argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Education
Robert Henry Halfon (Conservative, Centre-right): I strongly endorse what the Secretary of State has set out about the review, and I also welcome the comments, particularly the moving comments at the end, of the shadow Secretary of State As I understand it, Arthur was not in school—he had been kept at home by his father—when this tragedy happened. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will know that, putting aside the 200,000 children sent home because of covid, who are known about by the school system, there are another 100,000 ghost children, as I call them, who are lost in the system. They not returned to school for the most part, and are potentially subject to safeguarding hazards—county lines gangs, online harms and, of course, awful domestic abuse Will my right hon. Friend ensure that we are not discussing these issues again in this House following a further tragedy similar to the one that we have just heard about? Will he proactively make a real effort to work with the local authorities, the schools and the regional commissioners to make sure that those 100,000 children, who are mostly not in school, are returned to school and are watched by the appropriate authorities? We must get those children back into school, otherwise we may face—I hope not—further tragedies along the way.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Education
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend, the Chair of the Education Committee, is absolutely right to raise this concerning issue, which is a focus for my Department; I am working closely with other Departments and agencies to work through it. He will know that we launched the See, Hear, Respond programme, which is aimed at supporting vulnerable children and young people whose usual support networks were impacted by the pandemic and national restrictions. The tragedy for Arthur is that he was never off the school register. Nevertheless, my right hon. Friend’s point is a powerful one.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Law and Crime
Julian Carlton Knight (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement and for his engagement over the last 72 hours "No one loves me" and "no one is going to feed me": those are the words that broke the heart of my town, and, it seems, of our country as well. A young lad who never had a chance; he experienced unimaginable brutality in his short life. Will my right hon. Friend confirm that no stone will remain unturned and no difficult question unasked, that this investigation will proceed without fear or favour, and that at the end of it we will know clearly and publicly who failed Arthur and how he was failed? In addition, will he ensure that the investigation focuses on the clear breakdown in partnerships between the likes of social services, the police and educators? Why on earth were they not talking to each other? At the very least, we owe it to Arthur that every lesson from this horrific tragedy is learned and that no town has its heart broken like Solihull has had.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Government Operations
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s words. The words of Arthur have, I know, torn the heart of the nation. I assure him that both reviews will be able to go wherever they need to. I hope that he agrees with me that transparency is the best disinfectant in this case. I thank and commend him for making himself available at all times when we needed to make contact and discuss with him and his office what we were planning to announce in the House.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I would be delighted to meet the hon. Lady. I think her characterisation is slightly unfair in the sense that we work towards improving the system, and the teams both in the Department and on the frontline do tremendous work. We worked on Step Up to Social Work and Frontline, which delivered thousands of new entrants into the social care system. Since 2017 we have seen an uplift of 10% in the social care workforce, which I hope she will agree is to be commended.[Official Report, 16 December 2021, Vol. 705, c. 6MC.] But I am very happy to meet her because I know she cares passionately about this subject.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Law and Crime
Mohammad Saqib Bhatti (Conservative, Centre-right): I stand with great sadness today. My constituents in Meriden who are served by Solihull Council have been devastated by the death of Arthur. My thoughts go out to those who loved him, and I pay tribute to that young boy with that beautiful smile I welcome the announcements of the inspection and the review today. I do not think any Member of Parliament ever wants to be standing here addressing circumstances such as this. I completely agree on the Attorney General’s review of the sentencing. I have to admit that many times over the past few days I have thought they should lock them up and throw away the key. Unfortunately we have been here before. What reassurances can my right hon. Friend give to my constituents that the inquiry will bring meaningful change that will protect children like Arthur in future?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Law and Crime
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s important question. I reassure him that both reviews will be thorough and will be shared with the House, but will also feed into Josh McAlister’s overall review of children’s social care. I have to say that 29 years minimum for the murderer of Arthur, and 21 years for his father, is what the court could deliver, but I know that the Attorney General has had a request to look again at the leniency of that sentence.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for the right hon. Lady’s question. I thank the 34,000 social workers who, today and every day, are out protecting young people. We continue to look to bring more people into the profession; as I mentioned, there has been a 10% rise since 2017. Whatever the reviews recommend—including of course the McAlister review—that is exactly the thing that we will look to implement.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Timothy Paul Loughton (Conservative, Centre-right): I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I am sure the Secretary of State shares my sense of déjà vu. This tragic case reveals familiar failings raised: 12 years ago, by Lord Laming in his report into Baby P and how we need to have better joint working; 11 years ago, when we started publishing serious case reviews so that we can all learn from them; and 10 years ago, when I launched the Munro review—crucially, not as a knee-jerk reaction to a recent tragedy—to free up social workers from the bureaucracy that was keeping them from eyeballing and face-to-face time with those vulnerable families. While definitely welcoming the Government’s determination to respond urgently with a review, may I suggest that first the Secretary of State reviews why the findings of previous reviews have not been acted on or why the system has not allowed the necessary changes to happen?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s question. He has what I would describe as institutional memory of the children’s social care system. His work as Children and Families Minister in the Department has remained invaluable. He is right to challenge us on ensuring that what we intend to implement from those reviews, including the Munro review—the Department accepted the majority of its recommendations—then happens operationally on the ground to reflect that. That is equally important, and that is why the MacAlister review is so important. It deals with the operational challenges, so that we can turn some of this stuff into reality on the ground.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his important question. The reviews will look at all aspects of the failures in this tragic case. It is worth reminding the House that directors of children’s services work also very closely with chief execs and lead members. From my time as Children and Families Minister, I remember that it is that combination of leadership that delivers the right outcomes that we want to see, but the review will look at that as well.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Law and Crime
