MPs urge plans to be put to the test

Pilot children’s trusts should be evaluated before being
implemented nationally, a group of MPs and Lords has
recommended.

In a report released this week, the all-party parliamentary group
for primary care and public health said: “A good deal of work is
needed to firm up exactly how such trusts are going to function in
practice.”

Their report, based on an inquiry held recently on how children can
become the focus of policies, argues that it is clear “many senior
professionals had no idea what a children’s trust should look
like”.

But it admits that waiting for the outcome of any evaluation now
looks “unfeasible” given the government’s plans to introduce
children’s trusts in every council by 2006.

The report also calls for the children’s minister to be given
cabinet rank and for the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
to be incorporated into law.

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