Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

Under Article 19 of the EU reception directive, the Government must ensure that unaccompanied minors are represented. This was underlined in the Joint Committee on Human Rights’ 10th report and Article 19 specifies that representation must be either by a legal guardian—the course recommended by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley—by an organisation responsible for the child’s care and well-being, or by other appropriate representation. I can tell the Committee that the Government’s view is that we comply fully with this and with the other requirements of Article 19. All unaccompanied minors who apply for asylum, including in age-disputed cases, are referred to the Children’s Panel of the Refugee Council within 24 hours of the claim being lodged. The Children’s Panel, which is funded, as the noble Baroness said, by central government, provides appropriate guidance and signposts asylum-seeking children to the appropriate services they need. The panel also ensures that the child is aware of his or her rights and the services to which he or she is entitled throughout the asylum process. The panel does not offer legal advice, but it can refer the child to a legal representative if he or she needs one. The legal representative will assist with the person’s asylum claim and be funded by the Legal Services Commission. So while the noble Baroness is right that the Children’s Panel is an NGO, it is only one part of the picture of support provided. It signposts children to the services that they need, including legal services funded, as they need to be, by the state, and ensures that local authorities make an assessment of need and make services available. In respect of some of the other services to which the noble Baroness referred, entitlement to representation by CAFCASS officers in family and related proceedings does not depend on immigration status. Similarly, if asylum-seeking children are involved in criminal proceedings, which were also mentioned by the noble Baroness, they will be protected by the code of practice to which she referred as much as citizen children would be. Furthermore, the UK Borders Act 2007 introduced a requirement for the Border and Immigration Agency to have regard to a code of practice set out by the Secretary of State designed to ensure that, in exercising its functions in the UK, the BIA takes appropriate steps to ensure that children are safe from harm. We are drawing up that code of practice and, as a minimum, the immigration procedures to be covered by that code of practice will include checking documents and confirming identity, checking the bona fides of accompanying adults and destination address, interviewing children, caring for children during enforcement activities, greater attention to the needs of children who are detained in immigration premises, caring for children during escort and transfer activities, applying child-specific standards to contractors and other commissioned services and there will be provisions about the need to be vigilant for trafficked children and children who have gone missing—who were also referred to by the noble Baroness. The Border and Immigration Authority refers all lone children with no parent or carer to children’s social care. Local authorities then make an assessment of needs in accordance with the statutory guidance set out in the Framework for the Assessment for Children in Need and Their Families. Local authorities have a statutory duty that their functions are discharged having regard to the need to safeguard and promote the welfare of all children, under Section 11 of the Children Act 2004, regardless of their immigration status. The children that this amendment seeks to target would almost certainly be ““children in need”” as defined by Section 17 of the Children Act 1989, and most are likely to meet the criteria under Section 20(1) of that Act, requiring the local authority to accommodate them and so they become looked after. The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, asked me why most, but not all, asylum-seeking children are classified as looked after. The answer is that it depends on whether or not they need to be provided with accommodation. Some asylum-seeking children are cared for by relatives or family friends who are established here and, therefore, may not have looked-after status. However, if they need accommodation they will be looked after and they will have a social worker. Our statutory guidance to local authorities in Local Authority Circular (2003) 13 makes it clear that there is a presumption that any child who has no parent or guardian in this country should be accommodated under Section 20 of the 1989 Act. The recent High Court decision of Mr Justice Holman in cases involving the London boroughs of Wandsworth, Hackney and Islington concerning the status of young asylum seekers confirmed that where an asylum-seeking child needs to be provided with accommodation, the local authority should provide it and the child should be looked after. We recognise that unaccompanied children and those who have been trafficked can be particularly vulnerable. In addition to Working Together, we have published supplementary guidance, Working Together to Safeguard Children who may have been Trafficked, and launched the NSPCC Child Trafficking Advice and Information Line to assist local agencies in addressing the specific safety and welfare needs of children who have been trafficked. Assessment plans and interventions for children are already subject to external scrutiny through a number of statutory routes. For example, the care plan of looked-after children must be regularly reviewed at meetings chaired by the independent reviewing officer, as I mentioned earlier. These officers have powers to refer individual cases to CAFCASS for consideration of legal representation and we are taking steps through the Bill to strengthen the role of the IRO to ensure that this is implemented consistently and effectively. The courts already have power to make an order in specified family proceedings to appoint a CAFCASS officer to be the children’s guardian. This arrangement continues until the court determines that it is no longer necessary. In addition to that scrutiny of whether their care plans are being implemented, any child in need who has a complaint or wishes to make a representation about the services that they receive is entitled to independent advocacy support, under Section 26A of the Adoption and Children Act 2002. Article 10 of the Council of Europe Convention on Action Against Trafficking in Human Beings, to which the United Kingdom is a signatory, requires that as soon as an unaccompanied child is identified as a victim each party shall provide for representation of the child by a legal guardian, organisation or authority which shall act in the best interests of that child; take the necessary steps to establish his or her identity and nationality; and make every effort to locate his or her family when this is in the best interests of the child. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary is considering the changes needed to comply with the Council of Europe Convention on Action Against Trafficking in Human Beings. In doing that, the Home Office will consult with a range of stakeholders, including our established non-governmental organisation stakeholder group. This will include an assessment of all the options for improvement to the arrangements for all trafficked children. In concluding this rather technical response to the specific points raised, perhaps I may say in more general terms that of course we recognise that some services for looked-after children have not always been of the highest quality. It is a fundamental purpose of this Bill to improve those services precisely to meet the objectives that my noble friend Lord Judd set out. It is also why we are taking forward the full range of reforms described in the Care Matters White Paper, which has been broadly welcomed by the Committee, that apply to all looked-after children, regardless of immigration status. But, as we have discussed often during our consideration of the Bill, much of the inconsistency in provision is not in fact a matter for primary legislation, but a matter of improving the skills of the workforce, reducing staff turnover, improving the quality of services and sharing best practice to bring up the quality of services everywhere to the level of the best. We do not believe it is necessary to create an additional demand in terms of statutory entitlement to a guardian in every case that merely duplicates existing statutory requirements. Therefore, we do not support the amendment, but believe that the whole range of improvements to provision for children in care, which will be brought about by Care Matters and this Bill, will affect those children also.