Methodology

Children accommodated in secure children's homes

• Published: 23 May 2023

Introduction

This document contains supporting information for the statistical release ‘Children accommodated in secure children’s homes'. It includes further detail on the quality, reliability and methodology of these statistics overall, and in relation to a range of potential uses. 

The information is collated from the annual SA1 data return which is reported to the Department for Education (DfE) by all secure children's homes in England and Wales. It covers the position at the end of the reporting year. 

The release contains information for both England and Wales due to a long-standing agreement with the Welsh Government. The combined figures for England and Wales are presented as the main figures as cross-border placements mean that Welsh children may be accommodated in English secure children's homes, and vice versa. Figures for England only are provided in the data but should be interpreted with this caveat.

Types of secure accommodation

Children and young people can be placed in the secure estate in either a welfare placement or a justice placement:

Welfare placements

A welfare placement includes where a child is placed by their local authority (LA), following approval by the courts, into a secure children's home under section 25 of the Children Act 1989, for the protection of themselves and/or others.

Justice placements

A justice placement includes where a children is placed by the youth justice system either when they are remanded by a court, or when they are placed by the Youth Custody Service (YCS) when they are detained for, or convicted of a serious offence.

Currently, there are three types of secure accommodation in which children and young people can be placed on youth justice grounds. These are young offender institutions (YOIs), secure training centres (STCs) and secure children's homes.

Only justice placements for children who are placed within secure children’s homes are available in this release. Data on children placed in YOIs and STCs are published separately by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ).

The government’s 2019 manifesto committed to trialling secure schools and in the long term, the government’s vision is that secure schools will replace YOIs and STCs. 

From September 2017, the overall responsibility for commissioning of youth custody transferred to the MoJ from the Youth Justice Board. At the same time the YCS took over responsibility for individual placement of children and young people into youth custody and day-to-day management of youth custody.

Secure children's homes and placements

Secure children's homes provide care in a secure setting for the most vulnerable children and young offenders with challenging and complex needs, including sometimes severe behavioural and emotional difficulties. 

The secure homes website has further information on the homes included in this publication. There are currently thirteen secure children's homes in England. Twelve secure children's homes are managed by LAs and one by a charity (Nugent).  Of these thirteen English homes, six cater solely for children placed on welfare grounds, two contract solely with the MoJ providing placements for young offenders, and five provide both types of placements.

There is one secure children's home in Wales, which is managed by the local authority,

Many factors are considered when determining if a child is placed in a secure children's home or another type of secure custodial accommodation. Children aged under 12 who commit serious offences will always be placed in a secure children's home. For older children, the YCS will take account of their vulnerability, based on what is known about their mental health, emotional and cognitive development etc. Local authorities have an occasional but compelling need to commission secure welfare placements.

Some secure homes have developed expertise in addressing specific needs and vulnerabilities and these specialisms will be taken into account in determining the most appropriate placement for an individual child. Whilst there is generally a preference for placing children within travelling distance of their home if it is in their best interests to do so, for this very specialist provision it is sometimes necessary to place further away from home. 

Published statistics

The Department currently publishes the following Statistics: secure children's homes - GOV.UK annually.

These UK Statistics Authority first designated these statistics as National Statistics in June 2013, in accordance with the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007, signifying compliance with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.

Designation can be broadly interpreted to mean that the statistics:

• meet identified user needs
• are well explained and readily accessible
• are produced according to sound methods
• are managed impartially and objectively in the public interest.

Once statistics have been designated as National Statistics it is a statutory requirement that the Code of Practice shall continue to be observed. Since reconfirmation, we have continued to align the statistics to the Code of Practice, for example we have:

• improved the commentary supporting the statistics, through the introduction of this document
• taken steps to ensure that our published statistics protect confidentiality
• provided data in machine readable, tidy data format.

Data quality

Aggregate data is collected annually through the SA1 statistical return from each home. Each return is checked against a series of validations, and there ear no known quality issues with the data. The collection process is unchanged and has remained stable for many years. 

