Is it a Cold Society?

It was 14 years ago when I left care. It saddens me greatly that the same things that were happening to kids in care then are still happening now. How can this be?

How much research needs to be done before we finally have some ACTION and perhaps new legislation to make everything equal for ALL care leavers. How long until we offer them the support they deserve and need?

When I graduated from an uncaring care system into custody, I had no real support other than a one hour weekly meeting with my Youth offending officer. I had no care leaver services involved with me, not even a single appointment with anyone to see how I was, never mind £2000 and a flat. It was a lottery if kids leaving care got enough help I suspect. Some of my care brothers and sisters were given a flat and a grant of £2000. Even so, they would often be put in a flat in a unsafe place where they were at risk of drugs, crime and exploitation, or else their flats would be overrun with young people, often other  unsupported care leavers, which leads to anti-social behaviour, inevitably followed by eviction and homelessness because they simply were not prepared for independence. They had never been taught the coping skills, were emotionally unready and massively under supported. Looking back, failure for many was probably inevitable under those circumstances.

The rest of us would have to make our own way in life and independence. Some of us failed and were homeless. Some couldn't handle the pain and trauma they had been through and took their own lives. Some died from drug overdoses. I chose to be lonely and isolated, to keep out off drugs and out of crime. I paid a heavy price with my mental health ending up in psychiatric ward and hostel. All of the above probably could have been avoided with the right support and guidance.

I want to dedicate my life to social care, no matter how many hoops I have to jump through to get there. I'm inspired by other care leavers who are achieving and being successful at whatever career they have chosen. I just want to be respected as someone who has given something back and helped ‘Looked After’ children and young care leavers. I just can't sit back and watch ALL this talent and potential being wasted. These young people are often damaged and have had so many traumas in their short lives.

Why do each government in turn think it's OK for these young care leavers to be left to fail?

There has not been any fundamental improvement for all children leaving care since 1948, in spite of the ambition of the Children Acts of 1948 and 1989 and the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000
I think as a Society it's not the case that all the general public don't care about kids in care. I think it's probably more likely that they don't know much about Looked After Children and care leavers.

Is it a cold Society?

How can people in positions to make change for the better of Society’s most vulnerable children sleep at night in their big comfy beds knowing how many care leavers are on the streets outside in this bleak rainy weather; isolated, lonely, scared and probably in need of a hug and some support and guidance.

It's an awful feeling I get: "Am I doing enough?"

Statistics reveal that 62% of looked after children have been abused or neglected. These young people are already suffering a great deal of pain, upset and instability. But still they are being asked to leave care at 16-18 years old. Out of 9,900 young people to leave care 16% were 16 years old; 15% were 17 years old. That's thousands of young people aged less than 18 year of age. Is it any wonder that up to 40% of 18-21 year olds in custody have spent time in care?  69.9% re-offend within a year of release. Expensive and ineffective at best!

It has to be cheaper for the government purse to offer the option of support to ALL care leavers until they are 21 at least, no matter where their address is. It would reduce so many negative statistics and reduce the number of care leavers and possibly in future even reduce the number of children coming into care.  There are so many potential positives, not least amongst them that it would save lives. If we give young people a better chance of making it in the world of independence, the outcomes can only be positive.

Not sure how people can be upset with me for being part of a campaign to make things equal for ALL young people!

Ben Ashcroft

It's Not Rocket Science

Hello! My name is Rosie Canning. I help with the social media side of Every Child Leaving Care Matters campaign.

Until I got involved with ECLCM, I very rarely mentioned that the first 16 years of my life were spent in care. I suppose it was the same old reason: shame; embarrassment; carrying society’s sins on my shoulders. Sometimes though, I feel okay talking about my experiences, usually with other people who’ve been in care. We are linked by our traumatic pasts, cause let’s be honest here, life in care is rarely a bed of roses.

On Tuesday I had a good ‘post care’ experience. I attended the 'Therapeutic Child Care Conference - Hopefulness in a Changing Landscape’, as the guest of Amanda Knowles from the Consortium for Therapeutic Communities.

