Revealed: hundreds of vulnerable children sent to illegal and unregulated care homes in England

Observer investigation finds that private companies made £105m despite not being registered with Ofsted

Hundreds of extremely vulnerable school-age children in England are being sent to illegal, unregulated homes every year because of a chronic shortage of places in secure local authority units.

An Observer investigation has established that councils placed 706 children, the majority of them under the age of 16, in their care in homes that were not registered with Ofsted, the children’s social care watchdog, in 2022-23.