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Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

I am happy to consider the issue further but the Government’s view is that the provisions in Section 17 of the Children Act 1989 are both strong and fairly specific in terms of the requirements on local authorities. While it is true that Section 17(1) states: "““It shall be the general duty of every local authority … (a) to safeguard and promote the welfare of children within their area who are in need; and (b) so far as is consistent with that duty, to promote the upbringing of such children by their families, by providing a range and level of services appropriate to those children’s needs””," Section 17(10) states: "““For the purposes of this Part a child shall be taken to be in need if—(a) he is unlikely to achieve or maintain, or to have the opportunity of achieving or maintaining, a reasonable standard of health or development without the provision for him of services by a local authority … (b) his health or development is likely to be significantly impaired, or further impaired, without the provision for him of such services; or (c) he is disabled””." Those are strong duties on local authorities and we would need to be persuaded that the insertion of new duties over and above that was a wise proceeding before we took any step in that direction.