£25bn cost of North’s kids in care
AS the North of England struggles to compete with the more affluent South, here’s a striking figure – higher rates of children entering care are estimated to have cost our region at least £25bn more in the past four years.
That’s one of the key findings in new analysis showing a North-south divide in the numbers of children going into care, with young people in care homes generally needing high levels of support from health, welfare, education, justice, and children’s services.
One in every 52 children in Blackpool is in care compared with one in 140 across England, while the North of England accounts for just over a quarter (28%) of the child population, but more than a third (36%) of the children in care.
The researchers said, given this cost, if the North of England had experienced the same rates of children entering care as the South between 2019 and 2023, “it would have saved at least £25bn”.
The report’s lead author, Dr Davara Bennett, based at the University of Liverpool, said the findings show “the damage caused by cuts to prevention and failure to address the very real problem of child poverty in the North”.
The report was researched and funded by Health Equity North – which focuses on finding solutions to public health problems in Northern England – for the Child of the North Allparty Parliamentary Group (APPG).
The analysis suggested a rise in child poverty between 2015 and 2020 “led to over 10,000 additional children entering care in England” and that the “Northsouth divide in overall care rates is partly explained by widening inequalities in children entering care since 2010”. The report stated: “Decades of underinvestment in the North have hollowed out preventative services, increased rates of children in care and undermined foster care provision, leaving local authorities at the mercy of the private residential care providers.”
It also said the location of children’s homes “compounds challenges in accessing quality education for children in care” with homes often built where housing costs are low, and “a correlation between property prices and school quality”.
The report added: “This means children in care are more likely to live in economically deprived areas and attend lower quality schools.”
APPG members and the report authors made a number of recommendations including policies to reduce child poverty such as scrapping the two-child limit and benefit cap, as well as more investment in prevention strategies such as targeting additional investment in the North.
In the Lords, the Bishop of Newcastle Helen-ann Hartley described the “compelling testimony of two young women, Rebekah and Kirsty, whose lives have been impacted by experiences in the care system” at the launch of the ‘Children in Care in the North of England’ report in Westminster this week.
And she offered an idea from New Zealand, where she served as a bishop from 2014 to 2017. ‘Family group conferences’ – mediated meetings involving parents and wider family members – are used to help determine how best to support children.
She said: “A study published by Foundations last year confirmed that family group conferences reduce entry into care.
“However, unlike in New Zealand, UK local authorities are not obliged to offer them.
“Will the Government extend their preventive services so that every family, where there are concerns about the care of their child, is offered a family group conference?”