Education and Adoption Bill

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): I rise to support clause 13, which promotes best practice on adoption through regional adoption agencies. First, however, I should like to congratulate my Cheshire neighbour, the Minister for Children and Families, on his promotion to Minister of State, and pay tribute to him for the excellent work that he led in the previous Parliament to improve the adoption process and the support for adopters and adopted children. It is clearly in recognition of that that he has retained his portfolio, and he is bringing forward this further initiative today with undiminished vigour. I know that he grew up with some 90 fostered or adopted siblings and that he understands these issues intimately. He understands that living in a loving family can give a child the best possible start in life.

Real progress on adoption has already been made as a result of reforms initiated by the previous Government. In 2014, 5,000 children were found the permanent home that they needed—a record increase of 26% on the previous 12 months. The increase in the past three years has been a combined 63%—a remarkable achievement reflecting an improvement in the life chances of thousands of children. That has been achieved through implementing determined improvements, initiated, as I say, by the previous Government. Clause 13 follows on from that.

Since 2010, a number of adoption support reforms have been introduced so that the families can be confident that support will be provided if needed. These include placing responsibility on local authorities to inform prospective adopters and adoptees of their rights to assessments of need and entitlements to other adoption support services; improving access to specialist therapeutic services through the £19 million adoption support fund; extending entitlements on priority schools admissions; access to the pupil premium; and reforming adoption pay and leave.

22 Jun 2015 : Column 705

In 2013 the adopter approvals process was reformed to ensure that prospective adopters could be assessed and approved more quickly. Most approvals now take place within six months—or should do. The new assessment process is just as rigorous as its predecessor but is structured to ensure swift and appropriate progress. The Department for Education has ensured that there has been continued improvement in opportunities to support matching children to adopters. That includes the work of the national adoption register service and the provision of exchange days and adoption activity days.

The Department funds First4Adoption, which is a national information service for adoption in England. The Department has also provided £17 million in additional funding over 2013-16 to help voluntary adoption agencies to recruit and approve more adopters, including those who can meet the needs of children who are harder to place. The Government have provided local authorities with £200 million over 2014-16 to support adoption reform on the ground and improve the recruitment of adopters. Last year, the Department and First4Adoption worked closely together in developing promotional resources in order to reach out to anyone interested in adoption. It is particularly important—the Minister is aware of my concern about this—that adoption is promoted to women with unplanned pregnancies as an option for them to consider. In 2014, the introduction of the Adoption Leadership Board headed by Sir Martin Narey has helped to drive further progress in recruiting new adopters.

Tremendous progress has been made, but more needs to be done. More than 3,000 children are still waiting to be adopted—to be matched with new parents. Sadly, more than half have already spent 18 months in care, despite enough approved adopters being readily available. Ministers are right to try to address this; it is so important because it is a matter of social justice. Children who experience a loving, stable family home in their early years are more likely to replicate that in later life in their own homes. Sadly, that is also the case vice versa. Children who do not experience supportive family life often experience other unfair disadvantages that are drivers of poverty, educational and employment challenges, physical and mental health issues, addictions, and debt and relationship problems often lasting well into adult years.

Clause 13 is important in promoting, as it will, best practice across regions. When trying to place a child from, say, east Cheshire for adoption, there is surely no reason to focus on east Cheshire families if a loving family in west Cheshire, or indeed nearby Staffordshire, provides the answer. Many of the current boundaries are arbitrary. I am pleased that Ministers want to break this down and ask local authorities and local adoption agencies to work collaboratively and creatively on the recruitment, assessment and approval of prospective adopters, and on decisions about the placement of children with families and ongoing support.

I understand that in the United States a form of “adoption speed dating”—my term—allowing children to meet prospective families is proving more successful than anticipated. Prospective adopters might have a particular picture in mind of the kind of child or the age of the child they want to adopt, but given the chance to meet several children in an informal atmosphere, they often realise that they can widen their ideas, and 

22 Jun 2015 : Column 706

there are successful matches from such events are at positive levels. That is the kind of creative thinking that the Bill seeks to encourage.

I was surprised to discover that there are as many as 180 different councils and agencies recruiting and matching children for adoption. That number seems incredibly large, especially as some provide adoption for a relatively small number of children. The number of agencies must be bewildering for would-be adopters, so the possibility offered by the Bill for the rationalisation of those numbers should promote the sharing and increase of best practice, as well as assist would-be adopters.

Of course, there are currently no barriers to councils working together to streamline adoption services, so I am pleased that there are examples of good practice to lead the way. For example, Warrington, Wigan and St Helens councils are already working together in the north-west. I am pleased that councils will be able to draw on external expertise to make their arrangements. Coram, a successful voluntary adoption service, already works with councils, including Harrow, Kent and Cambridgeshire councils. They—and, more importantly, local children—are already benefiting from those joint-working arrangements.

I am pleased that the Minister is on record as stating that he would prefer regional adoption agencies to spring up organically and be organised locally—as opposed to being imposed by Whitehall—and in a form chosen by the local authority and/or registered adoption society. We are all agreed that, in this policy area, one size does not fit all, so I welcome the fact that the Government’s approach reflects that.

I know we are using the term “regional adoption agencies” to describe the outcome of the reforms, but it is worth saying that they do not have to meet some fixed definition of “regional”. Ministers have said that local councils are free to organise themselves however they see fit, as long as they achieve sufficient scale to drive the efficiencies we all want to see. New regional adoption agencies can work across county or regional boundaries, minimising the delays in matching children with new homes. We all know that is critical, as a few months can be a very long time in the life of a young child, with their attendant needs for development, security and a loving family. I welcome the Government’s commitment to practical and financial support to help to deliver those changes. I am confident that, with that support, the majority of local authorities will see the advantages of joint working.

