An Eden man who led a once in a generation review into children’s social care is behind the government’s new £200 million plan to fix it.
Josh MacAlister, of Greystoke, led the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care, which is informing the root-and-branch overhaul of the system across the country.
Formerly a teacher and founder of children’s social work charity Frontline, Josh began leading the review in 2021 and in his spare time, is training to be a member of Patterdale Mountain Rescue Team.
His review was undertaken from Cumbria and was informed by the lived experience of families and workers in children’s services, recommending a more effective way forward with early intervention becoming the focus.
Over the next two years, a new Children’s Social Care Implementation Strategy published today will transform the current care system to focus on more early support for families, reducing the need for a crisis response at a later stage.
The government’s plan responds to recommendations made by Mr MacAlister’s review as well as the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel into the deaths of Arthur Labinjo Hughes and Star Hobson, and the Competition and Markets Authority.
Mr MacAlister said: “How we raise and care for children is probably the biggest reflection of who we are as a society. The children’s social care system at its best can reflect England at its best and at the moment we’re a very long way away from that.
“Over the course of the review, I spent a lot of time with people affected in Cumbria. I spoke with a 17-year-old girl in foster care about her experiences and I spoke with a woman in South Cumbria who had two boys caught up in violence and exploitation who needed to live in a children’s home.
“I also spent a lot of time with a young mum who was in a violent relationship where social workers had done a huge amount to help her and her children escape
“I think those stories showed that in Cumbria, if the system works well it can be completely life changing, but sometimes that’s pot luck of whether or not you’ll have that experience or not and when it fails people, it fails people really badly.”
The findings of the Mr MacAlister’s review revealed the current care system is often fragmented, siloed, and struggling to meet the needs of children and families across Cumbria and the rest of England.
He said: “There are too many places in England where services are not good enough for children and families. This is why we need wholesale change.
“We have a care system that is overwhelmed and children are sent to live far away from where they grow up, often with carers who can’t meet their needs. They lose those really essential lifelong loving relationships that many of us take for granted, and that is completely life changing.
“It leads to poorer outcomes long term for children, we see issues about the long term costs of not getting the system right for families and children. People who have been in care are significantly more likely to get caught up in cycles of crime, not to be in education or employment and are significantly more likely to die young and these are children that were in the care of the state.
“It affects all of us and we all have a responsibility to make England a better place for children and families and particularly for children in care.”
What will the new plan change?
From supporting foster carers, kinship carers and social workers to improving early help for families and children homes – the plan aims to give children who have had the hardest starts in life better support.
But after initially suggesting a £2.6 billion overhaul, Mr MacAlister said that while the new plan was a positive step forward, the government must go further for children in the care of the state.
He said: “This new strategy means that there’s now a government plan to start tipping the scales towards the kind of system children and families urgently need. There are notable measures – new support for kinship carers, more intensive help for families and a shift towards a care system that builds rather than breaks relationships. These are positive changes and the new direction being set is very welcome.
“Yet, without a whole system reset on the scale set out by the review, outcomes for children and families will remain stubbornly poor, more children will grow up in care and costs will continue to spiral.
“The government’s plan gets us started down the right path, but it must be more ambitious and go further and faster if it is to reach the tipping point of change that children need. Children in the care of the state – the government’s children – need to come first. Parents across the country put their children first and our government should act no differently.”
As part of the new overhaul, vulnerable children will be better supported to stay with their families, along with a greater focus on placements with relatives, friends or foster carers where that’s not possible.
Families will also receive local early help and intervention with challenges such as addiction, domestic abuse or mental health, to help them stay together.
This will start in 12 local authorities including the two new unitary authorities in Cumbria and is backed by £45m to embed a best practice model that will then be shared more widely.
Kinship care, where a child is placed with a relative or close family friend, will be prioritised by simplifying the process and providing more support to extended families, such as grandparents, aunties, uncles and others. Additional training and support for kinship carers will also be provided.
Foster carers will also see an above-inflation increase in their allowance to help cover the increasing costs of caring for a child in their home.
This will come alongside a £25 million push to recruit and retain more foster carers over the next two years, which is the largest investment in recent history.
Depending on local need, foster care recruitment will focus on areas where there is a particular shortage of placements for children such as sibling groups, teenagers, unaccompanied asylum seeking children and those that have suffered complex trauma or parent and child foster homes.
Another £30 million of the funding will be put towards family finding, befriending and mentoring programmes to support children in care and care leavers to find and maintain loving relationships.
The government will also increase the leaving care allowance from £2,000 to £3,000 from April this year, an above inflation increase to help them set up home independently. For care leavers undertaking apprenticeships, there will be an increase to the bursary available from £1000 to £3,000.
Finally, local authorities will also be supported to recruit up to 500 new children’s social care apprentices and there will be consultation on proposals to reduce over-reliance on agency social workers. The government will also introduce a new early career framework for social workers.
Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing, Claire Coutinho said: “The social care system does an invaluable job in changing lives. But more often than not, children’s social care has become the ‘forgotten emergency service’.
“We’ve seen from the tragic deaths of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson that more needs to be done to protect our most vulnerable children. That’s why our ambitious Strategy will reform the system, supporting the families most in need.
“This marks the start of our long-term plan that puts love for children and families at the heart of our care system and will ensure all children have the support and protection they need, creating the stable and loving home that every child deserves.”
