A report out today from public spending watchdog Audit Scotland warns of the poor outcomes from many children who end up in care, including doing less well at school, a higher risk of unemployment, homelessness and spending time in prison, as well as poorer health, including suffering mental illness.
The authors of Getting it Right for Children in Residential Care blame local authorities for short-term planning and weaknesses in contracts drawn up with providers in the private and voluntary sectors. They warn: “Contractual arrangements between councils and independent providers are generally weak.”
Last night, Jennifer Davidson, director of the Scottish Institute for Residential Childcare based at the Strathclyde University, said: “This report must be embarrassing for local authorities. The fact that they appear to be taking decisions that affect children’s lives on the basis of a lack of information is shocking.”
Around 1600 children a year end up in residential care, either voluntarily, or after being sent there from the courts or children’s panels.
Audit Scotland’s report says they are often sent in an unplanned way, with councils “spot-purchasing” places on a last-minute, case-by-case basis. The location of available spaces is often a bigger consideration than the child’s individual needs.
Researchers looked at a sample of 60 case files and found many were inadequate -- addressing only short-term outcomes and were vague or silent about the future.
“None addressed long-term goals such as achieving qualifications, going into further education, training or employment and living an independent, socially responsible and satisfying life,” the report says.
Meanwhile the money involved is rising steadily. Expenditure increased by 68% between 2001/02 and 2008/09, the report says, and may rise further. In 2008/09, 29 out of 32 councils overspent their budgets on residential child care, by £18m. Fourteen councils overspent by at least 10%, while Clackmannanshire, Falkirk and East Lothian all overspent by more than 30%.
Audit Scotland concludes: “Councils cannot demonstrate that they are achieving value for money as there is insufficient clarity about the quality of services, and outcomes and the costs of all types of provision available, including both in-house and independent provision.”
Children’s Minister Adam Ingram said the Government and Cosla were already working to establish a national commissioning strategy. He added: “In an ideal world, every child would grow up happily and safely in their own family. But some children cannot be sustained in families without the specialist intervention that quality residential placements can provide. The challenge is in identifying these children early enough and intervening more effectively.”
A Cosla spokesman described the report as “out of date the moment it’s published” and added: “We are disappointed and frustrated that this report fails to get across the effort being put in by local government to improve the lives of some of Scotland’s most vulnerable children.
“This report would have been more relevant had we not already accepted the findings of the National Review of Residential Childcare which was published last year. The NRCCI produced a well- thought-out and balanced report that we are acting on. However, we cannot deliver change overnight.”
