Arthur Labinjo-Hughes: Education Secretary refuses to rule out Children Act changes
Fiona Simpson
Thursday, December 9, 2021
Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi “will not rule out legislative changes” to the Children Act 1989 in response to the death of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, he has told MPs.
Answering questions from ministers on the death of the six-year-old in Solihull in June 2020, Zahawi said: “We need to carefully consider all possible routes to help ensure that children’s social care has the powers that it needs to protect vulnerable children like Arthur.”
The government has launched a national safeguarding review into the killing, for which Arthur’s stepmother has been jailed for murder and his father jailed for manslaughter, and commissioned a joint area inspection of the agencies who had contact with him before his death.
The Education Secretary was asked by David Simmonds, Conservative MP for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, if he agrees “that the Children Act 1989, which provides the main legislative and operational underpinning of children’s social care, is perhaps in need of updating?”
Zahawi said: “I will not rule out legislative changes if we need to make them.”
However, he added that the government must wait for the outcomes of the review and inspection into Arthur’s death and the publication of the ongoing Care Review before “specific legislative improvements” are looked into.
Zahawi also referred to the Care Review in relation to questions over changes to child protection systems and the role of social workers in dealing with families.
“I know that Josh MacAlister, who leads that review, will make recommendations on what a decisive child protection response needs to look like, given that that sits at the core of the system he is reviewing.
“Importantly, the review will look at how social workers, especially those with the most experience, can spend time with families and on protecting children. We all know that social workers do their best work with families, not behind a desk,” he said.
Zahawi told the House of Commons that the current system was in need of “bold and wide-ranging reforms” including improved investment in frontline social work including recruitment and retention.
“We need to ensure that we continue to retain the more experienced social worker leadership, and I hope that the MacAlister review will make some operational recommendations on that,” he said, in response to comments from Munira Wilson, Liberal Democrat MP Twickenham. She noted a 7.5 per cent vacancy rate for children’s social workers and a “high turnover rate” across the workforce.
Zahawi went on to reference two fast-track training schemes for social workers set up by MacAlister in his role at children’s social work provider Frontline.
“We had two successful schemes with Frontline and Step Up to Social Work, which resulted in thousands of people coming into the social care profession and the number of social workers going up by 10 per cent since 2017,” he added.
The Care Review was launched in January and plans to publish its final recommendations in spring next year.
