Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether his Department has taken steps to monitor the potential effect of care proceedings on children who have had their contact with their birth family suspended.
The potential effect of care proceedings on children who have had their contact with their birth family suspended will continue to be considered by judges as part of individual care proceedings.
The department has published guidance on children in care and contact with their families while the government’s social distancing guidance remains in force. The guidance makes clear that contact between looked-after children and their birth parents must continue but may be more appropriate to take place virtually at this time: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-guidance-for-childrens-social-care-services/coronavirus-covid-19-guidance-for-local-authorities-on-childrens-social-care.
We are also aware that the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory commissioned an urgent new research project, Understanding how children’s connections to birth families are being managed during social isolation. This showed that those taking part in our study reported widespread use of video calls by and for children in residential, foster and kinship care.