Evidence suggests that councils tend to look for adopters in-house before looking for them in other councils, which can result in children waiting longer than need be for new families. The Bill’s proposals are therefore important, as they will produce a culture change. The Government are sending out a clear message that that should happen—hence the proposal that councils should form regional agencies voluntarily but that, through new powers, the Government could, if need be, require councils to combine their adoption functions if they fail to join services voluntarily within the next two years. That underlines the determination of the Government to see these changes happen.

I urge all Members across the House to support clause 13—indeed, I have heard no valid arguments as to why we should not do so.

Health and Social Care

Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con): Her Majesty’s Gracious Speech included the welcome commitment to give every child the best start in life. I am optimistic that our Government’s legislative programme will prioritise strengthening families and boosting family stability, particularly given the Prime Minister’s own passion for these issues, which are vital for the nation’s economic and social welfare, and the fact that families were mentioned nearly 100 times in the 2015 Conservative party manifesto. Without the constraints of coalition, we have the opportunity to develop a robust and comprehensive range of family policies.

States have a vested interest in making families stronger. They make a contribution to society by producing a competitive labour force, caring for family members of all ages, playing an instrumental role in healthy child and youth development and putting a heart into local communities. However, there are profound social consequences when, for whatever reason, families fail. The high level of family breakdown in our country costs £48 billion per annum, and disproportionately affects people in our poorest communities, where two thirds of 15-year-olds no longer live with both their parents. With our Conservative commitment to compassion and social justice, we simply cannot ignore this issue. If it is sensitively handled, this could mark us out as the true party of the family.

I urge the Prime Minister to appoint a family champion—a Cabinet-level Minister to strengthen families. Our ground-breaking family test for all policies is welcome, but it is reactive to the proposals of other Departments, rather than proactive in forming a family-strengthening approach across all areas of policy, as a champion for families at Secretary of State level would do. We need to match the promises we have made on economic support for families with more policies not only to prevent family breakdown but to promote healthy relationships, just as we promote physical health and wellbeing. Children’s health and wellbeing are fundamental to their educational attainment, and their ability to thrive in the workplace 

2 Jun 2015 : Column 532

and in wider society rests on their benefiting from safe, stable and nurturing relationships with those closest to them—and for most, that means their family.

We ignore this at our peril. The state cannot be a surrogate family. Supporting family relationships is one of the driving principles of the troubled families programme, which has rightly been extended, but we must do more. We need places in every community where people can go when relationship problems are beginning to emerge, in order to enable everyone—including couples, and parents of toddlers and teenagers—to build strong relationships from the outset and to maintain healthy relationships into later life. This, in turn, could help to address many other challenges, such as mental ill-health, obesity, self-harm, addictions, loneliness and child poverty. However, many families have no role models to look to as the basis for a successful family life. Family life throws out challenges for us all. Real complexities can ensue, as we have seen from the troubled families programme, if families are not equipped to make a go of it. For almost a decade, organisations such as the Centre for Social Justice, and individuals such as its associate director Dr Samantha Callan, have been calling for change.

One important change would be for Sure Start children’s centres to broaden their offer and become family hubs—local nerve centres co-ordinating all family-related support. Relationship support and education, at all life stages, would be part of a family hub’s core offer, whether supporting couples in their own relationship, or as parents, or grandparents, or in marriage preparation, or strengthening father involvement, or supporting families as carers for elderly relatives, or when specific challenges occur. For example, many couples will not, or cannot in a timely way, go to Relate, which is one of many organisations that family hubs could host or help families access. To ensure that as many parents as possible know what is on offer at a family hub, local health commissioners should ensure that all antenatal and postnatal services are co-located there. The Field review on poverty and life chances recommended that all birth registrations should take place there, too.

The social justice directorate in the Department for Work and Pensions is piloting a family offer in some children’s centres that takes in some of the aspects I have mentioned, but more is needed. More national leadership will be essential if this scheme is to be implemented at a pace that this country needs to strengthen family life. This brings us back to why we need a family champion.

Education, early intervention and prevention will ensure that families are less dependent on social services and welfare. I stress that I am not just talking about deprived areas here. Broadening Sure Start centres into family hubs would provide an effective means of tackling family breakdown, strengthen family life and help deliver the Conservative vision of giving every child the best start in life.

Finally, I urge the Government to work towards a fully transferrable tax allowance for all married couples. Thirty hours of free childcare amounts to £5,000 a year, and the value of the Government’s tax-free childcare offer is £2,000 a year. What message do those figures send out when the marriage allowance for single earners is just £200 per family? It must be recognised that doubling free early years education and making childcare 

2 Jun 2015 : Column 533

tax free when both parents work without reviewing the marriage person’s tax allowance skews support overwhelmingly towards a particular type of family.

Families in which one parent chooses to take time at home—working and caring within it and investing in their children’s future—while the children are young are doing the right thing just as much as those families in which both partners choose to work outside the home. Stay-at-home parents deserve our appreciation, respect and support.

Over this Parliament, reversing Britain’s tragically eye-wateringly high family breakdown rates must be our ambition—it must be a priority—and strengthening families by supporting healthy family relationships at all ages and stages of life and rolling out family hubs to achieve that should be our vision.

5.12 pm