Cafcass's management could not have predicted the sustained increase in care cases from November 2008. Cafcass had to deal with an extra 200 new care cases each month from November 2008 - around 40 per cent more. Simultaneously, the courts needed advice on hundreds more children involved in family breakdowns. Between November 2008 and July 2009, the number of children involved in care and other public law proceedings without a dedicated family court adviser grew from around 250 to 1,250. Cafcass was not well placed to respond efficiently and effectively because it had only partly resolved known organisational challenges around management information, IT systems and staff engagement by the time demand started to increase. Cafcass increased its capacity and, between August 2009 and June 2010, reduced the proportion of children without a family court adviser, from 10 per cent to 2 per cent in care cases and from 34 per cent to 5 per cent in family breakdown cases. The Department allowed Cafcass to bring forward £4.6 million from the 2009-10 and 2010-11 budgets and gave Cafcass an extra £4.8 million. The cost increases do not represent a failure of value for money. Cafcass is now implementing a £10 million transformation programme that should allow it to improve how it deals with future fluctuations in demand. In order to be successful, these changes will require greater organisational cohesiveness and improvements in staff morale.
The Government's focus on driving up the number of adoptions should not be delivered at the expense of other routes to permanence, such as special guardianship or kinship care, for children for whom adoption may not be suitable. The Committee is also concerned that there is a significant lack of information about rates of adoption breakdown. The most pressing issue is that of post-adoption support. Children adopted from care have a range of needs due to their early life experiences, often of abuse or neglect, which are not resolved simply by being adopted. There should be a statutory duty on local authorities and other service commissioning bodies to ensure the provision of post-adoption support. Cost concerns need to take into account the significant amount of money which local authorities save when a child is adopted from care. The drive to increase adoptions must also not undermine preventative programmes and efforts to keep birth families together. The Committee also recommends a pilot scheme offering support to families who have had children removed from their care. Other recommendations from the Committee include: encouraging more local authorities to move towards joint adoption services with neighbouring authorities and adoption agencies; ending the current practice of employing Independent Reviewing Officers (IROs) within local authorities and, instead, employing them externally, giving them the independence needed to promote the best interests of children; providing a designated teacher with responsibility for the wellbeing for adopted children within every school; and improving the training and supervision of social workers
The legal framework of family justice in England and Wales is strong. Its principles are right, in particular the starting point that the welfare of children must be paramount. Every year 500,000 parents and children are involved in the system. But the system is under great strain: cases take far too long (the average case took 53 weeks in 2010); too many private law disputes end up in court; the system lacks coherence; there is growing mistrust leading to layers of checking and scrutiny; little mutual learning or feedback; a worrying lack of IT and management information. The Review's recommendations aim: to bring greater coherence through organisational change and better management; making the system more able to cope with current and future pressures; to reduce duplication of scrutiny to the appropriate level; and to divert more issues away from the courts. The chapters of the review cover: the current system; the proposed Family Justice Service; public law; private law; financial implications and implementation; and there are eighteen annexes. The proposals are now out for consultation, with the final report due in autumn 2011.
Family Courts will need to be more prepared to cope with litigants representing themselves following Government reforms to Legal Aid - MPs on the Commons Justice Committee have warned in a new report. The MPs are also calling on the Government to scrap the provisions in the Children, Schools and Families Act 2010 to allow media access to Family Courts following universal condemnation of the plans. The report recommends that Ministers reformulate proposals to increase transparency in Family Courts putting the views of children centre stage. The committee rejects the Family Justice Panel's Interim Report recommendation that a statement be introduced into legislation to "reinforce" the importance of a child having a meaningful relationship with both parents. The MPs believe it ought to be obvious to the courts, and to parents, that a child deserves a meaningful relationship with both parents but that inclusion of a statement in the law could create confusion and the mistaken impression the law had changed. The committee also calls on judges to reduce the costs and delays in case management associated with expert reports. Judges should be encouraged to, where possible, insist on joint reports and require clear explanations of why additional assessments are needed, ensuring the parties' solicitors work together to reduce the number of questions for the expert. Government plans to fold Cafcass into the proposed new Family Justice Service do not go far enough, according to the report. The committee calls for this to be the first step in a series of reforms designed to transform the body into a less process-driven, more child focused and integral part of family justice.
Ofsted today publishes the Annual Report 2010/11, drawing on over 31,000 inspection visits across the schools, early years, children's social care and learning and skills sectors in England. Launched by Her Majesty's Chief Inspector Miriam Rosen, this in-depth analysis provides an insight into the quality of those services for children and learners, what is working well and what needs to improve. The report highlights how an inadequate inspection judgement, whether for a children's home or a school, a college or a nursery, can be an important catalyst for change. For example, the total number of schools in a category of concern - that is judged to be in special measures or being given a notice to improve - reduced from 553 at the end of last year to 451 at the end of August 2011. Over a fifth of schools judged inadequate at their previous inspection were found to be good or better when inspected again this year. In addition, schools are now emerging from special measures faster than the previous year - after an average of 18 months rather than 20. In inspections of local authorities'; children's social care, where Ofsted completed the second full year of unannounced inspection of contact, referral and assessment arrangements, weaknesses identified the previous year had been addressed in the great majority of cases.
