My Lords, my amendment in this group is Amendment 28. But before I turn to it I should say that, having listened to all the points that have been made, whether on speech and language difficulties, referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, the kinship carer issue mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, or the splitting up of siblings—all these issues are so important. The fact that they have not been addressed effectively does not speak well of what we have achieved so far. We must ensure that we achieve more appropriate success in future.
My Amendment 28 stresses the need for a recovery principle to guarantee therapeutic support for looked-after children. Amendment 1, to which I spoke, also proposed that relevant bodies must also ensure the provision of appropriate support to advance looked-after children’s,
“recovery, happiness and emotional stability”.
As many as six in 10 children in care are there because they have experienced abuse or neglect, yet our support offer often falls woefully short. Between 60% and
90% of children who have experienced sexual abuse will not get access to therapeutic support. NSPCC research has also found that as many as one in five children are turned away from CAMHS after referral to a service. While the average waiting time between referral and assessment is two months, unbelievably many children are waiting up to six months.
Around 100 children contact the NSPCC’s ChildLine service each week about mental health concerns and abuse. This has profound implications for children. Looked-after children are four to five times more likely to attempt suicide than their peers outside the care system. Research from the United States also indicates that nine out of 10 children who are abused go on to develop a mental health condition by the time they are 18.
Young people who worked with the NSPCC to provide evidence for the Education Select Committee’s inquiry into the mental health of looked-after children said that the traumatic reasons that caused them to enter care are often never really dealt with. One said:
“Wounds turn into scars that will never heal”.
Another child, describing her care experience, explained to the committee that she had just accepted that she did not deserve the best in life. No children should ever have to carry these burdens with them throughout their lives.
It is therefore vital that the Government accept this amendment. Some £1.25 billion is on the table to improve mental health provision in the UK, and we must ensure that this reaches looked-after children. A robust legislative framework that puts the needs of looked-after children first is a vital way of achieving this.