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Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

There are two reasons for speaking. The first is to comment on the amendment; secondly, I should like to say a brief word about CAFCASS—I think that that is appropriate. On the amendment, I thought that 10 years was a step too far but, to begin at the beginning, I should like to give local authorities an opportunity to prove whether they can give independence to the IROs. History is against us. I was the first chair of the independent panel, Guardians Ad Litem for London, which drew together guardians from local authorities so that there was a degree of independence. A guardian from one authority could be deployed in another simply because of the difficulties that had been caused by the guardian trying to criticise the work in their own local authority. In that instance, local authorities found a solution in London. It did not stand up throughout the country, which led to the pressure for the independence of the whole organisation and the creation of CAFCASS. Was it St Augustine who said, ““Make me good, but not now””? CAFCASS might be a good organisation to do this work were it needed, but not now. We know where we are. The Ofsted report did not come as a surprise to us; we know where we are in getting the organisation in order and what are the issues about practice. Practice is especially problematic in two areas; those are the two areas where we are grateful for the inspection, because it helps us to draw attention to the difficulties and to tackle them more robustly than we might otherwise be able to do. However, we look to our regulator to give us support and help, especially when the press picks up issues in the way that they do. I repeat, I think that the board knows exactly where it is in tackling those issues and I am grateful to the noble Baroness for commending our chief executive, who has been relentless in his work to improve the organisation and will be so in pursuing the work for the development of practice. Should local authorities fail—I sincerely hope that they do not; there is every hope that they can find solutions to the independence question—no doubt CAFCASS will by then be in good health to be reconsidered.