Children looked after by local authorities: quality report

Data description

The children looked after statistics release provides annual information on the characteristics and attributes of children looked after by local authorities.

Statistics are presented for children who are looked after at any point during the reporting year 1 April to 31 March, with a further snapshot of analysis on children looked after on 31 March.

Classification system

Data are collected as per the detailed guidance issued for each reporting year and adheres closely to the definition of looked after children provided in law as detailed in the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (UK legislation). In a small number of instances where there is scope for confusion, guidance on how to interpret the term 'looked after' for statistical purposes is given.

There are four Excel forms that make up the children looked after census. Local authorities are required to submit individual level data for the sections on “Child identity details” and “Episodes of care” for all children looked after at any point during the reporting year, and data for the sections on “Adoptions of children looked after” and on “Care leavers” only for children leaving care who are either adopted or aged 16 or over and cease to be looked after during the year (or both).

Child identity details

Personal details of the child such as date of birth, gender and ethnicity.

Episodes of care

Data items which relate to individual episodes of care which either start or end during the year, including reason for new episode, legal status, placement and start/end dates.

Adoptions

Completed in respect of all children who ceased to be looked after during the year on the granting of an adoption order, including dates for various steps in the adoption process and some information on adopters.

Care leavers

Completed in respect of all children who ceased to be looked after during the year who were aged 16 years or over at the time of ceasing, including reason care ceased, accommodation at the point of ceasing care and provision of a personal adviser and pathway plan.

For the purposes of entering data onto the return, the period of time during which a child is looked after by the local authority is broken down into "episodes" of care. Each episode represents a period of being looked after under the same legal status and in the same placement. A new episode is started when either the legal status or the child's placement changes (or both). Episodes of being looked after of less than 24 hours in total must not be recorded on the census.

Definitions are explained in the detailed data collection guidance and those for terms used in the statistical outputs are explained here.

Adoption

Adoption is the legal process by which an adult becomes the permanent parent of a child. On the granting of an adoption order, a child is no longer legally connected to their birth parents, and the adoptive parents gain full parental responsibility.

Child

A child is defined under Section 3 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (UK legislation) as a person who is aged under 18.

Child looked after

Section 74 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (UK legislation) states that a child who is looked after by a local authority is a child who is in its care, or provided with accommodation, for a continuous period of more than 24 hours, by the authority in the exercise of any functions which are social services functions, apart from functions under Section 15, Part 4, or Sections 109, 114 or 115.

Disability

A person is considered “disabled” under Section 3 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (UK legislation) if the person has a disability for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010.

The Welsh Government is committed to the social definition of disability, in which it is recognised that people with impairments are disabled by barriers that commonly exist in society. However, data have been collected based on the Equality Act 2010 which uses the medical model of disability.

Legal status

The legal status records the legal status underlying being 'looked after'. If a child is looked after because they are accommodated, the legal status goes some way to describe, in legal terms at least, why the child is being looked after.

Pathway plan

Section 107 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (UK legislation) states that a pathway plan is a plan setting out the advice and other support which the local authority intends to provide for the young person under Part 6 of the Act.

Personal adviser

Section 106 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (UK legislation) states that a local authority must arrange for category 1-4 young people to have a personal adviser. Personal advisers help care leavers make decisions about the future by supporting them to implement and review their pathway plan.

Placement

The placement category can be defined as indicating where the child is living while being looked after.

Population estimates

The rates of children looked after relative to the general population aged under 18 have been calculated based on mid-year population estimates provided by the Office for National Statistics. Estimates for the period included in the reporting year are used, for example, rates for 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025 data were based on mid-2024 estimates.

Short breaks

Short breaks are provided to children and young people with care and support needs, to provide them with opportunities to engage in activities outside the home, or to give their parents, or guardians, some “respite” from the normal duties of looking after the child, or both. Children whose short breaks are provided under Part 6 of the 2014 Act are regarded as voluntarily accommodated under section 76 and become looked after. The existence of a planned series of short breaks made under Part 6 is recorded as a single on-going episode of care, using legal status V1.

Unaccompanied asylum-seeking child

An asylum seeker is someone who has lodged an application for protection based on the Refugee Convention or Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, who is awaiting a decision on that application. An unaccompanied asylum-seeking child is an unaccompanied minor, not someone who is the member of a family that was recognised as having asylum-seeking status.

Statistical unit

Statistics are published for children looked after either during the reporting year or on the census date of 31 March.

Several figures reported exclude children looked after exclusively under a series of short breaks. This reflects that these children are moving in and out of care and are only actually being looked after for those days and nights when they are being accommodated. However, the census records the existence of a planned series of short breaks as opposed to individual instances of being voluntarily accommodated.

Statistical population

Statistics should refer to all children looked after during the reporting year or on the census date of 31 March.

Reference area

Statistics are published at Wales and local authority level.

Time coverage

Data are collected on an annual basis for a reporting year from 1 April to 31 March. Some data items are collected only for those who were adopted from care and/or those who left care during the year and were aged 16 and over. Data from the children looked after census are available from 1 April 2016 to 31 March 2017 onwards.