The conference was fascinating especially as it was all about the right sort of care. One of the speakers, John Diamond from the Mulberry Bush School, spoke about the 'frozen child' which goes right back to Barbara Dockar-Drysdale (1958). The Mulberry Bush School is a residential school for children who have been traumatised. They provide high quality therapeutic care and work with children until they are ready for a foster placement or find them a school that suits them. They help them re-learn stuff like being a child, how to eat a meal properly, boundaries, fun, play etc which is all part of the therapeutic child care model.

The ethics of this therapeutic setting is how it could be for children coming into care...i.e. assessed and kept in a safe haven until they are ready for a foster home or other placement and not the other way around. Hence the reason why so many placements fail; and children end up being failed by the corporate parent.

In my opinion, this government's emphasis on foster care, is wrong. The residential setting is just as valuable and important but as people in the know say, it is used as a last resort. What a waste.

Mark Kerr, PhD student and Assistant Lecturer in Social Policy at the University of Kent, gave a very interesting talk at the conference: ‘Reviewing the Needs of Looked After Children: A Challenge to the Rhetoric?’ As part of his PhD, Mark is looking into the outcomes for care leavers who experienced residential care. His main point, and he proved it with oodles of statistics, was that nothing has changed for children in the care system. There is hardly any improvement. It is an absolute bloody shambles. The care system is failing our most vulnerable young people.

Sir Tony Hawkhead, chief executive of Action for Children, said: “Young people who have had traumatic early lives, who struggle with learning disabilities or mental health issues are the ones who need the most care, but the state is turning its back on them.

“It’s ludicrous that teenagers who are still dealing with the legacy of abuse and neglect have to cope with adult responsibilities, like building a stable home, at an age when most of their peers are supported by parents.

“If we don’t rethink care so it acts less like a system and more like a parent then these problems won’t go away.”

Lisa Cherry wasn’t at the conference but she did write a response to Tuesday’s report Too Much Too Young by Action for Children, that states: “The emotional needs of children who have been in care are not being well looked after...”

Lisa responded by saying: “There comes a point and I guess I have reached it, where we have to say, we have enough research. It is robust. We pretty much know the answers already to what you are going to research. Please can we do something now?”

And of course she is so right, but this is not to take away the importance of the AfC report. We know all the stuff now, about trauma, about what works, about what these vulnerable, traumatised children need to get over their trauma and it's not being moved 65 times. Impossible? No, seriously, this happened and is still happening. And those moves took place over a period of five years. How was that even possible? At least 65 but probably more like 140 people if not more, were involved in rejecting and rejecting this young person.

The right sort of care is so simple, it's cost effective in the LONG term. When a child comes into care they need to be assessed, placed in a safe place, a safe haven. Or a therapeutic setting though unfortunately there are not enough of them. They then need specialist help to overcome the trauma. The trauma of leaving their families, the trauma of being moved; not all children are relieved to be taken away from their parents. The trauma of a new place. Once they have learned to play again, or just sit at a table and eat in a family setting without playing Greek restaurants; then and only then should they go into a foster family setting or be adopted. Everyone in child care knows this. Every child that has left care knows this. Yet it ain’t happening.

I remember being moved from a safe place to an unsafe place. I remember being in a constant state of fear. I was four and half years old, I knew very little about the world. Suddenly I was exposed to violence. I never knew when I would be attacked. I tried all the little girl moves that I knew. Nothing worked. At the end of this two year placement I was severely damaged and sent to another place where the abuse was worse. Does this gives you an idea of what a young child sometimes has to endure? Even without the physical, emotional and psychological abuse; let’s say the placement is considerate and caring. The child doesn’t know that, he/she is still in constant fear mode. Can they sleep safely? Will they still be there in the morning? Will something awful happen in the night? What about the other children there? Will they be violent to the child? This really is the tip of the iceberg. And so it takes weeks, months or even years to be able to calm down, to be able to sleep properly, to feel safe.

