Our Response to The Independent Children’s Social Care Review’s Final Report

On 15th January 2021, the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care was announced and Josh MacAlister was appointed as Chair, with the Review commencing in March 2021 and concluding in June 2022 to wait for Government to respond.

In the area of Racial and Ethnic Disparities, The Review stated the commitment to identify, consider and attempt to better understand racial and ethnic disparities that exist in children's social care and consider what could be done to address them. The Review also stated that they will look to understand in more depth and consider what should be done to address why Black children and children from some other ethnic groups are significantly more likely to be in care.

To help The Review meet their objective to identify and understand how the racial and ethnic inequalities and disparities within Children’s Social Care, has a direct impact to how Black Children and Young People experience The Care System, our Black Care Experience Report, containing painful stories of how racial and ethnic inequalities and disparities, had an impact on the lives of those Black and In Care. This Report was submitted to the Reviews Call for Evidence in March 2021.

Members of the Review Core Team were present at our Black Table Talks, to hear in real time, the voices of the lived black care experienced and the voices of the diverse children’s social care workforce.

Footage from The Black Care Experience Conference was also forwarded on to the Review Team, another way to help with engagement and further evidence the impact of inequalities and disparities.

The Review went on to host RoundTable Talks, and have said that they also engaged with Black Care Experienced Children and Young People and Families, but it is unclear as to how many were spoken to and what they were asked.

The Review also cite the findings of the What Works in Children’s Social Care ‘Anti – Racism’ March 2022 Report, evidencing how racial and ethnic inequalities and disparities are at play in Social Care.

Despite the time, effort and evidence, our Voices and our Stories were not included in the Final Report, and The Reviews findings in the area of Racial and Ethnic Disparities can be found in the Supporting Documents section of the website, as an Annex.

The Review has made the decision to proceed to Call for Change in this area as follows:
• Cultural Competence Training for Social Workers as part of the Early Career Framework Package
• Increase in the Diversity of Leadership within Children’s Social Care
• Improvement on Data on Ethnic Disparities in Care
• Collection of Data to improve understanding of the Care Experiences of Black Children and Young People

Although not robust, these are fair points to action, and are not dissimilar to the way forward for change outlined in the Black Care Experience Report. However we believe that to action and achieve these points, co-production led by Black and Care Experienced, Black Families and Black Professionals who have lived experience of the Care System, is vital and necessary, to not only provide oversight and make sure this process is undertaken with our best interests at heart, but to also make sure that ‘our voices with solutions’ are not blended and diluted within the struggles of other racial and ethnic minority groups, because as it is well known, our experiences are not the same.

The Review go on to state: ‘Alongside our recommendations highlighted here which have the potential to begin to address disparities, there is more work to do to understand these disparities and address them…We include understanding racial and ethnic disparities in this list as a priority area for research’.

The Black and In Care Group began this journey in the 1980’s and as a collective of the Black Care Experienced Community and our Network of Allies, we are surprised, disappointed and tired of hearing, more research is needed and subsequently redone, as this can seem as though we are to be taken around another cycle of research that may end up as a tokenistic and tick box exercise, to avoid tackling the root cause of the racial and ethnic disparities and inequalities that have a real impact on the Care received by the Black and In Care, and so are opposed to this recommendation.

With that in mind, we are in the process of strategizing our way forward to actively Campaign and call for much needed change, for the current and next Black and In Care Generation.

Our Chair’s Full Response to The Reviews Final Report can be found here.

ENDS

For more information, please contact us at:

• Email: Office@thetransformedyou.co.uk

• Phone: +44 (0)203 128 7061

About The Black Care Experience

Established in 2020, Our vision is to see that every Black Child and Young Person remains connected to their Culture, Identity and Heritage as they journey through the Children’s Social Care System, across the UK and Worldwide.

Black is defined as a Child and Young Person whose Ethnic Origin is either African, Caribbean including Mixed Race with African or Caribbean Heritage.

Our vision is made possible by bringing together a Network of diverse Children’s Social Care Workforce and Voluntary Sector Workforce within Children’s Social Care, to improve their systems and practice by learning from the Lived Black Care Experience and Black Family Members who have had experience of Children’s Social Care.

The Network also provides a space for best practice to be shared.