Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has admitted that the government’s universal free school meals scheme will have teething problems when it launches in September. According to the Guardian, Clegg told radio station LBC that some schools will not be ready to implement the scheme due to inadequate kitchen facilities. – See more at: http://www.cypnow.co.uk/cyp/news/1142729/daily-roundup-free-school-meals-youth-services-child-health#sthash.CrqH7juX.dpuf

Children and Families Act receives royal assent

The Children and Families Act has received royal assent, ushering in a raft of changes including adoption reforms, greater protection for vulnerable children and shared parental leave.

The legislation includes a number of new measures to protect the welfare of children, including giving children in care the choice to stay with their foster families until they turn 21 and a new legal duty on schools to support children at school with medical conditions better. Meanwhile, there are reforms to children’s residential care designed to make homes safer and improve the quality of care vulnerable children receive. The act will also introduce measures intended to help people better balance their work and home life. From next month, mothers, fathers and adopters can opt to share parental leave around their child’s birth or placement – with mothers and fathers being able to take up to a year, or several months at the same time. The act will also make it illegal for people to smoke in cars when children are present. Children’s minister Edward Timpson, said the act would make a big difference for vulnerable children. “Our adoption reforms will help the 6,000 children who need loving homes to be adopted,” he said. “Our reforms to special educational needs will see a system introduced which is designed around the needs of children and will support them up to the age of 25. “For children coming into the care system, the new 26-week time limit for care proceedings will reduce unnecessary delays. “Virtual school heads will champion their education; children in residential care will live in safer, better quality homes and care leavers will have the option to stay with their foster families until they turn 21. “The act will also make it easier for families to access more flexible childcare, and give young carers’ greater support.”

Source: CYPNow

More than 45,000 18- to 24-year-olds have been forced to go without food or other essentials after their benefits were incorrectly stopped under a new sanctions scheme. According to the Independent, figures from the Department for Work and Pensions reveal that tens of thousands of young people have been hit by the strict new system of penalties introduced in October 2012.

Labour considers witholding cash from schools if young people become Neet

A proportion of schools’ funding should be dependent on pupils’ progress post-16, a group of experts has recommended to the Labour Party.

Labour’s independent skills taskforce has concluded that making schools more directly responsible for pupil destination outcomes is the best way of reducing young people who are Neet (not in education, employment or training).

It wants schools to be given a responsibility to track the destinations of all pupils, with an element of funding – potentially 10 per cent per pupil – conditional on passing learners onto the next stage of their education or training.

The report says: “We believe that such an obligation in itself would incentivise collaboration between schools and colleges in the interests of young people. Our proposal would be to set the level of withheld funding at a level which drives institutional behaviour so we suggest an approach based on withholding 10 per cent of per pupil funding for every young person who fails to secure a next step, but this proportion will need testing and modelling.”

Schools that had funding withheld would instead be required to use that money to provide an enhanced careers guidance service in an effort to cut the number of future Neets, the taskforce’s report proposes.

A new national framework for information, advice and guidance in schools should be brokered by local enterprise partnerships based on the needs of the local labour market, and delivered in partnership between local employers and schools.

Young people would also be expected to continue studying maths and English until they are 18, with a new baccalaureate developed to measure the skills and learning school leavers have achieved, which would make it easier for employers to assess young people’s abilities.

Professor Chris Husbands, chair of the taskforce, said: “Successful economies and societies depend on developing all their young people. In Britain, we have a poor record of delivering high skills and effective qualifications for the forgotten 50 per cent: the half of young people for whom the current qualifications regime simply does not deliver.

“The taskforce has set out plans for radically improved information and advice which will help young people negotiate an ever more complex labour market, and for a deliverable National Baccalaureate – a simple framework for qualifications and skills which will make it easier for all young people to make the transition to adulthood.”

The taskforce was established in November 2012 and published a previous report last year on apprenticeships. Its proposals will now be considered by the party as it draws up its manifesto for the election in May 2015.

Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt said: “The talents of the forgotten 50 per cent – those young people who wish to pursue a vocational route through education – are being overlooked by this government.

“Labour will deliver for the forgotten 50 per cent through a Technical Baccalaureate with rigorous vocational qualifications, requiring schools and colleges to collaborate to reduce Neets and transforming careers advice by working with local employers so young people have the best chance of succeeding in the job market.”

Source: CYPNow

Government advises against cell use for children with mental health problems

The government has issued updated advice on crisis mental health care that states police cells should never be used to hold children and young people.

The Mental Health Crisis Care Concordat says every local area should establish protocols that set out how police officers should use powers under the Mental Health Act to ensure that a person deemed in need of emergency mental health care receives an assessment and are taken to a health-based “place of safety” rather than a police cell.

The protocols, which should be agreed by NHS commissioners, the police, the ambulance service and social services, need to make specific arrangements for dealing with children and young people detained under the act.

The Concordat says that protocols should ensure police custody is never used as a place of safety for children and young people except in exceptional circumstances. It defines this as “where a police officer makes the decision that the immediate safety of a child or young person requires it”.

“Even in cases where police stations are used, the use of cells should be avoided, and alternatives considered wherever possible,” it adds.

In addition, the Concordat states that units attached to adult wards in mental health hospitals can be used as places of safety if child-dedicated facilities are unavailable – under the Mental Health Act 2007, hospitals should provide “age-appropriate” facilities that are separate from adult wards.

The new advice comes just weeks after the Care Quality Commission revealed that 41 children were held in police cells in the South West under the Mental Health Act because of a lack of age-appropriate places of safety at local hospitals.

Figures published last week showed that 350 children have been treated on adult psychiatric wards so far this year.

The Concordat also highlights the importance of staff in hospital adolescent inpatient units having the “appropriate skills, experience and resources” to support those aged 16 to 18 whose care may soon transfer to the adult system.

Schools and youth services should be fully involved in developing crisis strategies for children and young people as they will often be the first to identify the problems a young person is experiencing.

It recommends that services ensure groups with a higher prevalance of mental health problems, such as looked-after children, care leavers and those leaving youth custody, have good access to mental health crisis care.

SOURCE: CYPNOW