Unpacking the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill: A Comprehensive Guide

Image: Fotolia/downunderphoto

By Tim Spencer-Lane

The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill was presented in Parliament on 17 December 2024.

The initial part of the bill includes reforms for children’s social care. The subsequent part addresses education in England. Most reforms regarding social care were anticipated in the policy document, ‘Keeping children safe, helping families thrive’, released in November 2024.

This article recaps the key provisions that will affect social workers.

Family group decision-making

The bill aims to introduce a new section to the Children Act 1989, mandating local authorities that are contemplating a court application for a care or supervision order to offer a family group decision-making (FGDM) meeting to the child’s parents or any individual holding parental responsibility for the child.

The goal of the FGDM meeting is to allow the child’s family network to convene and deliberate on the welfare necessities of the child and propose solutions in response to concerns regarding the child’s wellbeing.

This obligation does not apply should the local authority conclude that it would not serve the child’s best interests.

Child protection and safeguarding

Safeguarding partners

The bill intends to revise the Children Act 2004, making it mandatory for the three safeguarding partners (the local authority, NHS integrated care board, and police) within each locality to include education and childcare “relevant agencies” as essential participants in their multi-agency safeguarding frameworks. Presently, safeguarding partners are only required to collaborate with a “relevant agency” if they deem it appropriate.

Multi-agency child protection teams

The bill seeks to include new provisions in the Children Act 2004, requiring safeguarding partners to establish and manage at least one multi-agency child protection team in their region. The primary objective of these new teams is to assist the local authority in fulfilling its child protection responsibilities under section 47 of the Children Act 1989.

ICBs will be obliged to designate a health professional experienced in children’s health, while the policy will require nominating an officer to be part of each multi-agency child protection team. The local authority must identify someone skilled in education related to children and a social worker experienced with children, with the potential to appoint other suitable individuals following discussions with safeguarding partners.

Information sharing

The bill additionally proposes changes to the Children Act 2004, placing a duty on designated individuals and organizations to share information that may pertain to safeguarding or enhancing the welfare of a child, with other relevant parties in specified contexts. This duty is applicable when the individual believes the sharing may assist the recipient in performing any functions related to the safeguarding or promotion of children’s welfare, unless such disclosure would be harmful to the child.

The responsibility to share information will extend to individuals listed in section 11(1) of the Children Act 2004, including local authorities, ICBs, NHS trusts/foundation trusts, police departments, probation services, and youth offending teams, along with education and childcare “relevant agencies.”

Consistent child identifier

The bill also introduces provisions under the Children Act 2004 for a consistent child identifier (also referred to as a single unique identifier or SUI). Designated persons must utilize this consistent identifier when processing information related to a child for safeguarding and welfare promotion purposes.

Support for children in care or kinship care, and those transitioning from care

Kinship local offer

The bill proposes changes to the Children Act 1989, necessitating local authorities to publish information regarding their general approach to supporting children in kinship care and their caregivers in the area, alongside any available financial backing in their locality (the “kinship local offer”).

Local authorities must undertake reasonable steps to ensure that children in kinship care and their caregivers receive the information outlined in the kinship local offer.

Supporting educational success

By amending the Children Act 1989, local authorities would be obligated to take suitable measures to promote the educational outcomes for children in need, those who were previously looked after, and children in kinship care.

Actions taken under this obligation may include helping children to overcome obstacles to their educational success and enhancing school attendance. This duty is a strategic responsibility, which does not extend to the educational results of individual children.

The local authority must assign at least one individual to fulfill this duty (typically this is the head of the virtual school).

Supporting young people leaving care

The bill also proposes a new requirement in the Children Act 1989 for each local authority to evaluate whether each former relevant child (up to the age of 25) needs “staying close support” and, if warranted by their welfare, to provide that support.

“Staying close support” is assistance provided to help the former relevant child: (1) locate and maintain suitable housing and (2) access services related to health and wellbeing, relationships, education and training, employment, and community participation. Support comprises the provision of advice, information, and representation.

Moreover, adjustments to the Children and Social Work Act 2017 will mandate each local authority to also disclose the measures it has implemented to assist and support care leavers in their transition to adulthood and independent living.

Accommodation for children

Regional collaboration

The bill aims to amend the Children Act 1989 to grant the secretary of state the power to direct two or more local authorities to establish regional collaboration agreements.to execute their duties concerning the accommodation of looked after children.

The arrangements could involve: (1) jointly executing their strategic accommodation responsibilities, (2) having one of the local authorities execute those functions on behalf of the others, or (3) a corporate entity, as might be defined in the secretary of state’s directive, to aid them in fulfilling those tasks.

Deprivation of liberty

The bill also encompasses several modifications to section 25 of the Children Act 1989. It would alter the terminology from “restricting” liberty to “depriving” children of their liberty, thereby better representing the essence and intention of this section.

