ADCS response: Report on the Children and Families Act 2014
Responding to the House of Lords report ‘Children and Families Act 2014: A failure of implementation’, Steve Crocker, ADCS President, said:
“This report underlines many of the challenges we’ve been raising for some time and does it in a clear way. The 2014 Act aimed to improve services for and the lives of vulnerable children. Some of the reforms included here are having a real and tangible impact, such as the role of the virtual school head in supporting the education of children in care. Other reforms included in the Act have progressed less well, or have not had the desired impact for a whole host of reasons, including those relating to special educational, needs and disabilities. Often the sufficiency of funding is an issue but there are also difficulties in having the right data or levers to understand what needs to happen and influence others. Whilst mental health services were not covered in the reforms, the committee draws attention to the difficulties children and young people face in accessing timely support and asserts that the government has not grasped the importance or severity of this problem, my fellow directors and I can only agree. ADCS has repeatedly raised the issue of children’s mental health and emotional wellbeing and the urgent need for a review of children’s mental health services - the current system is not working for children and it threatens to overwhelm the social care system.”
ENDS