Caroline Elizabeth Johnson (Conservative, Centre-right): I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests; I am a children’s doctor. Arthur’s case has shocked and saddened all of us, but as Members have already said, we have been here before with similar cases. In my career, I have seen and looked after far too many children who have been injured and hurt by those who are supposed to love them and care for them the most. I welcome the Secretary of State’s review and I hope it will successfully reduce the number of cases. I want to focus my question on justice in particular, because I have seen cases where we have identified problems, but people have been let down, either because the Crown Prosecution Service has accepted lesser pleas to avoid court cases—I remember in one case, the barrister did not know the name of the children he had come to represent in local care proceedings—or sentences have been passed that have been hideously too low for the severity of the heinous crimes committed. When the Secretary of State is doing his review, can he confirm that he will be working with the Ministry of Justice on these cases, too?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Member is absolutely right that we need to ensure that we continue to retain the more experienced social worker leadership, and I hope that the MacAlister review will make some operational recommendations on that. Of course, we had two successful schemes with Frontline and Step Up to Social Work, which resulted in thousands of people coming into the social care profession and the number of social workers going up by 10% since 2017. She is right that if we look at the system overall, we have far too many agency workers, which I think is her point. We want that experience and leadership to be working full time in a local authority system rather than on an agency basis.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Lucy Allan (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the Secretary of State for his statement and his tone throughout. I know that he was passionate about child safeguarding as Children’s Minister and that children are in safe hands with him at the helm, so I am grateful for that This horrific case shows that fundamental reform of children’s social care is long overdue. Lessons learned and case reviews are not enough. Does the Secretary of State agree that the problems with children’s social care are systemic and that the challenges faced are not just about funding? Does he agree that scapegoating individuals, particularly inexperienced social workers, will not improve the care of the most vulnerable children?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Government Operations
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that we must ensure that we deliver better outcomes. We recognise that, which is why we made a manifesto pledge to have the MacAlister review. I am confident that the review will deliver recommendations that I hope we can be ambitious about and deliver rapidly My hon. Friend is also right that we cannot continue to have review after review. We have to learn from them and operationally implement the recommendations. I am passionate that, in complex systems, we must have thorough investigations, because that is how they are improved and made failsafe for those they protect.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Member for his very important question. Just to unpack a little bit of it, I think he is right to say that we need to make sure we know where every child is. There are some excellent examples of home schooling with parents who really do a great job, but that is not always the case. I know that he cares passionately about the work of children’s social services, and I hope that he will continue to care about this when he leaves this place, as he has announced he is doing. He will be sorely missed, I think, and his input will be missed On the hon. Member’s point about local councils, in this year’s and next year’s budgets, they have about £51.3 billion of core spending power for their services. They have had a real-terms increase for what they can do, with the £6 billion to cope with covid as well. Nevertheless, I think it is important that we do not scapegoat anyone, and he is absolutely right that we have to make sure we allow both the panel and the review to take their course and report back to this House.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Robert John Blackman (Conservative, Centre-right): I would go back a little longer than other people, and refer to the Jasmine Beckford case, as well as the Victoria Climbié case, the Baby Peter case and now that of Arthur. The one common theme throughout this whole terrible series of events is that the opportunities to take a child to safety were missed. Will my right hon. Friend make sure that the message goes out to frontline children’s social workers that if they have a suspicion—a suspicion—of a child being abused, it will be thoroughly investigated, and if necessary that child will be removed to a place of safety?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s question. He is right to remind us of the cases of Beckford, Climbié and now, tragically, Arthur. I think social workers are doing a tremendous job, and I think it is important that multi-agency work—for whatever reason, and we will find out through these two reviews—missed Arthur in this case and did not take him away. The father and partner were obviously evil and manipulative, but nevertheless we have to make sure, if there is any evidence, any inkling, any iota of harm to any child, that the child is taken away immediately.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): The hon. Lady raises an important point. I know from my time as children and families Minister that she has been campaigning on this issue and I know she is meeting the Minister for children and families on Monday, but I will certainly take a very close look at what she says and feed back to the panels.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Kelly Jane Tolhurst (Conservative, Centre-right): I must declare that my sister is a social worker. No one can understand how beautiful little Arthur died at the hands of the people who were charged with caring for him. I have great respect for my right hon. Friend, and I know that he will be absolutely determined in his passion to get at exactly why this happened and the learnings we can take forward. However, does he agree with me that it is now finally time really to look at and deal with the case load that these social workers have to deal with? Some of them have excessive case loads with very complex cases. Can we finally give social workers the confidence, the safety and the time to be able to do the job that they love and get up every morning for to keep children safe?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s incredibly important question. She will, I hope, remember that, when I was children and families Minister, I was the champion of social workers, and I will continue to be the champion of social workers as Secretary of State. I am very confident about the MacAlister review—hence why it was such a priority for us for it to be in our manifesto. It is so important that we now get this right, and case loads are very much a part of that, as she quite rightly identifies.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Law and Crime
