Lightweight guidance puts children's interests at risk

Process too often got in the way of practice – in social work, youth services and elsewhere. What’s more, a lighter touch from the centre chimes with this government’s approach towards localism and delegating decisions to communities.

However, its appetite is now showing signs of becoming dangerously voracious. Statutory guidance across all services sets essential benchmarks for good practice. But the long-awaited careers advice guidance for schools, published last week just five months before they inherit this responsibility from councils, stands at a derisory three-and-a-half pages. Face-to-face advice, it suggests, would only be used where schools deem it necessary. As today’s teenagers enter the most challenging labour market and higher education landscape for generations, professionals have branded the guidance as a "disgrace", "dismal" and "meaningless". Indeed, it is not alone in its featherweight status.