§ Lord Smith of Leighasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will respond to the rising numbers of children deemed "at risk" by increasing funding to local authorities. [HL25]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education and Skills (Lord Filkin)The statistical release relating to referrals, assessments and children and young people on child protection registers for the year ending 31 March 2004 was published last month. The release provides summary information that has been derived from statistical data reported by the 150 local authorities in England. All numbers are rounded to the nearest 100.
The data do not point to an increase of numbers of children on child protection registers. There were 26,300 children on child protection registers at 31 March 2004, 1 per cent fewer than a year earlier and 25 per cent fewer than in 1994.
The local authority social services letter (2003)7 Children's Social Services Funding 2004–05 set out the main aspects of the 2004–05 local government finance settlement which is relevant to the funding provided for children's social services. In total, we have provided an extra £90 million this year to support councils in improving their services to safeguard children including responding to the recommendations made in Lord Laming's report and the Joint Chief Inspectors' report Safeguarding Children. No conditions have been attached to this money to enable councils the freedom to choose how to target the extra resources so that they can maximise the outcome for children's services in their area.