If integration is the aim, then every minister needs to be a minister for children

Similarly, at governmental level, it’s not enough to have a single Minister in charge of policy relating to babies, children, and young people. Looking after this group spans too wide a breadth of policy. Every minister must be a minister for children. This point was powerfully brought home when we discussed putting children at the heart of Integrated Care Systems, the new structures being established by the forthcoming Health and Care bill.

It was heartening when the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Children, which I co-chair, met with children, parents, parliamentarians and the children’s sector to discuss integration, that the minister for health, Edward Argar, got it.

He recognised that an integrated approach to services for children would involve many of his government colleagues and that listening to children and families is essential if they are to collectively meet the challenges ahead.

So, what are the opportunities and where are the possible pitfalls in replacing Clinical Commissioning Groups with Integrated Care Systems (ICS)?

Recent events have underlined that safeguarding needs to be at the heart of policy relating to integration. And we cannot undermine the work done by local safeguarding partnerships as local areas move to the ICS model. Effective data-sharing for every child is essential if we are going to get safeguarding right. When this happens, teachers, doctors and the police can be the eyes and ears of social services.

But data sharing is also vital to children with complex overlapping needs. The system of support can leave them feeling shunted from pillar to post, explaining and re-explaining the harrowing challenges they face at every turn, before getting the support they need.

We also need to avoid the sense of helplessness that comes when services don’t listen. Co-producing integrated care with children and families enables them to have a sense of ownership and agency in decisions made by practitioners and policymakers.

On this final point the minister, Edward Argar, pledged at the APPGC to meet with children to hear their ideas for allotting government resources and taxpayers’ money. The National Children’s Bureau has already coordinated a productive meeting with young people and Treasury officials ahead of the Spending Review as part of the sector-wide ‘Children at the Heart’ campaign. So, to have a similar meeting when the minister and civil servants from the Department for Health and Social Care can be in listening mode makes me hopeful. Despite the challenges ahead, the road to more integrated care is progressing on firm foundations.

Tim Loughton MP is co-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Children