Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Meston, has highlighted the problem of large sibling groups. I want to draw attention to a very specific group, which is bereaved children. Sometimes there are several children in a single-parent family and, when that one parent dies, often the children left behind are half-siblings—sometimes several of them. The amendment is incredibly important because those children are grieving for the parent who has died and then for the sibling or half-sibling that they are separated from. The noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, has reminded me of a family that I was involved with where the mum died and the father had been abusive so had no contact at all with the children, and the oldest child was a few months away from being 16. We managed, with the help of a schoolteacher and various other people, to keep those children together. Many years later, I still have some contact with them, and all the children have done well. I am convinced that, if we had not struggled to keep them housed together, then one of them in particular would probably have gone off the rails, yet they have all pursued good careers and have all done well. As an investment for the long term in the lives of all these children, the amendment is important. I hope the Government will adopt it. I cannot see that it would cost anything in financial terms, but not adopting it probably would, because of the emotional trauma to the children who are separated from the people with whom they cannot share memories and remembrances about whomever it is they are separated from. Another issue regarding that group of children is that sometimes there is a grandparent, an aunt, an uncle or someone who can provide them with some stability but is not in a position to provide kinship care. Keeping all those links going, and enabling them to link to cousins as well, can really support them.