London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Saturday, Aug 23, 2025

Private children’s home bosses in England criticised over huge profits

Private children’s home bosses in England criticised over huge profits

Head of industry association hits out at children’s home owners ‘getting rich off taxpayers’ money’

Children’s home providers in England should not be able to profit from caring for society’s most vulnerable children, the new head of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) has said.

Steve Crocker criticised private providers driving around in sports cars and buying racehorses with their profits after “getting rich off taxpayers’ money”.

Profit margins for the 15 largest private children’s home operators average 22.6%, according to the Competition and Markets Authority.

Most councils in England have at least one looked-after child whose private placement costs £10,000 a week or more, with costs running to £60,000 a week in the most extreme cases. Yet in Scotland, which has moved much closer towards a not-for-profit children’s care system, costs are generally lower.

“There should be a national approach to management and profits,” said Crocker, calling for a national cap on fees in England. “We have long had the aspiration to make the sector not-for-profit – Scotland, which has had that aspiration for longer, has got nearer to it.”

The wealth of some at the top of some children’s care companies can be conspicuous. Blaklion, a horse that raced in the Grand National last month, is owned by a former children’s home chain boss and property developer, Darren Yates. He bought the animal in 2019 for £300,000 after selling his Sandcastle Care chain to a private equity firm. The business became part of Aspris, which said the acquisition would result in it having annual revenues of more than £200m.

Earlier this year the Guardian exposed Robert McGuinness, the owner of a “squalid” children’s home in Bolton, who drove around in a Lamborghini and spent large amounts of company money running a bar in York and on his own social life. The children’s home was shut down. A solicitor for McGuinness’s company said at the time that the expenses were legitimate.

Asked if the profits mattered if the homes were good, Crocker said: “It does matter because the profits that they’re making and what they’re getting rich off is taxpayers money. We should expect good value for money for public expenditure.”

Crocker, a former residential care worker and social worker who is in charge of children’s services at Hampshire council, said some providers were making large profits by cherrypicking the easiest children, with some maintaining their good Ofsted ratings by refusing to take children with the most complex needs.

He added: “One of the ways in which providers can ensure that they have a good or outstanding rating is that they basically get the pick of the children. In any one day they might get referrals for 10 children and they will choose, perhaps understandably, the children that are likely to be less challenging. The ones that haven’t got substance misuse problems, the ones that aren’t gang affiliated, who haven’t got significant convictions for violence etc etc.”

The result, he added, was a “two-tier system” where there was a severe shortage of homes for “really tricky kids”.

Many local authorities who sold off their children’s homes in the past 30 years amid a series of abuse scandals were now trying to buy or build new ones to save money in the long-term, said Crocker. Many of these homes were just for one child – “because often we find that when we put them with other children the problems really multiply”.

Despite some government funding available to build homes, councils still struggled after 11 years of austerity cuts and the ever increasing cost of crisis placements, he said. Children’s services departments were spending most of their budgets on a small number of children in care, said Crocker. As a result they cannot afford to expand the early intervention work that stops problems escalating.

“We would really want to invest much more heavily in early health and prevention and family services. That’s got to be the way forward,” he said, adding that the ADCS “really really hopes” such measures are in the forthcoming independent review of children’s social care. He also wants to see children’s homes jointly funded by child and adolescent mental health (CAMHS) services to offer therapeutic work to deal with behaviour problems

Crocker said the current system usually managed to keep children safe but did not do enough to “heal” damaged children. “Generally speaking, the English child protection system is one of the safer in the world,” he said. “But I think I’d argue that although it might be safer, I’m not sure we do enough yet to heal trauma of children.”

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “All children and young people deserve to grow up in a stable, loving home, and no private company should exploit those in need of placement.

“We commissioned an independent review of children’s social care, which will recommend reforms to the system, and are working hard to raise standards for children in care while it continues.”

