The Children’s Commissioner for England has published her ‘vision for care leavers’ that lays out what can be done to improve care leaver outcomes. Her recommendations include: Enable all care leavers to access the training, further or higher education, and job that they want through sharing best practice and increasing financial support. Improve care leavers’ […]
Children in care’s views on wellbeing: Coram Voice and Rees Centre ‘10,000 voices’ report – England
Coram Voice and the Rees Centre have published a report aiming to provide insight into the subjective wellbeing of children in care. The report summarises responses to a survey of nearly 10,000 children and young people in care aged 4-18 years between 2016 and 2021. Findings include: A larger proportion of young people (aged 11-18 […]
Ofsted Statistics – Fostering England April 21 – March 22
Ofsted have released their annual fostering in England statistics. This release covers: the numbers of foster carers and foster places and placements, in both local authority (LA) and independent fostering agencies (IFA) data relating to types of foster care, registrations, deregistrations and a range of other subjects the period between 1 April 2021 and 31 […]
Publication of Children’s Social Care Statistics for Northern Ireland 2021/22
The Department of Health has today published the ‘Children’s Social Care Statistics for Northern Ireland 2021/22’. Children in Need At 31 March 2022, 24,545 children in Northern Ireland were known to Social Services as a child in need; Some 34,969 children were referred to Social Services during 2021/22, the largest proportion of these children were […]
Launch of new fostering film
In a ground-breaking national collaboration, 56 local authorities across England, including Derby City Council, have worked together to share ideas and jointly fund the creation of a short film to raise awareness of fostering. It is aimed at finding more people who may be interested in becoming foster carers and providing nurturing, positive homes […]
Loving a Resistant Child
Parenting is one of the most challenging yet rewarding roles we will ever undertake. Raising children whether our own or foster children has its own unique set of challenges. The truth of the matter is that there is no single ‘right’ way to parent children. We are as unique as the children in our care. […]
Coranavirus: homeless young people
Centrepoint has published a series of FAQs to support vulnerable young people who are homeless or facing the risk of being homeless during the coronavirus outbreak. Read the news story here > […]
Coronavirus: care experienced children
The Children’s Commissioner for Wales has recorded a message for care experienced young people on Facebook. The message encourages children and young people to reach out for the help and support they need. View the Facebook message here > […]
Coronavirus: online safety for children
The National Crime Agency (NCA) CEOP command has launched a campaign to help keep children safe online during the coronavirus pandemic. The #OnlineSafetyAtHome campaign contains home activity packs with 15-minute activities for parents and carers to do with their children using CEOP’s Thinkuknow educational resources. New activities will be launched fortnightly. The NCA has warned […]
Being a foster carer during these trying times
By Lisa Scott Being a foster carer has its challenging moments at the best of times. During these unusual circumstances we find ourselves in, I have had to prioritise on food as I have eight mouths to feed, so I have to confess to some bulk buying in recent days as well as educating […]