Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when amendments to the Children Act 1989 to strengthen protections for children in local authority care will be brought forward, in the context of the recommendations of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse.

Our ‘Tackling child sexual abuse: progress update’, published in April 2025, set out the government’s work to respond to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse’s recommendation to amend the Children Act 1989. The update is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/tackling-child-sexual-abuse-progress-update.

The department will publish new national standards and statutory guidance for advocacy for children and young people and has committed to establishing a Child Protection Authority. In December 2025, we published the consultation on the authority’s scope, functions and powers, with the aim of making the system clearer, more unified and ensure there is ongoing improvement through effective evidence-based support for practitioners.

Further, the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill marks the biggest overhaul of children’s social care in a generation with a sharp focus on protecting children. This includes measures to establish multi-agency child protection teams in every local authority area, improve information sharing between agencies, and automatically include education and childcare settings in multi-agency safeguarding arrangements.