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I will always go where the evidence leads. The reason why we asked Josh MacAlister to conduct the review prior to the tragic murder of this innocent young boy is that we want to make sure that we deliver a system that is fit for purpose. We have made more funding available, but it depends what the review comes back with, and I will certainly return to the Dispatch Box and go through that with colleagues to make sure that we get this right.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Law and Crime
Simon James Hoare (Conservative, Centre-right): May I say, as many have, what a relief it is that my right hon. Friend is at the helm on this issue? This has been a bone-chilling case. He was right in his statement to say that no Government anywhere in the world can legislate for evil, and we have seen evil in this case. We also know that hard-working professionals cannot be everywhere all the time Quite rightly, the campaign to end violence against women and girls has a high national profile and commands the respect of Ministers across Government. May I urge my right hon. Friend to begin such a crusade to combat neglect and violence against children, so that, as others have noted, the precautionary principle—the taking away of a child if there is a scintilla of a doubt—is at the forefront of people’s minds, the resources are available, and the law stands four-square behind them?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her moving words about her own children; I felt exactly the same way this weekend about my nine-year-old daughter. The hon. Lady highlights a very important point. The MacAlister review is very much about making sure that we have a system that is decisive when it comes to the protection of children.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Laura Trott (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement. I ask him to be mindful—I know he will be—of learning the lessons from other tragic cases, particularly that of Baby P, where we saw a massive increase in referrals and in the number of children taken away from the care that they were in. We need an increase in resources for social workers in the near term to handle that increase in referrals, and I do think that a balance needs to be struck between taking children away from their parents, or the home that they are in, and making sure that they are safe. Will he ensure that he sends that message to social workers?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s important question. She is absolutely right about how social workers identify support networks for children—I have seen them do that brilliantly. Of course, if there is a scintilla of doubt in terms of any harm being caused to a child, they absolutely should be taken away. She also makes an important point about learning from previous cases and the additional work that will now be placed on the social work frontline. We are cognisant of that, and I know that the Minister for children and families is looking at how we can continue to support the frontline.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I would respectfully say that I do not think anybody in this House would ever disrespect the social work workforce or any social worker. I also think that evidence-based strategy is important, and that is why the MacAlister review is so important. It is worth remembering that local government’s core spending is increasing by an average of 3% in real terms each year for the spending review period. So more money is going into local government, but, depending on what the MacAlister review delivers, I would certainly be the first to make the argument for properly resourcing children’s social care.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
David Timothy Simmonds (Conservative, Centre-right): May I, like others, thank my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the tone of the statement? Does he agree that the Children Act 1989, which provides the main legislative and operational underpinning of children’s social care, is perhaps in need of updating? Does he have a view about how that might happen Further, picking up the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Julian Knight), does he agree that it is a weakness in our local safeguarding partnership model that schools and education are not a statutory safeguarding partner?
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who I know has deep experience in the area. He is right that we need to carefully consider all possible routes to help ensure that children’s social care has the powers that it needs to protect vulnerable children like Arthur. It is important that we wait for both reviews before we look to make specific legislative improvements. We obviously need to ensure that the national panel report and the findings of the joint targeted area inspection come back. Of course, we also have the independent MacAlister review. I will not rule out legislative changes if we need to make them.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nadhim Zahawi (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for the hon. Member’s question. Funding is one important part of the equation—absolutely—but equally important is making sure that we look at what went wrong and why, and how we will fix that operationally. People such as Martin Narey, who I was speaking to during the week, would say to the House that this is about not only funding, but making sure we have the operational competence to support children’s social care and the frontline in doing their job. Social workers tell me all the time that the best place for them is working with families, rather than dealing with all the bureaucracy that sits behind this.
Arthur Labinjo-Hughes — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Social Welfare
Nicola Jane Aiken (Conservative, Centre-right): I have never met a social worker who does not go to work every day to make a difference to the people they serve. I fear that, in this nation, we do not always hold social workers in the high regard that we do teachers, police officers, nurses and doctors, and that needs to change. As a former cabinet member for children’s services, I believe fully that this is about local accountability and that local councillors, whether the lead member or the leader of the council, have a role to play in keeping children safe. This is not just about the directors of children’s services and the social workers. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is about time that the Department for Education worked with the Local Government Association and other organisations in local government to ensure that cabinet members and council leaders really appreciate the role that they have to play in keeping our children safe?