Major review to investigate rising numbers of children in care

The seven-month long review launches this week and will investigate the reasons for the recent rises as well as the impact of national government policy on local children in care trends.

This will include welfare changes as well as funding for early intervention support for vulnerable families. In addition, it will look to highlight areas that have successfully addressed a rise in care applications to see what other areas can learn from them.

Government statistics published earlier this year show that the number of children in care is rising at its fastest rate in five years.

The figures show there were 72,670 children in care in the 12 months to the end of March 2017, compared with 70,440 the year before and 69,480 in 2015.

The number of applications for children to be taken into care are also at record levels with a total of 14,597 in 2016/17 - an increase of 37.4 per cent on the 2013/14 figure of 10,620.

The review is being managed by the charity Family Rights Group and led by a stakeholder group, chaired by Nigel Richardson, the former director of children's services at Leeds City Council.

Also sitting on the stakeholder group is children's commissioner for England Anne Longfield, Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) chief executive Anthony Douglas and Sir James Munby, president of the High Court's family division and England's most senior family court judge.

In September last year Munby warned that unless the increasing number of care applications was addressed the children in care system was facing "crisis".

Family Rights Group chief executive Cathy Ashley, said the timing of the review will ensure it can report before Munby retires next July. The final report from the review will feature recommendations for both local areas and government.

"All of us coming together presents a powerful lobbying force," said Ashley.

"We need to look at poverty, cuts to family support services and benefit reforms. But there are significant local variations. Part of it is looking at where is it that they seem to have been able to contain a care population in a safe way, both the approaches they have taken and the conditions.

"Is it about clarity of leadership? Is it about having a stable management and workforce? What partnership models are they using to engage with families?"

Others sitting on the stakeholder group include Lancaster University professor of social work Karen Broadhurst, the Local Government Association's principal children and young people policy adviser Ian Keating and Association of Directors of Children's Services president Alison Michalska.

"The number of care applications being made to courts in recent years has increased year-on year, as has the number of children coming into our care," said Michalska.

"This rise, in itself, isn't necessarily a bad thing as it means that local authorities are keeping more children and young people with the highest level of need safe, but it has placed considerable strain on the system across the board.

"It's vital that wherever possible local authorities and their partners are doing all they can to support families to stay together and in many places local authorities are remodelling their services, including by refocusing resources into edge of care services, to do this but this is no easy task at a time when demand is rising and budgets have been reduced significantly.

"A review which considers changes that could be made nationally and locally to reduce the number of children coming into care safely is long overdue."