This publication brings together OFSTED inspection and regulation data covering the period from September 2006 to August 2007. With the establishment on 1 April 2007, of the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills, OFSTED's responsibilities for inspecting children's services changed substantially, with OFSTED now regulating and inspecting childcare, children's social care and provision for learners of all ages. The first part of the report summarises the outcomes of routine inspections and regulatory visits across OFSTED's remit. The second part of the report examines three important themes in education and care: (i) improved life chances of children and older learners from disadvantaged backgrounds; (ii) the experience of children and young people where education and care develops awareness of personal, cultural and national identity; (iii) the effectiveness of education and training for young people entering work. The report also refers to the national test results for 2007.
the Ombudsman's review of complaint handling by government departments and public bodies 2010-11 , ninth report of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration session 2010-12
the Ombudsman's review of complaint handling by government departments and public bodies 2010-11 , ninth report of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration session 2010-12
This report reveals complaint handling across government to be inconsistent, haphazard and unaccountable, operating without any overarching design, overall standards or common performance framework. This is unhelpful for people who want to change their experience of interacting with a public service by making a complaint. It also means opportunities to improve public services through complaint handling are being missed. There is no shared view across government of the standard of complaint handling that a member of the public can reasonably expect. Complainants may be required to navigate anything between one and four stages of a complaint procedure before 'local resolution' is completed and the complainant can bring their complaint to the Ombudsman. The absence of any clear methodology or machinery to share best practice, or ensure lessons from complaints are learnt across government departments, increases the likelihood of the same mistakes being repeated again and again. The Ombudsman's Principles of Good Complaint Handling are a good starting point for government in the task of ensuring that all departments share an understanding of the importance of fairness, transparency, and accountability. But there is a need for strong leadership from the top, committed to developing a culture across the civil service that values complaints. The report covers the survey of departments, case studies, and gives statistics on complaint handling and the financial costs of poor complaint handling.
This is the Government response to Cm. 7967 'Proposals for reform of legal aid in England and Wales (ISBN 9780101796729) and sets out the plans to deliver the goals stated in that paper. The legal aid programme put forward includes: reform of the classes of cases and proceedings retained within the scope of legal aid; exceptional funding; amendment of merits test criteria for civil legal aid; establishment of the Community Legal Advice Telephone helpline; financial eligibility reforms; criminal remuneration; civil and family remuneration; expert fees and alternative sources of funding
With the establishment, on 1 April 2007, of the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills, Ofsted's responsibilities for inspecting children's services changed substantially, with Ofsted now regulating and inspecting childcare, children's social care and provision for learners of all ages. This report covers the first full year of reporting on the organisation's new remit. The first section presents an evaluation of the quality and standards in care, early education, schools, colleges, adult learning and skills, and children's services. It is based on evidence from more than 45,000 inspections and regulatory visits in 2007-08. The second section draws on Ofsted's thematic inspections and surveys in the different areas of its remit. This section evaluates the effectiveness with which providers seek to address three important matters: improving the life chances of the least advantaged members of society through excellence in provision; safeguarding children and young people from neglect, abuse and other forms of harm; and enabling learners to acquire the skills they need to succeed in their working lives. The Chief Inspector is encouraged by the recognition that much is going well for so many children, young people and adult learners, but frustrated that there is still too much that is patently inadequate and too many settings and institutions where the rate of improvement is unacceptably slow.
On cover and title page: House, committees of the whole House, general committees and select committees. On title page: Returns to orders of the House of Commons dated 14 May 2013 (the Chairman of Ways and Means)
Oral Evidence, Wednesday 9 November 2005 and Monday 8 May 2006; Mr David Bell, Mrs Miriam Rosen, Mr Robert Green, Mr Maurice Smith and Ms Vanessa Howlinson, Mr Andrew White, Mr Dorian Bradley and Mr Jonathan Thompson
Oral Evidence, Wednesday 9 November 2005 and Monday 8 May 2006; Mr David Bell, Mrs Miriam Rosen, Mr Robert Green, Mr Maurice Smith and Ms Vanessa Howlinson, Mr Andrew White, Mr Dorian Bradley and Mr Jonathan Thompson
work of Ofsted : Oral evidence, Wednesday 9 November 2005 and Monday 8 May 2006, Mr David Bell, Mrs Miriam Rosen, Mr Robert Green, Mr Maurice Smith and Ms Vanessa Howlinson, Mr Andrew White, Mr Dorian Bradley and Mr Jonathan Thompson
This report from The Commission on Families and the Wellbeing of Children addresses critical issues of child poverty and inequality in the context of the relationship between the state and families. It considers ways in which the state should support families and the difficult balance to be struck between its caring and control functions
The Committee's report on an evaluation of Whitehall departments' plans for structural change in response to the twin challenges of major public service reform and significantly reduced administrative budgets.The Committee expresses concern that the centre of Government, notably the Treasury and the Cabinet Office, is providing neither strategic leadership nor a governance framework to departments in managing their change programmes. The demand is immediate for an all encompassing strategic approach to change, minimising disaggregation and ensuring a 'joined up Government' approach.
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