Children and Young Persons Bill [HL]

I support everything that has been said so lucidly and with such conviction by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. Earlier, when I mentioned the green baize door, I may have given the impression that there was simply no window in that door at all. As far as the court is concerned, there is no window, but, of course, a window was created as a consequence of the remarks made by the House of Lords in its judgment in Re S. As noble Lords will know, that led directly to the reforms that were added to the Adoption and Children Act 2002, which led to the regulations of 2004. Everything that the noble Baroness said was underlined very clearly by the House of Lords. I do not want to give the impression that the House of Lords was insensitive to the needs of children in this regard; it applied what was a classical rule. I suppose it was inevitable that it came to the conclusion that it reached. In so doing, it expressed concern and was disturbed by the fact that children with no adult to act on their behalf may not have any effective means to initiate a challenge. A challenge would have been lawful, but there was no court to initiate that challenge. The child was entitled to initiate the challenge. The IRO is the trustee of the child and it seems to me that inevitably the IRO, if one were to follow the spirit of this pronouncement, must regard himself or herself as being in a position to review the totality of the situation of that child.