This dataset comes from a statutory return has submitted annually to the Welsh Government by each Welsh Local Authority about all the children in receiving care and support.  These returns have been submitted since the Social Services and Wellbeing (Wales) Act 2014 came into force. The first year covers the year 2016/17.   
 
The CRCS Census comprises of individual level data on all children receiving care and support, including those looked after by a local authority, who had an open case with a local authority on the 31 March that had been open for the three months from 1 January to 31 March.  
 
The purpose of the Census is to collect data that measures the characteristics and attributes of children receiving care and support who receive social services from their local authorities, including children looked after by local authorities. The census focuses on the reason why children receive help from social services departments, parental capacity, and on the health and education outcomes for each child. 
 
Coverage is wider than for the LACW return as this includes all children who are ion a care and support plan.  In addition to those looked after, it is therefore also possible to focus on those on the child protection register or who are on plans but are not looked after or on the child protection register.  

Data Owner Welsh Government 
Earliest Data Reflecting the year to 31st March 2017 
Frequency of Updates Annual
Lag in Updates Becoming Available Approx 4 months after the local authority returns have been completed and verified 

Meta Data 

ADR UK Cataloguehttps://datacatalogue.adruk.org/browser/dataset?id=2307984752202799032&origin=3 
Health Data Gatewayhttps://web.www.healthdatagateway.org/dataset/fb3fac03-a428-4b3f-8058-5622e1fd57d8 
Data ResourceLee, A., Elliott, M., Scourfield, J., Bedston., S, Broadhurst, K., Ford, D.V. and Griffiths, L. (2022) Data Resource: Children receiving care and support and children in need, administrative records in Wales.  International Journal of Population Data Science 7(1). doi: 10.23889/ijpds.v7i1.1694 
Data InsightN/A
Other useful publicationsN/A

Other useful information 

Local Authority Guidance: 

https://www.gov.wales/data-collection-local-authority-social-services 

Due to the anonymization process, not all data fields referred to in the local authority guidance are available for use by researchers.  However, this resource provides a useful starting point for understanding what is collected and the legal framework that sits behind the codes used. 

Direct comparisons cannot be made between the CiNW and CRCS data due to changes in the legislative framework. 

Aggregate data from 2017 onwards can be found on the Stats Wales website: https://statswales.gov.wales/Catalogue/Health-and-Social-Care/Social-Services/Childrens-Services/children-receiving-care-and-support  

Each year the Welsh Government produces a summary of the data. Copies of these can be found: https://www.gov.wales/wales-children-receiving-care-and-support-census  

Information on children receiving care and support or young carers receiving support who have been assessed through the new assessment process set out in Part 3 (Assessing the needs of individuals) of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 were published for 3 years (2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19) but have since been discontinued.  This can be found: https://statswales.gov.wales/Catalogue/Health-and-Social-Care/Social-Services/Childrens-Services/Service-Provision/assessments-by-localauthority-measure   

More recent data relating to assessments is now published on Stats Wales as part of the Social Services Performance and Improvement Framework: https://statswales.gov.wales/Catalogue/Health-and-Social-Care/Social-Services/social-services-performance-and-improvement-framework/children-and-families  

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