Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

I can inform the House that Lords amendments 21, 37, 38, 39, 44, 101 and 105 engage Commons financial privilege. If any of these Lords amendments are agreed to, I will cause the customary entry waiving the Commons’ financial privilege to be entered in the Journal.

After Clause 1

Cessation of Child Protection Plans

I beg to move, That this House disagrees with Lords amendment 2.

With this it will be convenient to discuss:

Lords amendment 5, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 16, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 17, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 19, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 21, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 37 and 38, Government motions to disagree, amendments (a) to (c) to Lords amendment 38, and Government amendments (a) to (d) in lieu of Lords amendments 37 and 38.

Lords amendment 41, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 42, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 44, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 102, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 105, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 106, Government motion to disagree, and amendment (a).

Lords amendments 1, 3, 4, 6 to 15, 18, 20, 22 to 36, 39, 40, 43, 45 to 101, 103, 104

and 107 to 121.

Children’s voices are heard rarely in this place and are too often ignored in our society, so I say at the outset that it is truly a special privilege to play my part in the passage of this landmark legislation. This Bill is about creating the conditions in which every child can achieve and thrive, to ensure safer and more secure childhoods, to tackle the scrouge of child poverty and to deliver high and rising school standards. Today I ask the House to renew its commitment to that ambition for our children and our country. I extend my thanks to my colleague and friend, Baroness Smith of Malvern, the Minister for Skills, for her skilful stewardship of the Bill. I ask hon. Members to back the Government amendments made in the other place that increase the ambition of the legislation.

In part 1 of the Bill, we have introduced a new duty on local housing authorities to, with consent, notify educational institutions, GP practices and health visiting services when a child is placed in temporary accommodation. We have also strengthened the Government’s work to put the voices of children at the heart of decisions about their futures, with amendments on family group decision making and the kinship local offer.

On that point, will the Minister give way?

Sorry, but I have to make progress as I have so much to get through.

Turning to part 2 of the Bill and schools, we are taking forward our historic strategy to lift children out of poverty. As my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth South (Stephen Morgan) set out last year, from September all children in households receiving universal credit will be eligible for free school meals. That will put £500 back in families’ pockets, support 500,000 more children with a nutritious meal and lift 100,000 children out of poverty. That is the difference that this Labour Government are making for children and families. We are supporting this by upgrading the eligibility checking system, making it much easier for local authorities, schools and parents to confirm free school meal eligibility.

Finally, the Government are also enabling the introduction of academy trust inspection and giving powers to the Secretary of State where academy trusts are not meeting acceptable standards.

I will now turn to the 13 non-Government amendments made in the other place, first the amendments relating to child protection. On Lords amendment 2, statutory guidance is already clear that a multi-agency conference should take place to review whether the child protection plan should be discharged. On Lords amendment 5, effective multi-agency child protection practices that prevent tragedies and save lives needs to happen now—further delay is unacceptable. In addition, evaluation is already under way, and regulations to give multi-agency child protection teams their functions will be subject consultation and parliamentary scrutiny.

There is much positivity in what the Government are bringing forward. Back in Northern Ireland, Minister Paul Givan has brought forward a pilot scheme to take smartphones out of the classroom while children are in school. Has the Minister considered that positive strategy? If it is a positive in Northern Ireland, I think it would be a positive here as well.

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that important intervention; I will turn to that matter in due course.

The Government cannot support Lords amendment 44 on principle. Extending the consent requirement would risk discouraging families from seeking or continuing to receive help or support. The amendment suggests that a child’s or a family’s circumstances can never change.

On that point, will the Minister give way?

I am sorry but I am going to make some progress.

I will now turn to the amendments relating to looked-after children and deprivation of liberty. Lords amendment 16 concerns a proposed review of the level of funding for the adoption and special guardianship support fund. We all know the importance of effective support for the success of adoptive families. That is why the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Whitehaven and Workington (Josh MacAlister), announced £55 million for the fund in 2026-27 and confirmed that the fund will continue in 2027-28. He also announced a 12-week consultation on adoption support, including the ASGSF. I am sure that hon. Members will agree that it is important that we do not undermine the integrity of the consultation by undertaking a separate review.

Lords amendment 17 intends to strengthen relationships between looked-after children and their siblings. In practice, it would require local authorities to record in the care plan any contact arrangements made between looked-after children and any sibling they are not living with.