Figures refer to the position on 31 March each year.  However, in 2020 the reference date was changed to 29 February due to the impact of coronavirus. This date was chosen as a representative date for ‘business as usual’ so the figures were not unduly affected by the national lockdown. The 2021 collection went back to the usual reference date of 31 March.

Methodology and data processing

Data collection

The secure homes return their aggregated data to DfE via a secure transfer system. In 2021, new information on ethnicity was added, the ethnicity groupings being aligned to other departmental publications in 2022. The data items collected are: 

1. Number of approved places (Item 1)
2. Number of places in use or available for use (Item 2)
3. Number of approved places contracted to the MoJ (Item 3)
4. Number of children accommodated (Item 4)
5. Sex of children (Items 5a and 5b)
6. Age of children (Items 6a-h)
7. Length of stay (Items 7a-f)
8. Type of placement (Items 8a-c)
9. Ethnicity of children (Items 9a-f)

Data validation

Validation checks are carried out on the data by DfE, for example:

• the number of places in use or available for use (Item 2) should be less that or equal to the number of approved places (Item 1)
• the number of approved places contracted to the MoJ (Item 3) should be less than or equal to the number of approved places (Item 1)
• the number of children accommodated (Item 3) should be less than or equal to the number of approved places (Item 1) and the number of places in use or available for use (Item 2)
• the total number of males (Item 5a) and females (Item 5b) should be equal to the number of children accommodated (Item 4)
• the total number of children in each age group (Item 6a-h) should be equal to the number of children accommodated (Item 4)
• the total number of children by length of stay (Item 7a-f) should be equal to the number of children accommodated (Item 4)
• the total number of children in each type of placement (Item 8a-c) should be equal to the number of children accommodated (Item 4)
• the total number of children in each ethnicity group (Item 9a-f) should be equal to the number of children accommodated (Item 4)

We also check the number of places available is less than the number of placed approved. Approved places may not be available for use for a number of reasons, for example refurbishment, staff sickness, staffing ratios or implementing new processes/ procedures.

Once the data has been checked, individual returns are collated by DfE into one dataset for analysis.

Data coherence and comparability

The validated data is compared to previous years to make sure there are no unusual changes. 

Figures reported each year are usually based upon children placed in the homes open at the reference date of 31 March. Throughout the period of COVID-19,  LAs reported that on occasion staff availability impacted the number of available places in some of their residential settings and the MoJ reported fewer young people in custody following the initial impact of the pandemic on court proceedings. Therefore, users should exercise caution when making comparisons over time. 

Comparisons to other sources

We check our figures to publications by Ofsted who report on maximum number of places in secure children's homes, and the MoJ who report on children and young people in custody within secure children's homes (links to this data can be found in the ‘Related information’ section). 

Footnotes to the data

The following notes should be considered when using the data in this release.

Places approved: The number of places for which the home had approval to operate with as on 31 March (29 February in 2022).

Places available: The number of places that were in use or available for use at the reference date This number excludes any approved places that are out of service, for example because they are undergoing development work. This number does not indicate the number of vacant places. 

Approved places available (availability rate) - percentages: Based upon the number of places available in relation to the number of places for which the home had approval to operate with and are displayed to the nearest whole number.

Children accommodated (occupancy rate) - percentages: Based on the number of children accommodated in relation to the number of places for which the home had approval to operate with and are displayed to the nearest whole number.

Places contracted to the MoJ - percentages: Based on the number of places contracted to the MoJ in relation to the number of places for which the home had approval to operate with and are displayed to the nearest whole number.

Children accommodated - by gender, age, ethnicity or length of stay  - percentages: Based on the number of children accommodated and are shown to the nearest whole number. Due to rounding the totals may not sum to 100%

Individual home notes are:

• Beechfield was undergoing renovation between 2017 and 2019 whilst unoccupied. It closed in 2019.
• Swanwick Lodge reported in 2018 ongoing staffing issues and building works. 
• Leverton Hall closed on 31 July 2014.
• Red Bank closed on 31 May 2014. It included the homes Newton House, Willows House and Vardy House.
• Adel Beck was previously known as East Moor until January 2015.
• Marydale Lodge was previously known as St Catherine's until 2020.
• Hillside is the secure children's home in Wales.
• Lansdowne has been temporarily closed at the date of the latest collection (31 March 2023). It is due to reopen in September 2023. At the time of temporary closure, Lansdowne was approved for 7 places.
• Clare Lodge was temporarily restricted to 5 places in 2023.