I still find it hard to sleep; I don’t feel safe even now fifty years later

For goodness sake it is not Rocket Science. Well the neuroscience bit is but we, and this includes the government, have access to the layman’s version.

Think about the child that was moved 65 times in five years. What is that poor child’s brain like?

So how on earth can a child be expected to concentrate on its studies. The brain is in meltdown, it is jumping ship, it is on red alert.

And where is all this leading? The Every Child Leaving Care Matters campaign of course. For goodness sake; if a traumatised young person is in a stable placement in children’s home at 16 or 17; why move them into what is often an unsafe environment, like a B&B or miles away from their school and friends. Let them stay; let them stay until they are 21. Give them a bit of peace in their lives and then see what they can achieve. Give peace a chance!

What should we be asking politicians?

Over the next few months as we move inexorably towards a general election the ECLCM campaign and it’s supporters have an opportunity to speak to politicians who, by and large have been deafeningly silent on the subject of children in care and specifically those leaving care. Children in Care becomes political news only when something goes badly wrong – the discovery of (yet another) disgraceful story of sexual abuse of children by carers; social workers apparently failing to take children into care with catastrophic consequences; social workers taking children into care unnecessarily – all well trodden media paths that are, in fact almost nothing to do with the children they are just news stories with more than a little impetus being given by the perennial tendency to attack the social work profession. Of course some of these stories are true and poor practice must always be exposed and answered for. But what about poor political practice when it comes to children in care? Such has been the failure of central and local government since at least the 1970’s to address the failings of the care system that surely an exposé will appear soon? Well it hasn’t so far and don’t hold your breath.  There has been virtually no improvement in outcomes for UK children in care in those forty something years.

Why should now be any different? Well, in part that depends on you. If you choose to take the opportunity to engage with prospective MP’s and Local Councillors as they canvass your support then you really may be able to make a difference for children in and leaving care.

If you can go to a meeting great or perhaps if someone comes knocking at your door you could ask them some questions which might include the following suggestions:

Do you know how many children in care there are in your constituency/ward?

Do you know how many children there are in care in the UK as a whole?

What will you do for these children?

How will you seek to improve outcomes for children leaving care so that they improve for the first time in 40 years?

Do you believe in equality?

Can you explain why children leaving residential care are not afforded an equal opportunity to stay put (remain in their placements) when children in foster care are?

Have you signed the ECLCM campaign to gain equal rights for children leaving residential care? If not please do so.

We appreciate that the key issues in the forthcoming election will be things like:

The economy – how much better it would be if we didn’t have to pay for so many care leavers to be in prison rather than contributing to the economy?

The NHS – how much money and what resources could be saved if so many care leavers weren’t in adult mental health wards?

Education – How much better would it be if children in care had the same opportunities to go into further education?

This list if not endless could go on for quite some time.

Only politicians can make a difference and you will vote them in or not so it’s you who can make the difference.  Please ensure that they are aware of ECLCM and indeed other vehicles for improving the lives of children in care.

We have relatively few politicians following and fewer still supporting our campaign but if they read this blog then they will have plenty of time to get their answers ready for you!

Alternatively you can write to your MP either by t is easy to find your local MP/local councillors contact details. You can use: writetothem.com which is easy to use and lists local MPs/councillors. All you have to do is enter your poscode. Or if you would prefer to post a letter, you can use our template letter which can be downloaded here.

What was I running too?

What does independent mean?

Am sure to find out soon

Now that I’ve turned eighteen.

Am somewhat quite excited

Am defo ready to have my voice

A chance to make decisions

But there’s no one to direct my choice?

Am not even really aware you know,

Of any choices I can actually make

What’s gonna happen to me

On this independent road I take

I played my music all night long

I watched the sun come up

I sit and contemplate the day again

Drinking cider from my cup

It’s not what it’s supposed to be

Not what I imagined at all

My independent arrogance wans

Am feeling very, very small

Month by month passes by

Longer spent in drunken bliss

It’s just so god dam lonely

Even the shit staff I miss

More loneliness more alcohol

The next few years are quite a mess

I was a massive drain at A & E

This I must confess

I couldn’t bear the loneliness

Started overdosing on the med

Just enough so they would keep me in

On a ward not my lonely bed.

