Hundreds of experts sign letter calling for independent review of care system

The letter, addressed to education secretary Gavin Williamson, was started by John Radoux, a children’s counsellor who grew up in care and has worked for 16 years in children’s homes.

It presses the government to honour a pledge in the Conservative Party manifesto to carry out a review of the care system.

“We fully support the need for such a review, and want to urge you to be ambitious regarding its scope,” it says.

The letter details “significant concerns that have been highlighted through research, the courts and in the media over recent months”.

It discloses a raft of issues including unregulated care homes, the “disproportionate” number of care leavers in police custody, “rising care bills contributing to ubiquitous council ‘overspends’” and “children being moved chaotically to different foster and children’s homes multiple times”.

“These problems”, the letter says, “and there are many more in children’s social care, have been known to most of us for years – indeed, experienced as a painful reality by some of us as children.”

“The unpalatable truth is this: many thousands of children are being harmed by a system intended to protect, nurture and care for them.”

“This has to change – we, as a society, must do better,” it adds.

Among the letter’s signatories are social workers, foster carers, care-experienced adults, directors of children’s services, academics and charity leaders.

The group is calling for a “wide-ranging” review of the care system which:

• Is commissioned by central government, but genuinely independent of it;
  
• Is framed and led from the outset as being not only non-partisan, but aiming to generate long-term (e.g. 30 years) vision and reforms that command genuine cross-party and cross-sector support and commitment;
• Has very broad frames of reference – there should be no aspect of children’s social care that  the review cannot consider. The review must also include support and provision for those leaving care and adults who have already left care;
• Must be properly resourced, and given a substantial amount of time rather than being hurried to meet an arbitrary delivery deadline;
• Engages and listens widely, embracing diverse and sometimes conflicting professional and citizen perspectives – throughout placing particular emphasis and value on the expertise and insights of those who have either been in the care of the state or who currently are;
• Builds upon the UK’s obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and existing research and good practice.

Radoux said he was prompted to write the letter after years of seeing the same problems crop up across the sector.

"Media coverage of problems in the sector has really ramped up over the last year or so but for years before that we were seeing the same problems that are still being discussed with no resolution; lack of local authority funding, a rise in complex needs and mental health among looked-after children, unregulated care homes and an awful, broken system from children transitioning out of care.

"I had done what everyone else does for years, moaned to colleagues about the issue so I floated the idea of an open letter on Twitter on got enough responses to start writing it," he said.

Radoux now plans to send a copy of the letter to Williamson in the hope it will prompt a review.

Speaking in The Guardian, major Conservative donor Michael Farmer echoed calls for an urgent review of the system, saying it was “at breaking point”.

The senior Tory peer said: “I would urge Mr Johnson to press ahead with a big review of children in care as a priority, because the system he has inherited is at breaking point. It needs to be looked at, root and branch.

“We must also prevent the care system from being a conveyor belt into crime, or other highly detrimental outcomes.”

The last date for signatures to be added to the letter is 21 January.

Latest government figures show that the number of children in care in England and Wales is at a record high. 

The Scottish government has announced that it will launch the findings of its Independent Care Review on 5 February.

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “The care review is a fundamental part of this government’s manifesto. We are moving forward with plans to review how we support vulnerable children and young people, in order to meet their needs and improve their outcomes.”