Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Report (2nd Day) (Continued)

Clause 12: Powers of CIECSS in relation to parent undertakings

Amendment 63

63: Clause 12, page 18, line 3, at end insert— “(1A) After section 16, insert—“16A Registration of parent undertakings(1) In making an application for registration under this Part, an agency or establishment which is a subsidiary undertaking must ensure that the application contains information about the parent undertaking.(2) If the application is granted under section 13 (grant or refusal of registration), the establishment or agency must ensure that information related to the parent undertaking is regularly updated.(3) The Secretary of State may, by regulations under section 16 (regulations about registration), make provision for the enforcement of the duty under subsection (2).(4) In this section, “parent undertaking” and “subsidiary undertaking” have the meanings given by section 1162 of the Companies Act 2006.””

My Lords, noble Lords will remember from our debate in Committee that on this side of the House we had considerable practical reservations about the Government’s approach to regulating groups of children’s homes and foster care providers. These two amendments aim to improve the process that the Government plan to embark on.

Amendment 63 would simply require an agency or an establishment to provide information about its parent undertaking when it registered with Ofsted and to keep that information regularly updated. I assume that it would make it simpler for future regulation and enforcement if the identity of the parent undertaking was clear from the outset, given the complexity of the ownership structures of some of these groups.

My Amendment 64 aims to strengthen the effectiveness of the enforcement regime by giving it commercial teeth that would impact on these businesses. One would hope that preventing them expanding and restructuring financially or organisationally when they were subject to an improvement plan would lead to speedier compliance with the regulatory framework, as well as preventing a suboptimal group from expanding. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

My Lords, in the absence of other comments I will turn to Amendments 63 and 64, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, in relation to the provider oversight scheme. The scheme will enable Ofsted to require provider groups to implement an improvement plan across multiple settings where Ofsted reasonably suspects standards are not being met. If the provider group does not adequately implement improvements, Ofsted will be able to issue it with a fine.

Amendment 63 seeks to ensure that, where an applicant for registration with Ofsted is a subsidiary undertaking, the applicant must provide information about its provider group. This information must then be kept updated and new powers would provide for enforcement of these requirements in regulations. I do not believe this amendment is necessary. There are existing powers in Sections 12 and 22 of the Care Standards Act 2000 which we intend to use to impose requirements on an applicant for registration, or a person already registered to carry on an establishment or agency, to provide information in relation to its parent undertaking—for example, contact details for service of relevant notices by email, and information about other subsidiaries under the same parent undertaking.

Amendment 64 seeks to ensure that, when a parent undertaking is required to implement an improvement plan, it is subject to financial and commercial restrictions, including the limitation on the acquisition of further subsidiaries, the opening of new establishments or agencies, and the organisational or financial restructuring of the parent undertaking while the improvement plan is being implemented. The measure as drafted allows for regulations to set out that a person is not a fit and proper person to carry on an establishment or agency where their parent undertaking—the provider group—has failed or is failing to comply with an improvement notice. This will allow Ofsted to refuse registration applications in respect of new settings that are under the ownership or control of the parent undertaking that has failed to comply with provider oversight requirements. The significant restrictions created by this amendment on parent undertakings which are implementing an improvement plan would not be proportionate, given that the purpose of this measure is to require the provider group to implement change quickly across all settings where concerns have been identified.

I thank the Minister for her remarks. I perhaps accept them more in relation to my Amendment 63 than my Amendment 64, but time will tell how the Government’s plans work out. With that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 63 withdrawn.

Amendment 64 not moved.

Amendment 65

65: Clause 12, page 22, line 13, leave out subsection (5) and insert— “(5) In section 37 (service of documents)—(a) in subsection (1)—(i) omit the words from “carrying” to “agency”;(ii) omit the “or” at the end of paragraph (a);(iii) at the end of paragraph (b) insert“; or(c) by being sent by email to the person’s email address.”;(b) after subsection (3) insert—“(3A) A notice or other document sent to a person by email is, unless the contrary is proved, to be treated as having been served on the working day immediately following the day on which it was sent.”;(c) after subsection (5) insert—“(6) A person’s (P’s) email address for the purposes of this section is—(a) an email address identified for the time being by P, or by a person who manages an establishment or agency carried on by P, as an address for contacting P, or(b) if an email address is not so identified, an email address which the person serving the notice or other document believes is used by P.For the purposes of this subsection, a person “identifies” an email address by providing it to a registration authority or publishing it.(7) In subsection (3A) “working day” means a day other than a Saturday, a Sunday, Christmas Day, Good Friday or a bank holiday under the Banking and Financial Dealings Act 1971 in England and Wales.””Member’s explanatory statement This amendment would allow for notices under Part 2 of the Care Standards Act 2000 to be served on parent undertakings and others by email.

Amendment 65 agreed.

Clause 13: Power of CIECSS to impose monetary penalties

Amendment 66

66: Clause 13, page 23, leave out lines 23 to 29 Member’s explanatory statement This amendment would remove provision no longer needed because of the protection provided by the new general data protection override in section 183A of the Data Protection Act 2018, inserted by section 106(2) of the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 and which came into force on 20 August 2025.