I found solace in many razors

At one point near lost a leg

“I just don’t know where I’m going no more”

My emotions began to beg

Time and time again I repeated this

My mental health completely shot

Carted off to mental wards

Each time I lost the plot

Back into something familiar

Where people were paid to care

Though this system is debatable!

But there was definitely people there

I yo yo’d back n forth this way,

Hospitals, dry clinics and psychs

I swapped my tipple for new highs

Growing more “resourceful” for my likes

Looking back am somewhat shocked

At the places I have been

Situations…I’d left myself wide open

All that shocked, I have seen

My party pal, my mate Jackie

She gained independence just like me

But her escapes turned to heroin

And she eventually paid the fee.

It’s a funny situation care

We’re a similar kinda lot

I moved around so many times

Long-term friends I haven’t got

I never learned to retain them

I just moved out and made them anew

It’s a pattern that has followed me

Of real friends, I have very few.

Social skills had developed

Within a community so unique

Skills that didn’t fit society

Leaving relationships of mine quite bleak.

Not the healthy happy types

Some erratic, hostile and bad

Most I found we used each other

To obliterate all that sad.

I adopted social expectations

Of the linear line of life

I had two kids, they were MINE

Playing house and am the “wife”

I saw to ensure my chain broke

I would wholly do my best

Motherhood was far from natural

A heavy burden on my chest

They saved me in so many ways

In ways I can’t explain

I found the drive to better myself

They took away the pain.

My two little saviours

With all that innocence, they just give

They lifted my heart and filled it

They gave me tickets to finally live.

I didn’t get an education

In that system I didn’t fare

A very familiar tale for most

Who found themselves in care.

I did get lots of other quals

Life skills that where quite unique

Skills that have saw me survive

In a life that was quite bleak

Resilience and downright resourcefulness

Determined and quite strong

Every so called weak state I lived

Has got me where I belong

Here now, on my new journey

One I have waited for too long

Face the fear and I jumped in

am now where I belong.

I always shouted to the staff

You’re shit and I really do know best

I’ve always said I’ll do their job

Now am putting it to the test.

So Eighteen years later am sitting at a desk

Sitting in a classroom trying my very best

Eighteen years later from the other side I look

Learning the practices, of the roads my life has took.

18 years later,

The systems have not changed

Many young people still leave care

No support and nothing arranged

Struggling unidirectional down pathways

Leading to trouble and negative stats

Losing hope, some opt out

Sitting lonely in their flats.

This cannot be a circle or chain

That continues on and on,

We can change things for future generations

And learn from who’s been and gone.

I as a parent will definitely not

Be choosing between my kids,

Who I will love and support each day

And the other nothing give.

Each of my children are equal

I love them both the same

I will cherish and support them equally

Throughout life’s little game

Each of my children are equal

I want the government shouting out with pride

EVERY CHILD LEAVING CARE MATTERS

No matter where they reside.

Danielle McLaughlin

When Care Left Me and I Left Custody

The day of my release was an amazing day and thinking back the feeling was better than any drug but not one I wanted to take or feel again. 

When I left Custody I had very limited options: my mom's or homelessness. I was a seventeen and a half year old vulnerable heading towards re-offending and failure. 

Social services withdrew from seeing me or looking after me. A feeling of abandonment prevailed as I wasn't ready to take the world of independence on. It was a lonely feeling and a genuine fear for my future. I didn't have options or opportunities when I first came out of the young offenders institution. 

I had to be resilient and determined not to re-offend and stay away from my old crowd of mates that were still offending and taking drugs. I didn't want to be part of the revolving door going in and out. I didn't want a life of crime, drugs and prison.

