Select committee to scrutinise Government strategy for reform of children’s social care

The Education Committee has this week (4 December) launched an inquiry to examine whether Government social care reforms are going “far and fast enough”.

The cross-party committee’s inquiry will focus on support offered to children with complex needs, how the sector is funded via local authorities, and ways to improve “early intervention” to tackle rising demand.

The committee revealed that there has been a 7.29% increase in children receiving support from children’s services since 2010, despite a 0.3% fall in 2022.

The number of children on child protection plans is 50,780, an increase of 29.95% from 2010 but a decrease of 0.3% from 2022.

Further, there are now 27.5% more looked after children, including adoptions, since 2010.

Marking almost a year since the Government announced its ‘Stable Homes, Built on Love’ strategy, the committee revealed it will look at how effective it has been so far and is projected to be in future.

The proposals set out in the ‘Built on Love’ social care implementation strategy are organised under six ‘pillars’ of reform:

• Family help provides the right support at the right time so that children can thrive with their families
• A decisive multi-agency child protection system
• Unlocking the potential of family networks
• Putting love, relationships and a stable home at the heart of being a child in care
• A valued, supported and highly skilled social worker for every child who needs one
• A system that continuously learns and improves, and makes better use of evidence and data

The Education Committee said its inquiry will investigate what it describes as the “growing issue” of young people being placed in settings “located many miles outside of their local areas because of scarce accommodation, even to different counties”.

The inquiry will also look into the social care market, “as many children’s services are contracted by local authorities to private providers”, said the committee.

Further, MPs will examine protection for vulnerable children and support for care leavers. The committee warned that most recent government data shows that 38% of care leavers aged 19-21 are not in education, employment or training, compared to 11% of all young people in that age group.

Education Committee Chair Robin Walker MP said: “The children’s social care sector is facing pressures on multiple fronts, underpinned by rising costs, growing demand and a lack of ability to identify and tend to issues before they reach a crisis point. I have seen examples of local authorities whose spending on children’s social care is now overtaking the vast sums they spend on care for adults. This increase in demand is also a reason why we should look to support alternatives to residential care, such as adoption, kinship and foster care. 

“We know that the high stakes, selfless work by professionals in this space is crucial to keep children safe from harm and on the right track. As we get underway with this inquiry in 2024, it will have been a year since the Government announced its ‘Stable Homes, Built on Love’ strategy. It will be the right time for my cross-party colleagues and I to look across the board at whether the many policies in that strategy are really turning things around, or whether the Government needs to go further and faster.” 

Lottie Winson