Children and Adoption Bill [HL]

The noble Earl will recognise that that is exactly what I sought to do. I am not a lawyer, but this seems to hinge on an understanding of the difference made by the use of the word ““reasonable””. In operational terms, for workers on the ground the suggestion that there should be reasonable contact immediately makes a presumption that workers should do all that they can to ensure that contact is made wherever possible. The statistics bear that out. Some 66 per cent of the caseload of a CAFCASS officer concerns domestic violence. One per cent of that 66 per cent means that a lot of children are left in quite interesting situations—I do not use the word ““dangerous”” because domestic violence covers such a wide range of circumstances. I need to think carefully about whether the word ““reasonable”” means anything different from contact in terms of the culture of trying to make proper assessments. We must not become caught up in a culture that makes people feel anxious. Indeed, there are groups that have threatened our staff and made them anxious. That does not help when trying to make proper assessments, and I hope that everyone will agree that those groups should work with CAFCASS in order to secure better contact for fathers. I wanted to make that point briefly. Does reasonable contact also mean that you would have a greater expectation of the involvement of absent fathers? Many women we speak to worry not about the access arrangements of fathers but about their absence. Would the noble Earl’s requirement for reasonable contact raise the burden of responsibility? The scrutiny committee considered the point, and the Government responded by saying that it was covered in other ways. However, we need to ensure that we have ways of making sure that fathers who have absented themselves take more interest in their children. From the survey, we know that, when officers are involved at the commencement of proceedings, a large percentage of parental access is reinstated. I believe that the absentee percentage dropped from 36 per cent to 8 per cent. Any social worker or mediation official would be pleased with that. Does the noble Earl think that the requirement would have the reverse effect of placing the responsibility for reasonable contact on absent fathers?