Freedom of Information Act 2000
Information Request 11032176
For the years 2015-2020 I would like to know:
-Number of new looked after children in the local authority per year
-Breakdown of ethnicity of new looked after children in the local authority per year
-Number of children adopted in the local authority per year
-Breakdown of ethnicity of children adopted in the local authority per year
For ease of answering this request, we have created the spreadsheet New Looked After Children 2015-2020.
To assist with understanding these figures, please note the following:
- The data given is for 2015 – 2020 (inclusive) calendar years (not Statutory return years)
- Figures for 2020 Looked After Children are not fully validated as the statutory return for April 2020 to March 2021 has not yet been submitted and the data not yet validated.
For clarity, please note the following definitions:
- “Looked After” – children in care (excluding those with a legal status of V4 short breaks)
- “New children” – children coming into care have “Periods of Care” (PoC), whereby they start and end a period of time in the care of the Local Authority. Some children have multiple PoC and can have multiple PoC within the same year. For the purposes of this request, the following figures have been worked out:
- The number of new PoC starting within the year – This figure will include some children multiple times as they came into care more than once.
- The number of unique children who had a new PoC that year – This figure only counts the child once (even if they came into care more than once).
- Number of “New” children – This figure counts the number of children that came into care and were not in care earlier in the year (though it should be noted they could have been in care in earlier years).