HC Deb 23 March 1979 vol 964 cc174-7W
Mr. Ashley

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what is the increase since 1969 in the number of local authority residential places for mentally handicapped children.

Mr. Moyle

At the end of 1969 local authorities in England were directly providing 1,211 residential places for mentally handicapped children. By the end of the following year the number had grown to 1,354. Subsequent figures are not comparable with these because one effect of the Education of Handicapped Children Act 1970 was to change the classification of certain accommodation previously designated as being for mentally handicapped children. However in March 1972 the number of places provided—under the new definition—was 1,132 and by March 1977 the number had grown to 1,619.

In addition to this direct provision, local authorities also pay for mentally handicapped children in accommodation provided by other bodies.

Mr. Ashley

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what steps he has taken to ensure that all health authorities undertake a multi-disciplinary review of the assessment of all mentally handicapped children in hospital.

Mr. Moyle

The publication HC(78)28/LAC(78)16—" Children in Hospital: Maintenance of Family Links "—issued by my Department in September last year, asked health and local authorities to take an early opportunity for reviewing the needs of all children who had been in hospital for more than three months and to review the situation regularly at intervals of not more than six months thereafter.

Mr. Ashley

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will seek to impose a mandatory requirement on each local authority to make provision for mentally handicapped children in its area who are unable to live with their families and are at present in hospital.

Mr. Moyle

Local authorities already have a general duty to provide residential care for mentally handicapped children and my Department has consistently placed this high on its list of priorities in its planning guidance to social services authorities.

However, the Government believe that a small number of severely mentally handicapped children need the specialist services of a hospital, and it would therefore be inappropriate to require local authorities to provide residential care for them.

Mr. Ashley

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) if he has yet issued a circular, drafted as a consultative document in June 1978, for ending the inappropriate admission of mentally handicapped children to long stay hospitals;

(2) what is his estimate of the numbers of mentally handicapped children in hospitals who could be discharged if adequate foster care and places in ordinary and special children's homes were made available; and what is his estimate of the numbers of these children who should be kept in hospital.

Mr. Moyle

As I said in my reply to my hon. Friend on 16 January, many comments received on the draft circular stated that additional resources would be needed to develop community facilities

England
1975 1976 (provisional)
Percentage of patients aged 5–15 participating in education—
School outside hospital 7.8 11.7
School inside hospital 72.9 72.3
Education elsewhere in hospital 12.5 9.8
Percentage* of beds in wards for children—
more than 20 beds 5 6
more than 30 beds 2 2
Special in-patient units or wards for children—
number 22 22
number of beds 832 859
* Number of beds provided for children on wards of more than 20 (30) beds expressed as a percentage of all beds in mental handicap hospitals.

Mr. Ashley

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what is his estimate

before dates could be set for the ending of inappropriate admissions.—[Vol. 960, c. 713.] My colleagues and I are considering what further action would be appropriate in the context of decisions on the overall priorities for planning and the use of available resources, but I hope that it will be possible to issue a revised circular later this year.

I have no reliable basis, at present, on which to make an estimate of the number of mentally handicapped children in hospital who could be discharged if adequate alternative facilities were available. However, as at present drafted, the circular would ask authorities to inform the Department of their estimates of the number of children needing hospital care, the number needing local authority residential care and the number needing other services such as foster care.

Mr. Ashley

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what changes there have been in the provision of specialist facilities for mentally handicapped children in hospital since the publication of his Department's statistical and research report series No. 19 (HMSO 1977); and if he will list these changes according to the specialist needs outlined in that report.

Mr. Moyle

The overall changes in facilities and services between 1975 and 1976 which can be separately identified as relating exclusively to children in mental handicap hospitals are listed below. It is not possible to identify separately the complete range of facilities or the amount of staff time devoted to children. The corresponding report for 1976 is expected to be published later this year.

of the number of mentally handicapped children at present in hospital.

Mr. Moyle

The number of children under 16 resident in mental handicap hospitals and units in England at the end of 1976—the latest year for which information is available—is estimated to be just over 4,500.

Some mentally handicapped children are admitted to other National Health Service hospitals for various reasons but cannot be separately identified.

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