Clause 9
Children and Young Persons Bill [Lords]
4:30 pm
Beverley Hughes (Minister of State (Children, Young People and Families; Minister for the North West), Department for Children, Schools and Families; Stretford and Urmston, Labour)
That is an important point that goes to the heart of my response to the amendment. The back-up procedures that we are putting in place will start to inculcate what the hon. Lady rightly calls a change of culture, which is what is needed in some local authorities.
For example, as part of making the proposals a reality, we published the new volume 1 of the court order guidance in January. The guidance introduced a requirement that relatives and friends should, as far as possible, be considered as potential carers in all cases, as part of the care plan that is lodged with the court at the outset of care proceedings. About 60 per cent. of children are looked after as a result of going through court proceedings, so we have a potentially strong lever here. The guidance that the courts now have makes it clear that they are required to check that the care plan has thoroughly examined and assessed whether there is a possibility of the child living with family or a friend. If not, the courts are required to ask why not. That is one important lever.
Another important lever, which relates to the proposal in the amendment, is that all local authorities are now required to use the integrated children’s system. That is an electronic system or template setting out in great detail the content of the care plan. Under the ICS, the care plan for a looked-after child requires the social worker to record evidence of the wider family’s capacity to care for the child as one of the family and environmental factors. That includes the practical efforts that have been made to ensure that such placements could happen.
Our intention is to make kinship care a reality in practice, and all of us on the Committee share that intention. Under the ICS, we are requiring social workers—this is true of all the care plan, but particularly where children do not go through the court processes and the court does not examine these issues—not only to mention their assessment of the wider family’s capacity to care for the child, but to give evidence in a particular place in the care plan to support that assessment.