Decision hangs over Doncaster

Education Secretary Michael Gove has announced an independent review that could lead to a government takeover of children’s services in Doncaster.

The threat follows years of high-profile child protection failures at the South Yorkshire authority and has sparked concerns among council leaders.

Mark Rogers, chair of the children’s network for the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives (Solace) and chief executive of Solihull Council, is concerned about what could result from Gove’s review, which will be led by Julian Le Grand, professor of social policy at the London School of Economics.

He believes that unlike previous occasions where the government has intervened in local services, this case could see Whitehall remove Doncaster’s legal duties for children’s services.

“No council has been legally stripped of its responsibilities and accountabilities before,” he says. “The sector should be worried about this because if the government separated out legal responsibilities, this would fragment the broad range of local public services in a damaging way.”

Damaging for families
Rogers fears that such action could damage provision for families, which is delivered by both adult and children’s services.

“If you outsource both the service and responsibility for it – privatise it effectively – that creates a distance that is difficult to bridge,” he says. “It brings into the system more disconnections, and we have plenty of those already.”

Talk of stripping Doncaster of its children’s services responsibilities could also set a precedent, he adds. “This could be the thin end of the wedge. If Gove considers giving the statutory responsibility to someone else in this case, then he might do that with other things.”

Joe Gibbins, area organiser for Unison in Yorkshire and Humberside, shar