It was difficult to be living back with my mom where previously it had failed every time. As did this after two weeks. My thoughts and voice weren't listened too when I had said I didn't want to go back there exactly because of this reason.

Then to a hostel after a few days sleeping rough. My mental health was slipping. Dirty, no money or food. And no support! The loneliness got the better of me. I had had enough and wanted to end my life. Isolated and not seeing anyone. I missed my youth offending appointment. Thought I was going back to jail. Some of the darkest days.

I know how it feels to be lonely and isolated, when you feel the world is against you and there is no light. I'd stopped hanging round with my old crowd of friends because I didn't want to re-offend. I chose loneliness instead. I knew I could be with people but that was only going to make it worse. I felt trapped with no-one to turn too.

I took an overdose and was admitted to the Psychiatric hospital and medicated up to the eye-balls to the point I couldn't talk and felt all fight in me was gone. Hard for me to explain.

After two weeks I ran as I hated being on the medication. I had one visit from my youth worker. No family or friends visited. Did I give up? Or fight?

Then I went to Project Challenge which helped me more than words can say. I can't articulate what they did for me. And what I did for myself. The best experience of my life with some of the best views I've ever seen walking across the Alta Via 1.

I then met my son's mom where I stayed six years. On the day my son was born, one of my closest friends was left to die after being released from custody and taking heroin. That was possibly the hardest day of my life. Proud and happy my son was born then hours later to find out my friend/brother had died in tragic circumstances.

I always struggled in the relationship with my son's mom. I was distant. Not very close. I was always thinking and struggling with leaving all my friends behind and starting again. The loss of so many to drugs and suicide. So much of which could have been avoided with the right support, opportunity and funding. So many wasted lives.

I then left the relationship for the sake of my son. I could be a good dad still. It hurt so much to leave him because he was mine! I loved every bone of him. He was my world. I'm not going to lie I struggled being a parent when he was younger because I hadn't resolved my own problems and it affected me. His mom has a great family who all support each other. 

I then spent seven more weeks in a psychiatric ward as I had a breakdown. The most awful seven weeks. But again it was give up or fight?

I fought and started running and got back in to football. That helped me clear my head and make progress and start to give something back.

From there I have made great progress and give something back and help make a small difference to some young peoples' and professionals' lives. Using my negative experience to make theirs a better one.

If I had not found people to help and support me, I would still be struggling. We all need support from time to time and a lot of care leavers don't have these options.

If we support young care leavers now and give them options, opportunity and support we can save lives and cost to the future government purse.

It shouldn't be about money but the reality is that it is. Money first and children and young people second.

Wars seem to be more important to fund than our own young people who will become the future of our country.

Every Child Leaving Care Matters

Please support it!

Ben Ashcroft

Our Day Out

Ed Nixon, Acting Chair of ECLCM, writes:

Over 25 years ago Willy Russell wrote a great play (in my view) called ‘Our Day Out’. It had a resonance for me as I sat on the 0847 from Lime Street to London with three colleagues as we made our way to Euston to join the rest of us (non-scouser) members of the campaign. The play was about ‘deprived children’ from Liverpool who had a day out in Conway. Our day on 11th September was on behalf of ‘deprived’ care leavers – those deprived of the opportunity to stay put in their placements, should they so wish, until they are 21 years of age.

Thanks to Mr Craig Whittaker, MP ECLCM had been afforded the chance to have a high profile meeting in Portcullis House, Westminster. This turned out to be a diverse group of individuals and organisations who, it transpired, have a great deal of sympathy with our campaign’s single issue – that children leaving residential care should have the same option as their ‘peers’ in foster care – to remain cared for and supported until they are twenty-one years of age, an age when young men and women not ‘looked after’ frequently continue to look forward to several more years of being supported, supplemented and subsidised by their parents. 

Mr Whittaker reminded us that in political terms this is absolutely not a ‘vote winner’ but that it is ‘the right thing to do’. The main obstacle to including children leaving residential care into existing legislation is money – though just how much money is debatable when one considers the long term costs associated with a failed care system.

