§ Mr. Kirkwoodasked the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) how many children were placed under supervision in each year from 1979 to 1984 on grounds of child abuse or neglect;
(2) how many children were in local authority care in each of the years from 1979 to 1984;
(3) how many children were admitted to care in each year from 1979 to 1984 as a result of child abuse or neglect.
§ Mr. WhitneyChildren subject to abuse or neglect can be admitted to care by a variety of legal routes and are not separately identifiable in the statistics held centrally. The information available on children admitted to care for 1979 to 1983 is given in table 1 of "Children in Care of Local Authorities, Year Ending 31 March 1983, England" (A/F83/12), copies of which are available in the Library. Figures for 1984 are given in the table. Information on the number of children in care in England at 31 March from 1979 to 1983 is given in table 2 of the same volume; the number in 1984 is 74,845.
Information is not available centrally on the reasons why supervision orders are made.
Number of children admitted to care in England and circumstances in which they were admitted during the year ending 31 March 1984 Reason for entering care Number of children admitted* Received into care under Section 2 of the Child Care Act 1980† Short term illness of parent or guardian 4,851 Long term illness or incapacity of parent or guardian 365 Confinement of mother 742 Family homeless 244 Parents are dead/no guardian 119 Abandoned or lost 472 Death of parent 243 Deserted by parent 1,662 Parent or guardian in prison or remanded to custody 464 Unsatisfactory home conditions 3,678 Other reasons 6,233 Sub-total 19,073 Committed into care by order of the courts On remand or committed for trial/sentence or 2,204 detained in care Subject to an interim care order 2,100 619W
Committed by care orders made under the Children and Young Persons Act 1969 under Section 1(2)(a) 1,542 1(2)(b) 146 1(2)(bb) 23 1(2)(C) 138 1(2)(d) 571
Reason for entering care Number of children admitted* 1(2)(e) 608 l(2)(f)/7(7) 1,322 15(1) 213 25(l)/26(2) 6 Sub-Total 4,569 Committed by care orders made under other Acts Section 43(1) of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 330 Section 10(1) of the Domestic Proceedings and 21 Magistrates Courts Act 1978‡ Section 7(2) of the Family Law Reform Act 1969 235 Section 2(2)(b) of the Guardianship Act 1973 91 Section l7(l)(b) of the Children Act 1975 2 Others 127 Total 28.752 *Includes estimates for those authorities who were not able to return any data
Numbers and rates *for (a) infant, (b) neonatal, (c) early neonatal and (d) deaths under 24 hours for children in Leeds Western Health Authority 1982–84 Period of deaths 1982 1983 1984 Numbers Rates Numbers Rates Numbers Rates (a) Infant 40 9.23 47 10.70 35 8.19 (b) Neonatal 26 6.00 31 7.06 19 4.45 (c) Early neonatal 21 4.85 28 6.38 13 3.04 (d) Under 24 hours 12 2.77 21 4.78 8 1.87 * Rates per 1,000 live births
Definitions:
(a) Infant—deaths of children aged under 1 year.
(b) Neonatal—deaths of children aged under 4 weeks.
(c) Early neonatal—deaths of children aged under 1 week.