I am proud that this Government have set out the biggest reforms to the children’s social care system in a generation. In particular, we are implementing changes to expand fostering, creating 10,000 additional places for children, and resetting the system to back kinship care, so that more children can grow up safely with people who already know and love them. These changes will allow many more children who grow up in care to spend time with their brothers or sisters.

I congratulate the Government on making kinship care central to their policies. Many children in care experience significant disruption in their lives, through multiple home moves and school changes, and relationships with their brothers and sisters are so central to a child’s sense of identity, belonging and emotional security. Will the Minister look again at how regulations and guidance could better ensure that those relationships are protected?

I agree with my hon. Friend about the importance of sibling relationships. Lords amendment 17 would do little to advance that cause, but the reforms that we are driving forward on children’s social care will.

Lords amendment 19 seeks to include integrated care boards in regional co-operation arrangements. The Government agree that is important to include health partners in regional arrangements to improve looked-after children’s outcomes, but there are already legal requirements on local authorities to do this. These duties will continue to apply to local authorities that form regional care co-operatives, and the amendment is therefore unnecessary.

Lords amendment 21 concerns joint funding arrangements for children deprived of their liberty. Mechanisms for pooled funding already exist and work well in some areas, and legislating now would be premature ahead of pilots that will test effective models.

Lords amendments 41 and 42 seek a monetary cap rather than a numeric limit on branded school uniform. I welcome their lordships’ support of the Government’s aim to tackle the cost of uniform for parents. Our manifesto was clear that we will limit of branded items of uniform required, so uniforms make children look smarter but do not make families poorer. However, these amendments would undermine our shared aims. A cost cap would risk creating perverse incentives for schools by creating a financial target; many schools could require more branded items, reducing savings for parents.

A cost cap would require Government to regulate for wider, unworkable factors, including how many spares parents might buy, cost variations for clothing sizes and even promotional pricing. It would also impose new bureaucracy on schools to carry out regular retail price monitoring, often across multiple suppliers. We recognise concerns about high-cost individual items, which is why we will strengthen existing cost guidance to be clear that high-cost compulsory branded uniform items should be avoided.

I completely agree with the Minister’s position; parents should have the choice to send their child to whichever school they believe is best for them. In relation to admissions, one of my first cases after becoming an MP was an automatic off-rolling of a child after she had been absent for 20 days, despite the absence having been communicated to the school and extended due to a bereavement. She was off-rolled with no process and no review, and she was out of school for nine months. Will the Minister consider reviewing this punitive policy to ensure that there is a formal review before a child is removed from their preferred school?

Order. The Minister is being very generous with her time. However, she will be aware that many Members wish to speak in this debate. As it stands, that will be very difficult, given the time constraints.

If the hon. Gentleman writes to me about that case, I am happy to look into it for him. Off-rolling absolutely should not be happening.

Let me turn to the crucial issue of allergies. Lords amendment 105 seeks to introduce mandatory allergy safety provisions for all schools. The Government agree with Members across the House who have been campaigning for improved allergy safety in schools, including my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Chris Bloore) and the hon. Member for Rutland and Stamford (Alicia Kearns). Last week, we published draft statutory guidance, which will be in force in September. It sets out clearly that schools should have a dedicated allergy safety policy and stock spare adrenalin devices, as well as whole-staff allergy awareness training.

At the launch, I had the privilege of joining Helen and Peter Blythe, and their wonderful daughter Etta. Their campaigning in memory of their son, Benedict, has been both brave and instrumental. We recognise their argument about allergy safety requiring the strongest protections. That is why I am pleased to confirm—with Helen in the Gallery today—that we will put Benedict’s law on the statute book, with our own amendment to require schools to have and publish an allergy safety policy, to have regard to statutory guidance and to give powers to the Secretary of State to make regulations relating to allergy safety. This will protect children with allergies in schools and ensure that our guidance can evolve as clinical advice changes. I am sure the whole House will join me in thanking Helen once again for her bravery and brilliant campaigning.

I thank the Minister for recognising that we need to legislate to protect children with allergies in schools. Can she reassure us that the Benedict Blythe Foundation, Helen and the MPs who have campaigned for this will see the amendment at the very earliest opportunity before it goes to the Lords, so we can ensure that Benedict’s law is delivered in full?