I will speak to Amendment 130 in my name and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. I will also speak to the proposed deletion of Clause 15 from the Bill. Rather unusually, I would prefer that Clause 15 were removed from the Bill altogether than that the Government accept the amendment in my name and that of the noble Baroness.
Given the widespread concern outside this House that the noble Lord, Lord Watson, has already mentioned, we need to understand much better than we do at the moment why the Government are so keen to have this sweeping power in Clause 15. I find the underlying premises of Clause 15 extremely strange—even more so than when I spoke about the clause at Second Reading. First, the clause seems to presuppose that in some way legislation is blocking the delivery of good quality children’s services. There was an opportunity to explain these alleged blockages in the Minister’s latest document, Putting Children First but, on a quick read, I cannot see that that opportunity was taken except for some rather generalised remarks about testing “deregulatory approaches” and a quote from Professor Eileen Munro about “unnecessary legal rules”. But my understanding is that in her review of child protection, Professor Munro was not arguing for changes in primary or even secondary legislation, but for amendments to statutory guidance. Will the Minister clarify what the primary and secondary legislation blockages are, preferably in writing to all members of the Committee before Report?
To compound the confusion, I understand that the Government have already used existing statutory power to amend statutory guidance following the Munro review by issuing directions to particular local authorities. Ofsted’s annual report shows local authorities adopting innovative practice without the need for changes in legislation. Moreover, as the noble Lord, Lord Watson, mentioned, the Government’s very own Red Tape Challenge, as it was called in 2014, seems to have revealed very little to remove for children’s services. Again, will the Minister clarify that, preferably in writing? So far, the Government have produced no evidence that primary or secondary legislation is impeding innovation in children’s services. They already have plenty of scope for amending statutory guidance or issuing directions to particular local authorities without the wide-ranging power to repeal or modify children’s social care requirements in Clause 15 that would last, I understand, for at least six years.
One is entitled to be a little suspicious about what the Government are really up to with Clause 15. Of course, I am the sort of chap who takes for granted that Ministers are well intentioned when they bring measures before your Lordships’ House, but could it be that what lies behind this provision is a short-cut way of outsourcing whole chunks of services? Ofsted seems to be claiming that up to 25% of children’s services are inadequate. Rather than working with some external turnaround capacity to improve matters,
is there a new-found enthusiasm within DfE for trying to get quicker results by removing legislative impediments to outsourcing?
Personally, I have no particular objections to outsourcing if that can be shown to have a beneficial effect for children after trialling. I have been trying to probe what the DfE is up to with the transfer of children’s services to trusts. On the answers that I have received, this is clearly an expensive process, it can be very time-consuming, accountability can become extremely blurred and at present there is no body of evidence to support it as a general remedy for failure. Moreover, the DfE has still to publish the report that it commissioned in 2014 from LaingBuisson into developing capacity and diversity in the provision of children’s services. I know from my involvement in that work that it did not suggest that creating a market in children’s services would be easy.
I turn briefly to Amendment 130, which would require the Secretary of State to set up an independent review panel to consider whether any exemptions or modifications under Clause 15(2) are likely adversely to affect the legislative safeguards or rights of children approved by Parliament and to consider the published advice of such a panel before acting. I consider this the least that we should do if the Government persist in proceeding with Clause 15. To sum up, we need much more transparency and clarification from the Minister on why the Government need Clause 15 and why they cannot use their existing powers of direction and statutory guidance to secure their espoused innovation objectives.