain why the warm words offered from the Government Front Bench last year have not been translated into action in this Bill.
Three-quarters of children in the care system are in foster care and the Government have failed to champion, support and focus on this group. Three months ago the Government published a paper entitled Adoption: A Vision for Change. When can we expect the publication of Foster Care: A Vision for Change? From the Prime Minister down, Ministers have made things harder for foster carers, by doing down their role and contrasting it unfavourably with adoption. I believe that the Government should be setting out a reform programme which takes a long-term, holistic view of the entire care system and ensures that adequate support is provided to every child. This Bill could have done that but fails to do so.
The seven corporate parenting principles are certainly welcome but they should, we believe, be a duty, as happens in Scotland, and they should cover all relevant public services. If I heard the Minister correctly, he said that other agencies were to be added to the corporate principles. For the avoidance of doubt, we believe that health—including clinical commissioning groups and NHS England—the criminal justice system and police and housing services should all play their full part in delivering the best for looked-after children. We will press the Government to strengthen this clause significantly, so as to encourage joined-up thinking and action on the needs of children in care and care leavers.
The local offer outlined in Clause 2 is welcome, although local authorities need only publish this information. There is a clear need for the emphasis to shift from reactive to proactive, with information given to care leavers, and the information should be given to them up to a year before they are due to leave care, allowing them to prepare and to gain most from the offer. There is no virtue in waiting until they are about to move out the door. Labour would like to see the introduction of a national gold standard for the services care leavers should receive, with government sharing best practice to drive up support for care leavers everywhere. What is needed is a national offer delivered locally, so as to learn from and avoid repeating the vagaries of the postcode lottery that is the SEND local offer established under the Children and Families Act.
The main question posed by Clause 15 is surely, what is the problem it is designed to address? We recognise that the children’s social care landscape has changed significantly since the last major legislative reform brought about by the Children Act 2004. We support innovation if it drives up outcomes for children and standards in local authorities, but innovation can take place very effectively within local authorities, as Leeds has recently demonstrated. We strongly believe that child protection services and, indeed, wider children’s social care should not be run for profit and we are concerned that this clause could be a Trojan horse. The Government have failed to justify such a wide-ranging and wholesale change. Many sensible voices in the sector are very concerned about this and we will press the Government, in Committee, to come forward with a detailed explanation as to why it is necessary. As it stands, the proposals are too wide ranging and without adequate safeguards to protect children and young people if plans to innovate go wrong.
Also, the introduction of a power to become exempt from statutory duties will be seen by some local authorities as an opportunity to drop certain provision at a time when financial pressures may make it difficult for them to meet all their statutory commitments. So it is crucial that where local authorities delegate their services or responsibilities for children in care and/or care leavers, the same principles that apply to local authorities will apply to those now running those services.
Clause 15 raises a number of questions, but at this stage I will ask Minister just two. Have the Government made any assessment of the risk to children of proposals to exempt local authorities from some key duties for keeping children safe? Secondly, if outsourced services are not subject to Ofsted inspections, how will it be known whether outcomes for children are improving?
Part 2 of the Bill covers social work, including, crucially, regulation. However, what is meant by Clauses 20 to 40 is just not known, because that is where the Bill disappears off into the mist. From that point it is a skeleton Bill, despite recent comments by the Minister. What do these clauses mean? Ask 10 people and you might get 10 different answers. In addition, since the Bill was published the Government have already submitted 14 amendments: none, it has to be said, within the area of Clauses 20 to 40. I think I picked the Minister up correctly when I said that he has announced another one, at least, today.
This is no way to legislate. Were this a one-off occurrence, we on these Benches would not perhaps make too much of it. I think it fair to say that, although we were critical of the Government’s Education and Adoption Bill a year ago, at least that came fairly soon after the general election—an election the Government themselves did not expect to win—and could not have been fully prepared. That has to be accepted, at least to some extent. But we are now well down the line and there is no cover for the Government regarding the Bill we are considering today. This has become an all too familiar pattern with not just this Bill and the Education and Adoption Bill, but other Bills in your Lordships’ House over the last year. That is a completely unacceptable development. That is why we submitted the amendment standing in my name: to draw attention to the fact that the Government are treating Parliament with contempt.
