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Address in Reply to Her Majesty’s Most Gracious Speech

My Lords, the Government introduced a plethora of social legislation in the previous Parliament and have a further raft in the forthcoming Session. Much of it is to be welcomed and is indicative of the seriousness of the Government’s thinking about some of the most challenging issues affecting many of the most vulnerable in society. It includes the introduction of a barring and vetting scheme   to protect children and vulnerable adults; the establishment of a framework for treating people with mental illness; and improvement of hygiene inspection in social care settings, such as care homes. In addition, the Government are intent on strengthening family life by securing sufficient childcare provision, the extension of statutory maternity pay and keeping children central to planning during court and contact procedures. I should commiserate with rather than congratulate the gentlemen on the Front Bench at this time; however, I join with other noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Warner, and welcoming the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, to the Bench. Alongside all that the Government have been consulting on the Green Paper Independence, Well-being and Choice, which seeks to put older people who use services in control of their lives by personalised budgets and direct payments; consulting on workforce planning for children’s services; and looking to eliminate smoking in some public places. I do not have time to speak about smoking in public places today but it has been covered well by the noble Lord, Lord Chan, and the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and I shall watch it with considerable interest—as the noble Lord, Lord Warner, knows, I was frustrated by the terrorism Bill in bringing forward an enabling Bill for London in the previous Session. I will be back. The Government are serious in their thinking, but what about implementation? Have they found a way of dealing with the problems of constant change, which in my long experience has always resulted in a loss of service to the user? What about quality as well as quantity? If I did not know differently of the noble Lord, Lord   Warner, I would think that no member of the Government had ever run anything, that they knew nothing of how to manage morale in large organisations or had simply decided to ignore all research into the management of change and the development of quality. Blue-sky thinking is important, strategic direction is essential, and change inevitable and often positive. But it must be combined with practical consideration of what will bring results. So can we look for some institutional stability alongside the rush for reform, as well as good risk assessment of the outcomes of changes? Take, for example, the moves already announced to merge, yet again, the body responsible for social care inspection and that of the healthcare commission into one. Health and social care sound pretty similar, so why not lump them together? But even the ordinary consumer knows that there are serious differences between the two: healthcare is universal, while social care focuses resources on some very vulnerable people; health services are dominated by hospitals, and within that on acute services, while social care is largely local with many community-based services. I remember the chief executive of a hospital telling a conference I chaired that, if it came to a choice between delivering good safeguarding for children by providing a focus for the local children’s trust within his hospital and delivering acute adult services, the latter would always come first. He had to achieve his targets, after all. Hip replacements will always win out against children’s mental health. The proposed changes will repeat a process undergone in the previous Parliament by the predecessor of the CSCI, the National Care Standards Commission, of which I was deputy chairwoman. I am not sure that any group of staff and service-users should be subjected to that degree of disruption unless they are failing. There is nothing to suggest that it is failing; indeed, were there   enough time, I could list its considerable achievements, but some have already been mentioned by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel. If we are to undergo the process again, can the Minister ensure that service users and providers are not only given the opportunity to make known their views on the most appropriate way forward for social care inspection, but that they are really listened to and heard? After all, the Government consider themselves to be a listening government. One of the considerable contributions of social care inspection has been how it has drawn attention to the need to ensure a well trained and skilled workforce. I welcome the Government’s vision in their most recent consultation, the Children’s Workforce Strategy. It talks of stabilising the workforce, learning from existing good practice, improving training and the development of practitioners. But those at the front line will tell you that they have heard it all before. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Warner, was central to one such report. What will be different this time? How will DfES achieve the aim of making the work attractive and promoting more entry routes, to quote the document, especially for social workers, where there is a chronic shortage of trained personnel? As deputy chair of CAFCASS, the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service, I regularly encounter these issues. We grapple with staff shortages, complex work programmes and policy changes along with societal attitudes about families in emotional turmoil and how they should be dealt with. I pay tribute to the CAFCASS workers, who have had much to contend with. Throughout, most never lost sight of the children whom they were there to safeguard and protect. There is much to change in the organisation, but that central concern for the child must be fostered throughout. Much of the children, contact and adoption Bill will fall to the agency to implement. The paramount needs of children must be strengthened through legislation. Measures must be workable and decently resourced. Everyone in the Court Service recognises that there are problems with facilitation and enforcement of contact orders, but the assessment of the child’s needs, not the wishes of adults, must remain central. There is no place for automatic 50:50 shared care; children are not property to be divided up. I am sure from previous pronouncements that the Government agree with that, but I seek further reassurance. Neither should contact arrangements be forced by unresearched beliefs. Not all children benefit from contact with fathers who are violent and controlling; and not all mothers are reasonable in complying with orders for contact. Of course children have a right to contact with their family, if that contact contributes to their care and development. That may not bring about a question about safety. However, with the Joint Committee, of which I was a member, I hope that the Government will favour time and place requirements for non-compliance of either parent, rather than other suggested measures such as electric—I cannot even say it; I mean electronic—tagging. That will have detrimental effects on already strained and complex family relationships. The serious problem about taking part in the address on the Queen’s Speech is how topics are divided up. For many children and adults in trouble or need, where a service comes from has little consequence as long as the service meets their need. That often reflects splits between departments. Although the Government are encouraging all those delivering services to work together, could they try a little harder to do the same? For example, while the Government contemplate whether to deliver the National Offender Management Scheme—yesterday’s topic—some organisations dependent on grants for services for children who have been sexually abused or are themselves abusers—perhaps in both categories—are put at risk as the grants to pay for these services become regional. While the Government sort that out, schemes may well be lost. We cannot afford to lose schemes. Some 10 years ago, as chief executive of Childline, I was involved with the charity NCH in considering the problems surrounding children and young people who abuse other young people. We found an astounding lack of knowledge and facilities to deal with that complex problem. In the previous Parliament, we had legislation about sexual offences and domestic violence—both welcome. There is now good research to show that one strong contributor to the behaviour of young men who sexually abuse is growing up in a home where there is sustained domestic violence. However, despite the growth of understanding and the legislation, where are the services? This week, the All-Parliamentary Group on Children revisited the topic. Presentations from Barnado’s, Childline, the Stop It Now Campaign and the NSPCC were consistent in drawing attention to the lack of projects and the inconsistency of treatment of these young people. It is sheer chance if they find themselves in the criminal justice system or identified as a child in need. Remember, almost without exception, they will have experienced chaotic upbringings, may have been abused themselves and be fearful about what they have done and the consequences. However, the way we arrange services leaves them and their future victims vulnerable. If you are lucky, you may end up in a quality placement in one of the few Barnado’s projects with the hope of a future but, more likely, the placement will be in a young offenders’ institution, where you may or may not get help—or even, bizarrely, in a mixed children’s home with every possibility of reoffending. Many need mental health services but the new legislation seems unlikely to improve the long waiting lists for child and adolescent mental health services—unless the Minister has a surprise answer up his sleeve. It is pointless providing education, education, education for those children who are emotionally unable to make use of it without help. Who does the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, think will look after those children once they are excluded from school—I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Prosser, that that sometimes must happen? That will be the social workers either in the local authority or the youth offending teams. Given the way that the noble Lord has spoken up for teachers, I hope that he will also speak up for social workers, who also need strengthening. So, as we move into the next phase of legislation, we ask the Government to be mindful of the consequences of their plans. What might look tidy may have negative consequences for service delivery; what appears like justice may lead to further injustice; and the failure of local services to work together may be a reflection of higher disfunctioning. Thinking and strategic vision are of value only if the outcomes bring practical benefit and services to those in need.