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Select Committee · Education Committee

Children's Homes

Status: Closed Opened: 15 Mar 2021 Closed: 16 Feb 2023 38 recommendations 21 conclusions 1 report

The inquiry will focus on children’s homes. It will examine a number of areas including educational outcomes and destinations, the quality of support provided by children’s homes, unregulated provision, rates of criminalisation, the sufficiency of children’s home places, and the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. Read the call for evidence for more detail about the … Show more

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Reports

1 report
Title HC No. Published Items Response
Second Report - Educational poverty: how children in reside… HC 57 8 Jul 2022 59 Responded

Recommendations & Conclusions

3 items
8 Recommendation Second Report - Educational poverty: ho… Accepted in Part

Local authorities must annually report to Ofsted, accounting for how every penny of their Pupil...

Local authorities must annually report to Ofsted, accounting for how every penny of their Pupil Premium Plus grant is being spent. The Department must strengthen its guidance on the grant, stipulating that all funding must be allocated via the Virtual School Head, and the Virtual School Head be awarded powers … Read more

Government response AI summary
The department will consider further changes to the guidance and specifically whether it should stipulate that the VSH must sign-off on all use of the funding and whether more detailed financial information should be included in the Virtual School Annual Report provided to Ofsted.
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Department for Education
16 Recommendation Second Report - Educational poverty: ho… Accepted in Part

The needs of looked-after pupils do not suddenly cease to exist when they turn

The needs of looked-after pupils do not suddenly cease to exist when they turn

Government response AI summary
The government acknowledges the importance of continued support for care leavers, having launched a £3 million pilot for Pupil Premium Plus style funding and allocated £36 million to extend the Staying Close programme. A comprehensive implementation strategy will address this and other recommendations.
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Department for Education
24 Recommendation Second Report - Educational poverty: ho… Accepted in Part

Access to specialist mental health support is essential in supporting children in care, and the...

Access to specialist mental health support is essential in supporting children in care, and the Government must commit to funding specialist mental health support for every school. It must also invest targeted funding to fully level-up spend per-child on mental health, and to reduce mental health waiting lists to no … Read more

Government response AI summary
The government acknowledged the importance of specialist mental health support, stating that they are investing an additional £2.3 billion per year by 2023/24, to allow 345,000 children and young people to access NHS-funded mental health services and supporting every school and college to access mental …
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Department for Education

Oral evidence sessions

6 sessions
Date Witnesses
1 Mar 2022 Fran Oram · Department for Education, Will Quince · Department for Education View ↗
1 Feb 2022 Children's Home - young people session View ↗
11 Jan 2022 Dame Rachel de Souza · Inspiration Trust, Dame Rachel de Souza · Office of the Children's Commissioner for England, Juliette Cammaerts · Office of the Children's Commissioner for England, Yvette Stanley · Ofsted View ↗
16 Nov 2021 Andrew Isaac · Children’s Services Development Group, Charlotte Ramsden OBE · Association of Directors of Children’s Services, Jonathan Whalley · St Christopher’s Fellowship, Michelle Lee-Izu · Barnardo’s View ↗
19 Oct 2021 Hannah McCowen · National Care Leavers Benchmarking Forum, and Catch 22, Mark Russell · The Children’s Society, Patrick Ward · National Association of Virtual School Headteachers (NAVSH), Victoria Langer · Become View ↗
20 Jul 2021 Anne Longfield, Former Children’s Commissioner, Josh MacAlister, Independent Review of Children’s Social Care, The Rt Hon. the Lord Adonis View ↗

Who gave evidence

17 witnesses
WitnessOrganisationSessions
Andrew Isaac · Independent Chair Children’s Services Development Group 1
Anne Longfield, Former Children’s Commissioner — 1
Charlotte Ramsden OBE · President Association of Directors of Children’s Services 1
Dame Rachel de Souza · Chief Executive Inspiration Trust 1
Dame Rachel de Souza · Children’s Commissioner for England Office of the Children's Commissioner for England 1
Fran Oram · Portfolio Director for Children’s Social Care Ref… Department for Education 1
Hannah McCowen · Manager National Care Leavers Benchmarking Forum, and Catch 22 1
Jonathan Whalley · Chief Executive St Christopher’s Fellowship 1
Josh MacAlister, Independent Review of Children’s Social Care — 1
Juliette Cammaerts · Director of Policy and Planning Office of the Children's Commissioner for England 1
Mark Russell · Chief Executive The Children’s Society 1
Michelle Lee-Izu · Interim Co-CEO Barnardo’s 1
Patrick Ward · Chair National Association of Virtual School Headteachers (NAVSH) 1
The Rt Hon. the Lord Adonis — 1
Victoria Langer · Interim Chief Executive Become 1
Will Quince · Minister for Children and Families Department for Education 1
Yvette Stanley · National Director for Regulation and Social Care Ofsted 1

Correspondence

2 letters
DateDirectionTitle
6 Sep 2022 — Correspondence from the Schools Adjudicator on the Children’s Homes Report, dat…
6 Sep 2022 — Correspondence from Ofsted on Calcot Children’s Homes and safeguarding procedur…