Additionally, the bill would authorize the deprivation of liberty for children in various alternative placement types beyond merely a secure children’s home. It broadens the application of section 25 to include accommodations intended for the care and treatment of children that may serve to deprive a child of their liberty (“relevant accommodation”).

The secretary of state would be empowered to delineate in regulations: (1) the maximum duration for which a child can be kept in relevant accommodation both with and without court authorization, (2) the group of children eligible for placement in relevant accommodation, and (3) a characterization of the alternative accommodations.

At present, numerous children are experiencing deprivation of their liberty outside of a statutory framework, through the inherent jurisdiction of the High Court.

The government’s objective is to “offer an alternative statutory avenue to sanction the deprivation of liberty of a child within a more adaptable form of accommodation, thereby incorporating more deprivation of liberty scenarios under a statutory structure via section 25, which includes criteria for access, necessary review intervals, and parity with [secure children’s homes] regarding access to legal aid.”

Regulating provider groups

The bill aims to grant Ofsted new authorities concerning parent undertakings (i.e., situations where multiple settings are owned or managed by the same private or voluntary provider group).

The bill seeks to impose an obligation on parent undertakings to create and execute an improvement plan when Ofsted identifies quality concerns in multiple settings and has reasonable grounds to suspect potential registration cancellation regarding those settings.

If parent undertakings fail to comply with these stipulations, Ofsted will possess the authority to impose an unlimited financial penalty.

Tackling unregistered children’s homes

The bill also introduces new powers for Ofsted to levy financial penalties for violations of the Care Standards Act 2000, including the operation of unregistered children’s homes. This aims to provide Ofsted with a swifter alternative to prosecution in such instances.

Financial oversight regime

The bill would initiate a financial oversight regime for relevant children’s social care providers who meet criteria that will be outlined in regulations. These are expected to relate to the size of the provider and whether it would be challenging to replace in the event of a failure.

The bill would empower the secretary of state to require providers subject to the regime to present a “recovery and resolution plan,” detailing risks to their financial viability and actions they intend to undertake in response to those risks.

The secretary of state would also possess the authority to arrange an independent business review of a provider if there is substantial financial risk to its sustainability. Furthermore, the secretary of state would be obligated to alert local authorities if there exists a genuine possibility of relevant services collapsing, which could have negative repercussions for the councils or any children under their care.

Limiting profits

This bill also makes provisions for regulations allowing the secretary of state to impose a cap on any profits accrued by a non-local authority registered children’s social care provider. The secretary of state may only enact such regulations if convinced that it is necessary. The government has indicated that this measure would only be utilized if other initiatives fail to adequately curb profiteering in the children’s social care placements market.

Agency workers

The bill seeks to authorize the secretary of state to establish regulations applicable to all English local authorities regarding the employment of “agency workers” in children’s social care. The regulations may stipulate that the agency workers fulfill specific criteria and establish provisions governing their management and the conditions under which they are supplied to local authorities.

Ill-treatment or wilful neglect

This bill also aims to address a gap in existing legislation by broadening the offenses of ill-treatment or wilful neglect by a care worker or care provider toward someone in their care, as outlined in the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015, to include children aged 16 or 17 in regulated settings in England.

Currently, the 2015 act safeguards against ill-treatment or wilful neglect by care workers offering healthcare to an adult or child or social care for an adult, while the Children and Young Persons Act protects individuals below 16 from cruelty by those responsible for them.

Children not in school

The bill proposes various reforms aimed at safeguarding children being educated at home. Most of these involve alterations to the Education Act 1996 and entail:

• Mandatory registers of children not in school within each local authority area in England, along with a duty on local authorities to assist the children on their registers (should a parent request this).
• Modifications to the legal framework governing school attendance orders (SAOs), such as instituting statutory timelines for issuing and processing SAOs and making it illegal for parents to remove a child under an SAO from school without adhering to the correct procedures.
• A stipulation requiring a parent to secure local authority approval to home educate if a child is: (1) subjected to an inquiry under section 47 of the Children Act 1989, (2) on a child protection plan, or (3) enrolled in a special school or academy.
• A power for the local authority, in instances where a child is involved in a section 47 Children Act 1989 inquiry or on a child protection plan and is already being home educated, to assess whether it is in the child’s best interests to attend school and mandate that the child is registered at a school.
• An obligation for local authorities to consider the home environment and other learning settings when determining if children should be required to attend school.

What happens next?

The bill will undergo debate in Parliament and will undoubtedly be revised throughout its journey. It is likely to become law sometime in spring 2025.

Certain provisions will take effect the day the act is enacted (such as the powers to create regulations and orders), while other provisions will come into effect two months later (such as the duty to publish information for kinship carers and children in kinship arrangements, along with the expansion of the ill-treatment or wilful neglect offenses).

Some measures will be rolled out over an extended timeline. For instance, the new multi-agency child protection teams are not expected to be implemented until 2027.

Tim Spencer-Lane is a lawyer specializing in social care, mental capacity, and mental health, and serves as a legal editor for Community Care Inform.