Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer, and thank you to Jane Dodds for bringing this issue forward. I extend my support to her.

It's an issue that's been discussed over many years now, and the Government has accepted the need to commit to take action, with the aim of scrapping for-profit children's residential services. There are two elements to place under the microscope: children in residential care and children in foster care, and the profit element is relevant to both of those. Now, at the moment, the large providers of residential care and foster care provide a large percentage of the provision. Many of these providers are part of a framework that provides some comfort in terms of the quality of provision, but not everyone is even part of the framework, and that is a cause of great concern.

It's also a cause for concern when children are placed a long way from home because there aren't enough settings available locally. On the other hand, private placements are available locally, with children within those placements who are very far from their own homes. According to the statistics of the children's commissioner, 535 children receive residential care in Wales, with 340 of them outside the boundaries of their local authorities. Certainly, there should be a far clearer focus on keeping children closer to home in order to support those important links with their families and communities. Removing that element of generating profit from childcare would support that, and it would remove the need to fill care homes so that they are profitable.

There are other benefits to the proposed legislation too, including providing better pay and career paths to staff, which would, in turn, lead to better care for young people. There is one thing that's entirely clear in my mind: we need a better commissioning system, better planning and services that are not profit driven and competition driven. At the moment, some of the most vulnerable children are being let down by a system that is not fit for purpose.