Historical amendments: Figures for previous years may differ between releases due to historical amendments. 

Disclosure control

The Code of Practice for Official Statistics requires us to take reasonable steps to ensure that our published or disseminated statistics protect confidentiality. As the data underpinning this release is in an aggregate form, where there is a single child with a particular characteristic, prior knowledge would be required to determine which child it is.

The following symbols have been used in the releases (updated to align with GSS standards):

• ‘c’ to protect confidentiality. Secondary suppression may be required
• ‘0’ where the original figure submitted is zero
• ‘z’ means not applicable
• ‘x’ means not available (for example ethnicity in years before 2021 when it was first collected).

We take reasonable steps to ensure our published statistics protect confidentiality. To ensure a suppressed figure cannot be identified by simple arithmetic, secondary suppression may be applied.

Percentages are displayed to the nearest whole number.

Due to rounding, it is possible that the sum of the category percentages may not always total to 100%.

Due to the size of the cohort within this release, percentages can be volatile. Users are advised to exercise caution when making comparisons over time, especially when considering characteristics data. These figures are a snapshot at the end of the reporting year so there will naturally be fluctuations in the data over time.

Related information

Ofsted

Ofsted publishes official statistics annually on children's social care in England. 

Secure children's homes are one of a number of types of accommodation that the statistics cover.  We check the number of approved places we publish for each home against the maximum number of places reported by Ofsted. However, data may not always match up due to slight differences in interpretation of classifications.

Youth Custody Data

The MoJ published youth custody data monthly on children and young people in custody within secure children's homes, secure training centres and young offender institutions. However, the MoJ does not include children placed in a secure children's home on a welfare basis. 

We compare the under 18-year old secure population accommodated in secure children's homes from table ‘2.4 Accom Type’ of the MoJ publication with those children detained and placed by the YCS, and those placed in a criminal justice context in this DfE release. Both sets of figures are useful in their own right, however there are small differences in definitions and methodology which can explain any differences in the two populations:

1. The MoJ figures are for those accommodated in secure children's homes aged under 18 years old, whereas the DfE figures include children and young people of all ages.
2. The MoJ figures are a monthly snapshot of the custodial population in the secure estate for children and young people.  They are taken on the last Friday of each month or the first Friday of the following month, depending on which is nearest to the actual month end.
3. Both sets of figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems, which, as with any large-scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and can be subject to change over time. The MoJ figures have been drawn from the internal YCS placements system (eAsset, which replaced SACHS in April 2012) which is populated by the YCS upon placement of children into custody. The DfE figures are taken from local records held by secure children's homes.

Rest of the UK

Figures on the number of children accommodated in secure children's homes in Scotland are published in the Children's and Social Work Statistics Scotland publication.

Northern Ireland does not produce statistics relating specifically to secure accommodation.

Users and usage

DfE, central and local Government

The information in this release includes the number of:

• secure children's homes in England and Wales
• places approved
• places in use or available for use
• children accommodated by age, gender, length of stay, type of placement and ethnicity.

It provides a comprehensive summary of the capacity within secure homes and trends within the sector to inform policy development.

Other users

We have less clarity on the uses made of this data outside Government. 

A user consultation was carried out in 2011 but no responses were received. We will continue to engage with users to make sure the release meets their needs and welcome feedback from new or previously unknown users. 

If you would like to feedback on the release, then please contact: CLA.stats@education.gov.uk

 

Help and support

Contact us

If you have a specific enquiry about Children accommodated in secure children's homes statistics and data:

Children looked after statistics team

Email: cla.stats@education.gov.uk
Contact name: Justin Ushie
Telephone: 01915358967

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Telephone: 020 7783 8300

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