Editorial - Adult social care cash injection must be replicated for children

The extent of pressures on children’s social care, and the impact they are having on vulnerable children and families, are laid bare in the No Good Optionsreport by the all-party parliamentary group for children (APPGC). The report details double-digit rises in the number of initial contacts, child in need assessments, child protection plans and children taken into care since 2010, while over the same period, funding has barely risen (analysis, p12). Despite this, a key theme in the report was of councils failing to provide early help to children in need.

The prioritising of spending on crisis intervention over early help is a major problem, but it is not one of councils’ own making. Any director of children’s services (DCS), council leader and social worker will want to tackle problems as early as possible – but when faced with the stark choice of stepping in to protect a child at risk or working to improve a family’s parenting skills, there is going to be only one winner. It should not be an either/or scenario, but in too many places, the pressure on resources means it is. Some councils are better than others at managing budgets, teams and services to enable prevention work to be carried out, and it is vital that best practice is shared. However, a recent poll by the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) found nine out of 10 DCSs are struggling to support children in need.