Advice on Children ' s Homes The Report of the Children's Department
of the Home Office, published a few weeks ago, pointed out that local authorities and voluntary organisations are still boarding out only a small proportion of the children in their care. Thousands of children up and down the country are in institutions, some of them the great unhomelike buildings which are a bad legacy from the past. The Home Office has now issued a memorandum " on the conduct of children's homes," based on the experience of inspectors and of the Advisory Council on Child Care. It cannot, of course, go into detail, since the institutions it addresses are so varied, but it contains general recommendations on size, equipment, reception, recreation and the-day-to-day comfort of the children. Most of the advice is self-evident ; the memo- randum should serve less as instruction than as a reminder of the high standard now required. The most notable change this century has made in the treatment of deprived children is the attempt, not to segregate them, but to give them a life approxi- mating to the normal. Hence the memorandum's insistence on small " family " groups of varying ages and on long contact with the same " house-mother." With this goes the advocacy of as much contact with the outside world as possible ; it is suggested that if a child has no relatives to visit him he should be befriended by local people. But, as the report says, on the staff depends finally the atmosphere of an institution, and the advocacy of time off for further study and refresher courses may do as much as anything to keep the atmosphere happy.
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