A new report has condemned the implementation of the Children and Families Act 2014, suggesting it was “a missed opportunity and has ultimately failed in meaningfully improving the lives of children and young people”.
The Act was intended to give greater protection to vulnerable children, better support for children whose parents are separating, a new system to help children with special educational needs and disabilities, and help for parents to balance work and family life.
Yet, following the publication of the report by the Children and Families Act 2014 Committee in the House of Lords, Children and Families Act 2014: A failure of implementation, it’s clear that insufficient data, a lack of joined-up action at all levels, and inadequate implementation and monitoring of the Act has contributed to its failure.
“The Children and Families Act 2014 was passed with the good intentions of giving greater protection to vulnerable children, better support for children whose parents are separating, a new system to help children with special educational needs and disabilities, and help for parents to balance work and family life,” said Baroness Tyler of Enfield, Chair of the Children and Families 2014 Committee, continuing:
“Regrettably, our inquiry has shown that this could have been the case, had any real focus been on implementing and monitoring the impact of the Act, without the added incessant churn within the Government. Instead, it was a missed opportunity and has ultimately failed in meaningfully improving the lives of children and young people.”
As part of its report, the Committee made a series recommendations to improve the framework moving forwards, including:
- Addressing the unacceptable ethnic and racial disparities in the adoption system by establishing an outcome focussed task force, accountable to the Secretary of State.
- Improving post-placement support for adopters and kinship carers including the expansion of the Adoption Support Fund, allowing it to be used for more than therapy and ensuring it is also focused on early intervention.
- Developing a safe and modern digital contact system for post adoption contact. The Committee urge the Government to support adoption agencies in developing and rolling-out a safe and appropriate national digital system for contact as a priority.
- Addressing the ever-growing delays in public family law cases, which began long before the pandemic. This requires improved data gathering and sharing, and top-level leadership of an often-disparate system by Government through the Family Justice Board. The Committee urge the Government to publish an ambitious target for the timeliness of public children cases, along with an associated action plan laying out how it aims to achieve this reduction and how it will measure progress.
- Producing an impartial advice website for separating couples, providing clear information on the family justice system and to reconsider proposals to make mediation obligatory, by replacing Mediation Information & Assessment Meetings and the mediation voucher schemes with a universal voucher scheme for a general advice appointment.
- Reviewing the current approach to empowering the voice of the child in family law proceedings including recommending the Family Justice Council reviews the guidance setting out the approach to judges meeting with children.
- Creating an ambition for a move towards a new dedicated 12-week paternity leave allowance and making flexible working a day one right to request and encouraging businesses to advertise jobs flexibly from the outset.
- Building robust systems for monitoring and assessing the implementation of legislation, including data collection and sharing and requiring the Government to publish a post-legislative scrutiny plan once an Act receives Royal Assent setting out how the success of an Act will be measured.
Baroness Tyler of Enfield added:
“The welfare of children and young people should be the Government’s paramount concern when developing policies in this area. We urge them not to allow another eight years to pass before they make the improvements which are so demonstrably necessary.”
A government response to the report is expected on 6th February 2023.
