---

Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

I am very grateful. That makes it clear what I am doing. In essence, I am speaking to the government amendments that will replace Clauses 7 to 10 and 30. These government amendments concern the duties on local authorities in respect of the placement of looked-after children. They follow concerns raised in Grand Committee and by stakeholders about the interrelationship between different duties in the Bill with regard to different types of carers and different considerations, including locality and the proximity to a child’s existing place of education, which are to be taken into account in making residential placements. I stress to the Committee that the changes involved here are not as great as might be thought from the volume of amendments. However, we thought it right to restate the entirety of the provisions on this issue in the form of a new clause and schedule in the Bill replacing existing Clauses 7 to 10 and 30. The new clause requires a local authority to make arrangements for a child it is looking after to live with its parents or other person with parental responsibility where that is consistent with the child’s welfare. This reflects the principle that state intervention in family life should be kept to the minimum necessary to protect the child from harm. This provision simply restates the existing law as set out in the Children Act 1989. However, where placement with parents is not in the child’s best interests, the local authority should place the child in the most appropriate placement available. The local authority’s determination of the most appropriate placement is subject to a number of considerations. First and foremost, subsection (7) requires that all the considerations, whether to do with proximity, out-of-area placements or any other consideration, should be taken in accordance with the local authority’s other duties under Part 3 of the 1989 Act, in particular its duties under Section 22 to safeguard and promote the child’s welfare and to ascertain and give due consideration to the child’s wishes and feelings and those of other relevant persons. This brings together into a single test the separate tests set out in existing Clauses 7 to 10. We believe that this is the correct way to ensure that placement decisions are made in the child’s best interests as set out in Care Matters. It also reflects the views expressed by noble Lords when we debated this issue in Grand Committee. Noble Lords commented in particular on the duty in Clause 8 relating to placing children within a local authority’s own area and to the different test that would apply in that case from the other tests set out in Clauses 7 to 10. The new clause applies a single consistent test; namely, that any decision and consideration of all factors relating to it should lead to the most appropriate placement that safeguards and promotes the welfare of the child in question. I stress that it is not sufficient for a local authority placement simply to be consistent with a child’s welfare. Under the clause as now drafted it must be the most appropriate placement that safeguards and promotes the child’s welfare. We believe that is the right position for the law to take. However, the placement options under the new clause are unchanged. They include, first, placement with a relative, friend or other person connected with the child. We recognise that placements of this nature may not in every case be in the interests of the child. However, the law should encourage local authorities to consider the use of family and friends placements first. It is important to make clear, as the clause does, that children in this position should continue to be looked after by the local authority. The carer must be approved as a local authority foster carer and must be provided with support, including financial support, in accordance with the criteria that apply to all other foster carers. That meets the point that also caused concern among noble Lords: that where family members are designated as the appropriate foster carer they are not receiving the allowances to which they should be entitled. Beyond family and friends, the clause sets out placement options as a foster carer previously unconnected to the child, placement in a registered children’s home or other arrangements, such as supported lodgings or independent accommodation. All these placement options are the same as those set out in Section 23 of the 1989 Children Act. The local authority must also ensure that, as far as is reasonably practicable and in line with its overall duties that I have described that apply under the 1989 Act, the placement allows the child to live near his home, does not disrupt his education, enables the child to live with a sibling who is also being looked after by the local authority and, if the child is disabled, has accommodation suitable to his needs. An additional requirement is set out in subsections (7)(c) and (9) which the local authority must observe: it must accommodate the child within its area unless that is not reasonably practicable. However, I stress that that is subject to the overriding duty under the 1989 Act to promote and safeguard the welfare of the child. As we have made clear in previous debates, the Government are committed to reducing the number of inappropriate out-of-authority placements, hence these new provisions. There are concerns about the quality of placement supervision, the co-ordination of services for children placed out of authority and the poorer outcomes for this group, hence the changes we are making under new subsection (9), although we are continuing to look at whether there should be a further explicit provision requiring local authorities effectively to plan to have a range of local accommodation available alongside the new provision, which responds to the concern raised by the noble Earl, Lord Listowel. Clause 9 introduced a new duty to place a child near to his school, preventing unnecessary school moves, with particular significance attached to school moves in the run-up to GCSE, when the impact on educational attainment is perhaps most significant. In response to concerns raised in Grand Committee about the definition of a school and whether it embraced a further education establishment, in new Section 22C this requirement has been rephrased as a duty to ensure that placements do not disrupt the child’s education. The advantage of this approach is that it is not specifically tied to particular educational establishments. The duty to avoid disrupting the child’s education will apply equally to children studying at FE colleges as to children in schools, which addresses a particular concern raised in Grand Committee. New Section 22D restates Clause 10, which provided that if the local authority is considering moving a child from a placement with parents, local authority foster care or a children's home, which are all regulated and well supported placements, to another type of accommodation, such as unsupported lodgings or a hostel, it must undertake a full, statutory review of the child’s case, chaired by an independent reviewing officer, before making a decision. We are convinced that the approach contained in the revised clause will allow local authorities to make effective placement decisions focused on the needs of the individual child. The detail of these requirements on local authorities will be fleshed out in the revised Children Act 1989 guidance and in the regulations, for which further provision is made in new paragraphs 12A to 12F to be inserted in Part 2 of Schedule 2 that will set out the detailed arrangements. I believe that the arrangements set out in the revised clause meet the will of the House more effectively than the original provisions and get the balance that we are rightly seeking to achieve between taking full consideration of issues to do with proximity, education and locality in placement decisions made with respect to children with the overriding duty of local authorities to see that any placements safeguard and promote their welfare.