In April 2021, CRAE and Just for Kids Law submitted to the Education Select Committee's inquiry on children's homes to highlight that the use of unregulated provision for 16- and 17-year-olds is increasing, despite the many instances of poor-quality provision seen in Just for Kids Law’s caseload.
While the vast majority of 16- and 17-year-olds who are homeless or at risk of homelessness and approach local authorities for help should be accommodated as a looked-after child under section 20 of the Children Act, we've found that an estimated 1,498 16- and 17-year-olds housed in unregulated accommodation (1 in 5 of all children living in unregulated settings) were not made a looked-after child by the local authority they approached in 2018-19.
We believe these children are being left behind as the Government’s planned reforms – to ban children in care who are under 16 from being placed in unregulated settings and to create national minimum standards for unregulated placements accommodating 16- and 17-year-old looked-after children – do not include them in their scope and may even lead to worse outcomes for them.