Source · Select Committees · Home Affairs Committee
Recommendation 90
90
Accepted in Part
Paragraph: 270
Devolved decision-making pilot for children lacks evaluation and excludes vulnerable groups.
Conclusion
We welcome the Home Office’s devolved decision-making pilot for children. However, we are concerned that more than two years into the pilot the Home Office has still not published an evaluation of its outcomes. Furthermore, we are concerned that the pilot excludes children within 100 days of their 18th birthday, as well as age- disputed children, and is only available in 20 locations.
Government Response Summary
The government stated an initial evaluation was conducted and committed to publishing future evaluations of the pilot. They expanded the pilot to ten additional sites but rejected expanding the scope to include age-disputed children or those within 100 days of their 18th birthday due to risks of incomplete cases.
Paragraph Reference:
270
Government Response
Accepted in Part
HM Government
Accepted in Part
105. An evaluation of the devolved decision-making pilot was conducted during the first year of the pilot (June 2021-June 2022) and was used to inform the pilot policy and make changes ahead of pilot expansion in early 2023. We remain committed to continue testing a devolved approach to decision- making for children. As previously mentioned, the Government will commit to publishing evaluations on the Independent Child Trafficking Guardian programme and devolved decision-making pilots in order to inform future policy development. 106. To enable further testing, ten additional pilot sites were launched in early 2023, taking the number of pilot sites to twenty, covering thirty local authorities. We are working closely with local authorities and stakeholders across all pilot sites to monitor and evaluate the successes of the pilot and use this to inform its future and next steps. The timing of any future expansion of the pilot will be driven by several factors. In particular, as the pilot is putting additional demands on local safeguarding partners, it is important these are considered and managed carefully before expanding the pilot more widely or committing to a national rollout. 107. The Home Office has no plans to expand the scope of the pilot to include children who are age-disputed or those who are within 100 days of their 18th birthday. The current set up of the pilot is designed to ensure that there is sufficient time for both a Reasonable Grounds and Conclusive Grounds decision to be made before a child turns 18. Any move to expand the scope to include children closer to their 18th birthday or those who age is under dispute will increase the risk of cases not being completed before the individual becomes an adult.