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Bunkers, Billions and Apocalypse: The Secret Compounds of Zuckerberg and the Tech Giants
Ukraine Declares De Facto War on Hungary and Slovakia with Terror Drone Strikes on Their Gas Lifeline
Animated K-pop Musical ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ Becomes Netflix’s Most-Watched Original Animated Film
New York Appeals Court Voids Nearly $500 Million Civil Fraud Penalty Against Trump While Upholding Fraud Liability
Elon Musk tweeted, “Europe is dying”
Far-Right Activist Convicted of Incitement Changes Gender and Demands: "Send Me to a Women’s Prison" | The Storm in Germany
Hungary Criticizes Ukraine: "Violating Our Sovereignty"
Will this be the first country to return to negative interest rates?
Child-free hotels spark controversy
North Korea is where this 95-year-old wants to die. South Korea won’t let him go. Is this our ally or a human rights enemy?
Hong Kong Launches Regulatory Regime and Trials for HKD-Backed Stablecoins
China rehearses September 3 Victory Day parade as imagery points to ‘loyal wingman’ FH-97 family presence
Trump Called Viktor Orbán: "Why Are You Using the Veto"
Horror in the Skies: Plane Engine Exploded, Passengers Sent Farewell Messages
MSNBC Rebrands as MS NOW Amid Comcast’s Cable Spin-Off
AI in Policing: Draft One Helps Speed Up Reports but Raises Legal and Ethical Concerns
Shame in Norway: Crown Princess’s Son Accused of Four Rapes
Apple Begins Simultaneous iPhone 17 Production in India and China
A Robot to Give Birth: The Chinese Announcement That Shakes the World
Finnish MP Dies by Suicide in Parliament Building
Outrage in the Tennis World After Jannik Sinner’s Withdrawal Storm
William and Kate Are Moving House – and the New Neighbors Were Evicted
Class Action Lawsuit Against Volkswagen: Steering Wheel Switches Cause Accidents
Taylor Swift on the Way to the Super Bowl? All the Clues Stirring Up Fans
Dogfights in the Skies: Airbus on Track to Overtake Boeing and Claim Aviation Supremacy
Tim Cook Promises an AI Revolution at Apple: "One of the Most Significant Technologies of Our Generation"
Apple Expands Social Media Presence in China With RedNote Account Ahead of iPhone 17 Launch
Are AI Data Centres the Infrastructure of the Future or the Next Crisis?
Cambridge Dictionary Adds 'Skibidi,' 'Delulu,' and 'Tradwife' Amid Surge of Online Slang
Bill Barr Testifies No Evidence Implicated Trump in Epstein Case; DOJ Set to Release Records
Zelenskyy Returns to White House Flanked by European Allies as Trump Pressures Land-Swap Deal with Putin
The CEO Who Replaced 80% of Employees for the AI Revolution: "I Would Do It Again"
Emails Worth Billions: How Airlines Generate Huge Profits
Character.ai Bets on Future of AI Companionship
China Ramps Up Tax Crackdown on Overseas Investments
Japanese Office Furniture Maker Expands into Bomb Shelter Market
Intel Shares Surge on Possible U.S. Government Investment
Hurricane Erin Threatens U.S. East Coast with Dangerous Surf
EU Blocks Trade Statement Over Digital Rule Dispute
EU Sends Record Aid as Spain Battles Wildfires
JPMorgan Plans New Canary Wharf Tower
Zelenskyy and his allies say they will press Trump on security guarantees
Beijing is moving into gold and other assets, diversifying away from the dollar
Escalating Clashes in Serbia as Anti-Government Protests Spread Nationwide
The Drought in Britain and the Strange Request from the Government to Delete Old Emails
Category 5 Hurricane in the Caribbean: 'Catastrophic Storm' with Winds of 255 km/h
"No, Thanks": The Mathematical Genius Who Turned Down 1.5 Billion Dollars from Zuckerberg
The surprising hero, the ugly incident, and the criticism despite victory: "Liverpool’s defense exposed in full"
Digital Humans Move Beyond Sci-Fi: From Virtual DJs to AI Customer Agents
YouTube will start using AI to guess your age. If it’s wrong, you’ll have to prove it
×