In the year to 31 March, 103 new council-run children’s homes opened in England. There was a 31% increase on the number of council-run homes a year earlier. Data from Ofsted shows.   Overall, at the end of March, 404 of 3,491 children’s homes of all types actively operating in England were run by local authorities and 32 homes were run by a voluntary organisation running services on behalf of a local authority.  It states: “There was a rise in the number of private sector homes, from 2,450 in 2023 to 2,748 homes in 2024.  The report comes amid a long-running sector-wide debate on the running of children’s homes by large private organisations. The Independent Review of Children’s Social Care, which published its final report in 2022, called for a ban on “profiteering” from children’s residential care