Support for Bereaved Children

Christine Jardine Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2024 Westminster Hall

[Andy Carter]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for highlighting the work that many charities do. He is absolutely right, and I will come to his point shortly.

I want to put the issue into some context. The Childhood Bereavement Network provides statistics on the number of children bereaved of a parent every year. The figure currently sits at about 46,000 annually. To put that in context, it equates to a young person being bereaved of a parent every 20 minutes. However, we know that that figure is inaccurate, and we have tried to estimate the total number of bereaved children. That is because grief can come with so many types of loss, and the figure we have applies only to children who have lost parents. Crucially, we lack the statistics that charities and service providers need in order to ensure that bereavement support networks, schools and professionals can support children.

[Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)]

I am delighted the hon. Member has brought this subject forward. As he probably knows, it is very close to my heart and I have been doing a lot of work on it. The figures he brings up for this problem are the tip of the iceberg, because although we know that children are bereaved every day, we do not know where they are and the charities do not know how to get in touch with them. That is why I have brought forward a private Member’s Bill—the Bereavement Support (Children and Young People) Bill—to create a protocol for putting children in touch with organisations and vice versa. Is that something the hon. Member thinks he can support?

[Andy Carter]

I pay tribute to the work the hon. Lady has done with colleagues on her private Member’s Bill. I absolutely support its aims, and I will talk a little more about it in just a second.

This debate is largely down to the experience of a young man called Dan Walsh, who I am pleased to say is able to join us in the Chamber today with his friend Finn and his teacher Alice. Dan is currently studying at Priestly College in my constituency, where I had the pleasure of first meeting him a few months ago during a visit. He gave me a heartwarming account of his experience of loss, how it impacted him and his family and how he not only overcame that terrible and tragic event at such a young age, but was empowered to become involved in campaigning to help others who, sadly, find themselves in the same position.

I would like to share the speech that Dan has written for this debate. He writes:

“Nearly five years to the day, I lost my father to a shock brain aneurysm. He was a fit and healthy man, and we had absolutely no warning of what was to come. At the time I was 12 and in Year 7, and little did I know that when I left school that day, my life was about to change forever in a way that I could never have anticipated.

The journey that followed was rough, my world had been turned upside down. At 12 I struggled to grasp the permanence of death. I let the guilt and anger consume and stop me from being able to properly process his passing.

Throughout that difficult time, I was reminded constantly that I wasn’t alone. My own family and school always made sure that I knew that they would always be there.

Yet it was at that point when I felt most alone.

Mark Lemon, an author, captured this feeling brilliantly when he wrote ‘grief is feeling lonely in a room full of people’. I knew full well that I was supported by loving and caring people, but nothing could ever stop me from feeling so isolated, nothing anyone could do would ever make me feel any different.”

--- Later in debate ---

[David Johnston]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point, and I am happy to have a discussion with my colleagues in other Departments to see whether something like that might be feasible.

One of the things that we are keen to ensure—again, I had this conversation with Dan and Finn before the debate—is that we balance the need to ensure that children and young people receive support against the fact that some of them may not want certain people to know what has happened, including their school and teachers. We may feel that it is better that their school and teachers know, but it might be the case that, for a whole host of reasons, it is not something that they want to be known or to have discussed. Nevertheless, as I say, I am happy to take that suggestion away and discuss it with my Government colleagues.

[Christine Jardine]

Further to the point that the hon. Member for Warrington South (Andy Carter) just made, I agree that perhaps there is no need to put the information on the death certificate. However, when it comes to the school census, very often children will have moved from one parent’s house to another’s, if the parents have separated, or even to their grandparents’ home, so the school has no way of knowing. It would therefore be useful to inform the school, but we also have to take into account GDPR. So it might not be as easy as the schools being able to tell people. However, if the person responsible for recording the death could set the whole process in motion, that might be easier.

[David Johnston]

The hon. Lady makes a good and important point. These things always involve considerable practical challenges, so they often sound simpler than they are in reality. However, we will certainly see what it is possible to do, given the constraints that she just identified.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South again for securing this debate. Children and young people who lose someone close to them deserve all the support, help and love that they can get. Nobody experiences grief in the same way, but we always want to consider how we can best support children and young people in the toughest circumstances, and where support is needed the Government are committed to ensuring that it is available and accessible.

Finally and most importantly, I thank and pay tribute to Dan for bringing about this debate. It is not often that someone of his age secures a debate in Parliament, and I am very impressed by the work that he has done to turn his very difficult experience into positive change for other young people.

Question put and agreed to.