Coming of age: has the Children Act 1989 lived up to its promise?
| Pages | 2-6 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.5042/jcs.2010.0296 |
| Published date | 30 June 2010 |
| Date | 30 June 2010 |
| Author | Rupert Hughes,Wendy Rose |
| Subject Matter | Education,Health & social care,Sociology |
Journal of Children’s Ser vices • V olume 5 Issue 2 • June 2010 © Pier P rofessional Ltd
2
10.5042/jcs.2010.0296
The Bill before Parliament emerged from a five-
year process of analysis and consultation. After
Royal Assent, much greater efforts than usual were
made in the next two years up to implementation
of the major provisions in October 1991 to
inform and explain its principles to professionals,
authorities and the courts through advice, guidance
and training. Implementation in practice continued.
The Act was wide-ranging, covering most
aspects of child law other than adoption,
delinquency and employment. New court
arrangements were set out, bringing together
family matters previously handled separately.
The duties of welfare authorities were set out to
safeguard and promote the welfare of children in
their area who were in need and, so far as was
consistent with this, to promote the upbringing of
these children by their families. A feature of the
Act was to define broadly the children in need
for whom the State had responsibility as children
needing services to maintain a reasonable standard
of health or development.
We have sought a wide range of contributors
for these special editions in the interest of giving
an up-to-date account of where we have come
from and where we are now – covering changes,
successes and failures – to help consider how
to improve services for children and families for
the future. It would not be possible to cover the
whole scope in some 20 articles. Those who have
written for us have chosen their own subjects
and, inevitably, we may have laid ourselves open
This special edition, with a second one to follow,
1989. We have chosen 21 years as it used to be
the age at which children moved to adulthood with
a ceremonial handing over of the door key, even
though under the Act, 18 is a more important legal
boundary. We, the guest editors, were both at the
time in the Department of Health (then responsible
for children’s social services) and closely involved
in the process of taking the Act through Parliament
and, for some years after, in efforts to get it
implemented. The Act in the main covers England
and Wales but not Scotland (except in relation
to child minding and day care); Northern Ireland
adopted its own version in the Children (Northern
Ireland) Order 1995. The Act was unusual in several
respects. As the foreword states in An Introduction to
the Children Act 1989 (DH, 1989):
‘The Child ren Act which rece ived Royal
Assent on 16 November 1989 is the most
comprehensive piece of legisla tion which
Parliament has ever enacted a bout child ren.
It draws together and simplif ies existi ng
legislation to produce a more practical and
consistent code. It integrates the law relating
to private individua ls with the respon sibilities of
public aut horities, in particu lar local authority
social ser vices depa rtments, t owards chi ldren.
In so do ing the Act strikes a new balance
between fa mily auton omy and the protec tion
of childre n.’ (piii)
Coming of age: has the
Children Act 1989 lived up to
its promise?
Rupert Hughes
Centre for Social Policy, Dartington, UK
Wendy Rose
The Open University, UK
Editorial
To continue reading
Request your trial