Data on children looked after were previously collected from the looked after children (SSDA903) dataset and accompanying returns for the period April 2002 to March 2016.

Source data

The children looked after data are collected directly from individual local authorities. Data collection is based on detailed guidance.

The children looked after census replaced the datasets looked after children (SSDA903), adoptions of looked after children (AD1), educational qualifications of care leavers (OC1) and care leavers on their 19th birthday (OC3) in April 2016.

Frequency of data collection

Data are submitted to Welsh Government from individual local authorities on an annual basis for a reporting year from 1 April to 31 March. Data are expected to be returned by the end of the May following the close of the reporting year.

Data collection

The children looked after census is made up of four forms. Data are submitted on Excel spreadsheets directly from each individual local authority via Objective Connect, a web-based tool to securely share and receive files. Data are recorded for each child who was looked after during the reporting year. Multiple episodes of care may be recorded, where legal status and/or placement changed during the year. Data include a local authority identifier which is a unique ID for each child and is retained from year to year. Data also include home and placement postcode unless the last episode in the year for a child was an adoption placement.

Data validation

Data validation occurs at multiple stages before publication.

Local authorities undertake their own validations prior to submitting data to Welsh Government. There will be some differences in the types of validations carried out by local authorities, largely because of underlying differences in administrative data systems.

Returns are received by Welsh Government where further validation is performed to improve data quality.

Using automated queries built into the data processing system, the validation exercise flags anomalous records. Using SQL queries run via SQL Server Management Studio, initial validations on the data while it is loaded into the raw database include checks on invalid codes, data outside expected range and missing data.

Information which may be inconsistent with that already held in a previous year is checked, in particular details submitted for the beginning of the current year which do not match those at the end of the previous year. This can often result in minor revisions to previous years’ data.

All records in question are returned to local authorities for investigation.

Any records which have any of the following issues are flagged as part of the validation exercise. 

• Missing, incomplete or duplicate records
• Invalid codes other than those detailed in the data collection guidance
• Values entered outside of expected range
• Unexpected changes in codes compared to previous years
• Contradictory values for related items
• Discrepancy in dates
• Specific policy related validations

Welsh Government compiles analyses in the format required for publication and conducts some final validations.

Data compilation

Each individual local authority submits a return for each child who was looked after during the reporting year. Data are processed and validated by the data collection team in the Welsh Government. Identifiers are removed to anonymise the data and data are aggregated to produce breakdowns for analysis and publication.

Any rates of children looked after relative to the general population are calculated based on the Office for National Statistics mid-year population estimates for the period included in the reporting year, for example, rates for 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025 data were based on mid-2024 estimates.

Data are added to the Secure Anonymised Information Linking (SAIL) databank and made available to trusted researchers for linking and further analysis.

Adjustment

Ordinarily, adjustments are not necessary. If codes other than those detailed are submitted, these are queried with relevant local authorities and amended to align with expected codes as per the detailed guidance. Any further anomalies identified as part of validation are queried with local authorities in advance of publication.

Quality assurance

Our statistics are produced to high professional standards set out in the Code of Practice for Statistics (UK Statistics Authority). They are produced free from any political interference.

Quality assurance is undertaken in line with the Statistical Quality Management Strategy and the Quality pillar of the Code of Practice for Statistics (UK Statistics Authority).

The children looked after data are individual-level and allow for detailed validation checks on every record for different data items, which is not possible with aggregated datasets.

Data are also checked at aggregate level against other sources where possible.

Quality assessment

The statistics in this release were reviewed in July 2026 and were deemed to meet the requirements of the Code of Practice for Statistics.

These statistics are published as official statistics (Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR)).

Relevance

User needs

These statistics inform users about the number and characteristics of children looked after. Supporting children looked after is an important function under the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act and the number and rate of children looked after on 31 March is monitored.

The main users of the statistics are:

• Ministers
• members of the Welsh Parliament (Senedd) and the Senedd Research Service in the Senedd
• officials within the Health, Care, and Prevention Group in Welsh Government
• other areas of the Welsh Government
• local authorities and their partners
• the research community including students, academics and universities
• individual citizens, third sector organisations and private companies
• other UK government departments
• media

The statistics are used in a variety of ways. Some examples of these are:

• advice to ministers
• to inform debate in the Senedd and beyond
• to provide publicly available data on the number, characteristics and attributes of children looked after in Wales
• to inform local authority social services departments practice and planning

If you are a user and do not feel the above list adequately reflects your needs, please let us know via stats.pss@gov.wales.

User satisfaction

Feedback relating to the children looked after statistics is welcome and can be submitted to stats.pss@gov.wales.

Completeness

For 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025:

• disability and/or ethnicity was unknown for fewer than 1% of children looked after on 31 March.
• missing postcodes for some children (however these are not required for children in adoption placements).

Percentages are calculated based on children where known information was provided and are rounded to the nearest per cent. Where information was not available, this is clearly indicated on StatsWales.

