COMMONS AMENDMENTS (Hansard, 5 November 1975)

§ Lord WINTERBOTTOM
My Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment. This is an important point for 1277 discussion and it relates to an Amendment which, if I recollect aright, was initiated in this House by the noble Lord, Lord Elton. Your Lordships will be aware that the Government opposed this clause on Report in this House, not because of any dispute about its underlying purpose, which was to bring about greater co-ordination between the statutory and voluntary agencies concerned with the welfare of children, but because, in the Government's view, the method proposed was unlikely to achieve this end. The Association of Directors of Social Services commented on Clause 53 in its document Comments on the Children Billand said that although the intentions were praiseworthy, the mere distribution of copies of orders would not ensure the protection of children. In fact, copies of orders distributed in the way proposed might well take some time to reach the person most closely concerned with the child. That is an important point.
The Government's view is that the aims of Clause 53 are more likely to be achieved by administrative means than by the distributions of copies of orders. Circulars have therefore been issued containing guidance on the diagnosis, care and management of cases of non-accidental injury to children and the need for improvement in co-ordination of the services for children. As a result, the whole of England is now covered by area review committees on which all the services concerned with children are represented. These committees ensure that case conferences are held immediately a child at risk is identified, and all senior and field personnel are kept informed about each case. The Government therefore moved an Amendment, which was accepted in Committee in another place, to remove Clause 53 from the Bill, it being thought that the administrative measures which had been taken had made the measures proposed in Clause 53 unnecessary. We appreciate and understand the concern of the noble Lord, Lord Elton, but I hope we can convince him, at least at this stage, that the area review committees should be allowed a chance to prove their competence.

§ Lord ELTON
My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Lord and I wonder whether he can go further. But first let me say that I do not propose to advise anybody to resist this Amendment, the purpose of which may well be achieved by better means and, maybe in part, by the means which the noble Lord has already described. The work of the area review committees will be one of the things to be looked at in the review three years after the measure comes into effect and will, I trust, be looked at closely. I am well aware of the number and force of the circulars which have gone out following the Maria Colwell, Lisa Godfrey and Bravery cases. It has been the subject of some distress to us that the cases have continued since the original circulars were set in motion, but one must accept that changes in practice take time to initiate and even more time for those working them to become familiarised with them.
However, what heartens me even more than the area review committee procedure is that I understand there is a system, now fairly generally in operation in most areas, of voluntary registration of cases of suspected non-accidental injury to children and I feel that this is a necessary corollary to the review committees, because they must have evidence, or at least suspicions, to review. I should be grateful if the noble Lord would give a brief resume of the way the system works and the sources of information which are open to those who maintain the register. I understand that the system is voluntary and is, therefore, piecemeal in the sense that not only are parts of the country not covered by it, but also that each part of the country has a slightly different system. As we agreed at an earlier stage of the Bill, one of the features of the non-accidental injury to children syndrome, if I may call it that, is the frequently very inconvenient and administratively difficult mobility of the families in question. The cases are very often associated with housing difficulty, and that in itself is associated with frequent and rapid removal, with not very easily traced lines of communication.
From that point of view, as well as from the point of view of administrative facility, it would be an extremely good thing if, at an early time, there 1279 was a standardised form of register and a standardised procedure for making entries on that register and for following them up so that, when a child arrives in Bootle from Exeter—and is in no less peril in Bootle than in Exeter—there shall be no time spent in wondering what this odd pro forma that has come from the West Country in fact means. I am aware that the Government may be in difficulty with certain civil rights movements who feel that the recording of any possibly deleterious information centrally is a threat to individual liberty. My own unshakeable conviction is that where the happiness and safety of a small child is at stake, that is more important than any philosophical considerations such as those.

§ Baroness ELLIOT of HARWOOD
My Lords, I entirely agree with what my noble friend Lord Elton said about the excellent principles and ideas behind this co-operation on a voluntary basis between all the interests concerned. But supposing it does not work, if one still has in the Bill a clause such as Clause 53, one will have statutory powers which one can enforce. If these groups are not functioning properly, what power is there under the Act to interfere and insist that something more effective shall be done? If it is taken out of the Bill there will be no statutory power to back this up.

§ Lord WINTERBOTTOM
My Lords, to reply first to the noble Baroness, the point at which, if what we are trying to achieve by the Bill proves unsatisfactory, action can be taken may be the three-year review. Amendment No. 203 is the relevant Amendment and perhaps we could have a brief word on this subject when that Amendment is dealt with.
As regards the point of the noble Lord, Lord Elton, about an ancillary organisation to the area review committee, this is, I must admit, new to me, but clearly it is of importance, because I believe that it is the sense of individual responsibility and conscience among the members of our society which will improve that society rather than legislation. At the end of the day, it is the general feeling of the average man and woman as to what is right and what is wrong which will decide what sort of society we have.
1280 I feel that the matter is sufficiently interesting for me to make the suggestion to the noble Lord that he might put down an Unstarred Question so that we could have a brief discussion of the subject, because then I could answer him with clarity and on an up-to-date basis which, at present, I am unable to do. I believe that it is worth doing, because, as we all recognise, this is not the last word on this subject and a follow-up along these lines might be of value.