Working groups on Care Matters set up

Lord Laming has been chosen as the chair of the government’s new working group on reform of placements for children in care, it announced at the conference.

Althea Efunshile, director of the vulnerable children’s group at the Department for Education and Skills, said it was one of four groups to be set up to take forward ideas in this month’s green paper, Care Matters.

Barnardo’s chief executive Martin Narey will head a group on the future of the care population, while Dame Pat Collarbone, executive director of development at the Training and Development Agency for Schools, will chair one looking at education.

The fourth group, on the proposal to set up GP-style social care practices, commissioned by councils, to work with looked-after children, will be chaired by professor Julian Le Grand – a former Downing Street health adviser.

Laming’s group will cover proposed changes to the care system including how a tiered foster care system could work in practice.