Welsh Assembly committee warns councils not to base decisions in relation to looked after children on cost

It is “critical” that all decisions about vulnerable children in the looked after system are based around providing for their well-being, rather than being influenced by short term savings, a report by the Welsh Assembly’s children and young people committee has warned.

In its ten-month inquiry, the committee heard evidence from children who had spent time in the child placement system. Many paid tribute to the foster carers they stayed with, but there were concerns about the number of times some had to move. One child had been placed 11 times in seven years.

Helen Mary Jones, chair of the committee, said: “This is a particular concern to the committee. We heard that since 2006 the number of children who had been place three or more times within a year had dropped by 4%.

“While this demonstrates an improvement, the committee doesn’t feel it is good enough and the Welsh government must work with local authorities and child welfare organisations to improve that figure.”

The committee also concluded that while there were plenty of examples of good practice in Wales, there were concerns that process and procedure were – on occasions – put before the best interests of the child.

Mary Jones said: “No two children have the same needs. By trying to squeeze them to fit into a rigid process we risk doing more harm than good.”

She acknowledged that social workers are an “easy target”, and said the report called for them to be given better support. A consistent message of the inquiry has been that the looked after system has the potential to change lives for the better, she added.

The report contained 33 recommendations across a range of areas. These include calling on the Welsh government to:

• Produce statutory guidance outlining that cost should not be used by local authorities to initially short list potential placements for a child. “Such guidance should clearly state that cost must only be used by local authorities to differentiate between potential placements that are considered to have mutually suitable intended outcomes for a child”
• Allow foster care providers to feed in comments on the effectiveness of the placement process and on the effectiveness of their communications with local authorities, including through the Children’s Commissioning Support Resource
• Provide guidance to local authorities, recommending they provide an information sharing checklist and flowchart to their social workers, covering whether they should share information with foster carers and children of foster parents
• Trial more effective ways of information sharing between governmental agencies, and issue statutory guidance to all local authorities, NHS Trusts and Local Health Boards to enable the production of written interagency protocols
• Progress its work on giving independent reviewing officers statutory duties to monitor the implementation of decisions made as part of placement reviews, and give more guidance to these officers across a range of areas
• Continue its work towards producing legislation to ensure that “everyone working in the field of child welfare, and the future of children, is legal required to listen to their voices”
• Provide statutory guidance detailing that when a placement review is schedule, the child’s advocate is informed with sufficient time to listen to the views of the child or young person and assist them in completing responses to consultation papers
• Work with the Care Council for Wales and local authorities to trial a Social Work Consultant role, which would enjoy appropriate remuneration and respect, and
• Engage with local authorities to ensure that there are effective, auditable mechanisms and clear lines of accountability for the transfer of care, including health care, when a child is placed out of county, and across any internal service boundaries.