Overall accuracy

Data are sourced from a robust and long-standing data collection. Statistics are considered official statistics. The collection is well-established with extensive validation and adheres closely to the definition of looked after children provided in law.

The statistics are based on administrative data. Consequently, data entry and processing errors or non-sampling error, are possible. These could occur when data are entered incorrectly into administrative systems, or through measurement errors resulting from inconsistent interpretations of definitions.

To reduce non-sampling error, detailed guidance provides explanations of the data items and response categories within the data collection, and a range of data validation checks are performed prior to publication.

The statistical release for April 2023 to March 2024 noted that the increase in the number of young people aged 16 and over ceasing to be looked after during that year was likely to be impacted by a reporting clarification. However, while the clarification resulted in additional data being provided on young people aged 16 and over ceasing to be looked after through the Care leaver return, it did not affect the overall number reported.

Data revision

Minor revisions are made each year which are agreed by local authorities. Typically, changes to previous years’ data are identified as part of processing data for the current year. It may take time to update local authority systems, which could mean changes particularly in relation to activity shortly before the end of the reporting year.

If an error is discovered after publication, statistics will be revised and clearly noted. Any revisions to the data are noted in the statistical release and in the information accompanying the StatsWales datasets.

Notes at the end of the release inform the users whether the outputs have been revised or not (denoted [r]) and give an indication of the size of the revision between the latest and previous release.

Users are informed about revisions in line with the Statement on revisions, errors and postponements.

Timeliness

Initial submission of data from local authorities to Welsh Government is expected by the end of the May following the close of the reporting year. There was a sixteen-month lag between the reference period of the statistics and publication of 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025 data.

Punctuality

Welsh Government aims to publish statistics as soon as possible after the data reference date.

Outputs adhere to the Code of Practice for statistics by pre-announcing the date of publication through the Statistics and research page on Upcoming releases. Furthermore, should the need arise to postpone an output this would follow the Statement on revisions, errors and postponements.

Geographical comparability

Local authorities have different data capture systems, however, the detailed guidance should ensure that data are inputted consistently across authorities. There are no known reasons which limit comparisons within any geographic breakdown in Wales.

All four UK nations publish data on children looked after separately. The outputs differ, reflecting the different legislation and policies, methodologies and data collection processes of the different nations.

In England, the Department for Education publish annual statistics on Children looked after, including adoptions.

In Scotland, the Scottish Government publishes annual statistics on looked after children.

In Northern Ireland, the Department of Health publishes annual children's social care statistics which includes children in care.

The definition of a child in care differs slightly across the UK nations. The Children’s Social Care Statistics for Northern Ireland includes a section on UK and Ireland Comparison of Children in Care Statistics.

Comparability over time

Data are available on children looked after from the reporting year 1 April 2002 to 31 March 2003 onwards. The source changed from the Looked After Children (SSDA903) return in 2016 to 2017 following implementation of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014, however, data are considered largely comparable.

A guidance document is issued for each reporting year. Guidance for the years  2024 to 2025, 2025 to 2026, and 2026 to 2027 are published on the local authority social services data collection guidance page.

Coherence (internal)

Data are collected from each local authority based on the same detailed requirements and guidance document, and therefore comparisons between local authority areas are valid.

Publication

The statistics are pre-announced and then published at 9.30am on the date of publication on the Welsh Government website.

A report is published (Children looked after by local authorities), providing analysis and insights using charts and commentary. Data tables for analysis covered in the html report are published on StatsWales. For the reporting year 2024 to 2025 information on young people aged 16 and over ceasing to be looked after was published in a subsequent bulletin.

The data available on StatsWales can be viewed and manipulated online or downloaded into spreadsheets. Additionally, datasets can be accessed using the public API for StatsWales.

Online databases

The full historical series of statistics are published on StatsWales.

Documentation on methodology

The following sources of information are relevant to the data collection and the published statistics on children looked after:

• Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (UK legislation)
• Code of practice on children in local authority care
• Local authority social services data collection

Quality documentation

All quality information is published in this quality report.

The administrative systems underpinning the data exist for operational purposes and are used for internal analysis by local authorities. Local authorities conduct validation exercises before providing the data, which leads to some resource burden. The Welsh Government has been providing funding to each individual local authority to support their ability to collate and provide statutory national social services data requirements.

Confidentiality: policy

The Welsh Government’s statistics and research statement on confidentiality and data access describes our approach to data confidentiality and conforming with the data governance principle of the Trustworthiness pillar in the Code of Practice for Statistics (UK Statistics Authority).

The Welsh Government holds a Data Protection Impact Assessment for this collection and a privacy notice explains how personal data collected is used.

Confidentiality: data treatment

Though person level data are collected from local authorities, data are not routinely published at this level. The dataset is aggregated to provide counts for different combinations of demographic characteristics, with totals for each demographic category also included. The published statistics on StatsWales have been rounded to the nearest five. Where there are fewer than five children in any group, the actual number has been suppressed and replaced by the symbol [c].

Person identifiers are removed from the data and are not published on StatsWales.