Just five days ago, the noble Baroness the Leader of the House was challenged in exchanges in your Lordships’ House over what she called “skeleton Bills”. She said:
“I want to ensure that as Parliament proceeds, it has the information it needs to do its job. Having gone through one Session, I feel that I have learned lessons that I want to ensure are properly applied by the Government ... I can assure noble Lords that I am taking very seriously my responsibilities to ensure that legislation is brought forward in as complete a fashion as possible.—[Official Report, 9/6/16; col. 898.]
It surely goes without saying that we are not there yet. Noble Lords do not need to take just my word for it. Yesterday, the Constitution Select Committee in your Lordships’ House published its report on this Bill. I am sure that both Ministers will have read it with interest. Inter alia, it said:
“The Bill grants extensive powers to the Secretary of State—in particular in relation to … Clause 11 … and … Clause 20 … these provisions appear to continue the trend we noted in several reports last session—the introduction of legislation that leaves much to the subsequent discretion of ministers. We regret that, despite the concerns expressed in the past by this and other committees, the Government continues to introduce legislation that depends so heavily on an array of … delegated powers”.
These words may be couched in moderate terms but they are none the less hard-hitting. I hope the Minister, on behalf of the Government, feels chastised, because I believe that he should. He should also explain to noble Lords why the Government continue to introduce Bills that deny opposition parties and Cross-Benchers the ability to scrutinise legislation effectively. We cannot scrutinise that which we cannot see.
I think that the Minister pointed to only two lots of regulations that appear in Clauses 20 to 40. I have asked my noble friend Lord Hunt to have a quick look at the Bill while I have been speaking. He has come up with 29 lots of regulations and powers within those clauses, so there is a considerable difference. That emphasises why we felt it necessary to bring forward the amendment before your Lordships today.
What little we can discern from the second half of the Bill is that it contains no detail on the proposed new statutory regulator, not even a framework. It is unclear why the Government wish to commit to the considerable cost of setting up a new regulator—as happened with the General Social Care Council around 10 years ago—at a time when council social care budgets continue to suffer as a result of reductions in central government funding.
Another document that I am sure the Ministers have read is the Bill’s impact assessment. On page 5, the conclusion the Department for Education reaches regarding social work regulation is that the Bill simply enables the making of secondary legislation and does not itself have any regulatory impact. Well, well—who would have thought it? That is repeated at least twice more in the impact assessment, which means that that assessment has not been able to be carried out effectively. That in itself is a matter for concern.
We on these Benches are greatly concerned that, as things stand, the system outlined in the Bill places regulation of the profession under direct government control, removing the independence necessary to win the trust of social workers and the public. Even if the Secretary of State could become the regulator—we
know that will not happen—even a government-appointed body would risk professional standards being subject to the political priorities of government, rather than a professional evidence base. These proposals will make social work the only health or social care profession to be directly regulated by government, and the Bill must be amended to create greater independence for any regulatory body established.
Labour does not oppose new ideas in social work training and practice, as hinted at in Clause 25. The expansion of, and support for, Frontline as a means of training new social workers was part of our manifesto last year. However, the intention was not to deny universities a major role, and student places must not be capped, as has happened with some teacher training. We know that the Government target for 2020 is for one in four arrivals to social work to be via Frontline or Step Up, the masters course for bringing in new social workers. That is not a matter for concern at the moment, but the Bill allows the Government to direct the content of training for social workers, which raises concerns of a drift towards a two-tier social work system for those on fast-track courses, with non-university providers being favoured for funding.
Social work is among the most important work in our society. Social workers make an amazing contribution to the country. We intend to improve the Bill to enable it to support that. Great social workers combine skill and knowledge with care and compassion to help transform the lives of the most vulnerable young people and families. We need to attract more life-changing social workers, and to do that we need to treat them with respect. If we do that, we will enable them to deliver what every child deserves: the best possible childhood, free from abuse and neglect. I beg to move.
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