Protecting and valuing young people in care

Despite the challenges of the ongoing pandemic and the difficult world we are living in today, it is important to celebrate the truly outstanding contribution of some of our young people who continue to do extraordinary things in extraordinary times.

This is particularly the case when thinking about some of our children in care and care leavers who never cease to impress and amaze me with their brilliant achievements, awesome resilience and critical insights.

At the recent full council meeting, I presented a critical paper regarding the council’s role as corporate parents: protecting and supporting our children in care and care leavers.

As lead member for children’s services, I have the honour and privilege to chair the corporate parenting forum, which includes youth ambassadors and some of our children in care as representatives.

These are critical meetings that allow our young people to speak, articulate their experiences and contribute to how we can improve the service and offering.

Since becoming chair last May, I have fundamentally changed the format of the meetings to allow for a more informal and relaxed approach removing much of the formality that surrounds council meetings and encouraging our young people to set agendas, speak openly and to control the meeting set up. We have had live workshops and exercises run by our young people including a live simulation of what it is like to be taken into care; a truly profound and moving experience that provoked me to request policy changes to parts of our service.

I can comfortably say these sessions are easily the most interesting and rewarding meetings I chair and attend. I thank all our young people for all the insights they bring. The report highlighted the excellent progress we have made combined with our recent Good rating by Ofsted which specifically accentuated areas of outstanding practice in this area.

Protecting vulnerable people is at the heart of this administration’s values and agenda and there is nothing more important than vulnerable children.

Our young people, particularly those in care, continue to inspire me with their enthusiasm, humility, worldly perspective and sense of fun.

Every single one them are deeply valued and we will continue to do our very best to give each and every person, the very best life chances and opportunities possible across the Royal Borough.

Cllr STUART CARROLL Conservative, Boyn Hill