As may have been expected as the debate was opened, a whole range of issues surrounding the failures and short-comings of ‘the care system’ were voiced. Laudable though the suggestions were to challenge how, as a society, we care for our ‘looked after children’ no better now that forty years ago; as a campaign group, we had to focus on our single issue. It was great to hear Kathy Evans from Children England remind the meeting that though our petition may have only(!) have a little under 8000 signatories, through the motion carried by her organisation supporting this cause, we can reasonably claim a more realistic figure of 108,000.

We determined in the meeting to establish an ‘e-group’ to enhance and broaden our ability to share the message and garner support for the cause. We agreed that as the forthcoming general election draws near and candidates seek our votes we should ask those perhaps less socially aware (we would say) than Mr Whittaker and the likes of his colleague Mr Bill Esterson MP, where they stand on or even what they know about children in care. We asked all of those present and this seemed to be well received that they ‘proselytise’ the ECLCM message and promote the cause in order that we can go eventually away with the job done.

The sad message of ‘Our Day Out’ , in my view, is that those who were taken on a brief trip away from their deprived reality are reminded at the end of the day of their depressing situation and even bleaker future leading to the stark realisation that a day out is about as much as they can expect. We expect so very much more than those in Russell’s play. We expect and will not disappear until every child leaving care is given an equal opportunity to remain ‘staying put’ until they are twenty-one. Not in fact until Every Child Leaving Care Matters.

The notes of our day and our presentation will be circulated to members imminently. If you would like a copy just join us – it’s free!

ECLCM and the three stooges - a trip from nowhere to the Palace of Westminster.

The ‘Every Child Leaving Care Matters’ campaign group past, present and possibly future, are coming to Westminster on 11th September. We look forward to meeting with friends and supporters from all over the UK for the first time to share ideas aspirations and opinions. We are extremely grateful to Craig Whittaker, MP for making this possible and for agreeing to play a part on the day, and very excited about this opportunity to get together.

If we pause and reflect for a moment, it  may seem odd that we are so excited about this opportunity to further promote our cause, but how much more odd is it that we should even have to exist, let alone have approaching 8000 signatories encouraging us to persevere with our cause?

In many senses a group such as ours should not be required in the United Kingdom in 2014, given our raison d'être. Given this odd situation, it is perhaps appropriate once more before the meeting takes place to reiterate our position and the context in which we came about and remain intact and as passionate as ever some nine months later.

There are many admirable and dedicated individuals and organisations who exist to support care leavers and happily many will be represented at the Harold Wilson room next week. Given the vital work these good people do, and indeed the contributions of thousands of social workers, their  managers, residential staff, affiliated professionals, councillors, members of Parliament and corporate parents around the country who work to support children in and beyond a life in residential care, one may ask  what possible need there could be for a small, passionate (if occasionally frustrated and even rather angry) group of strangers to come together over the course of a few days in the lead up to Christmas? What vital aspect of life for children in residential care could have been missed, overlooked or simply ignored to cause such an unusual event to happen? Of course, that event was the way the government proposed to implement its commendable ‘Staying Put’ initiative. 

Given Society’s expressed commitment to equality and justice, we as a small group found it hard to believe that in this day and age a British government could introduce a policy that on the face of it openly discriminates against one group of vulnerable children leaving care based solely on where they are placed during their final year in care.  This policy appeared to us to differentiate between blameless children shamelessly. We waited for the public display of outrage, and for the social work and national press to crawl all over the issue. Nothing.  We waited for those people concerned with social work with children and families and the care of children to speak out and to tell the government that they must have made a dreadful mistake? There was virtual silence, and as a result, ECLCM was born.

Following the initial ECLCM campaign and the welcome support of some caring MPs, the issue of support for young people leaving care was reviewed by the Education Select Committee.  To their credit, the Education Select Committee, after careful deliberation and review of the evidence, agreed with ECLCM that all children leaving care should be supported equally to at least 21 years of age. We now await the government response to their recommendations. What will happen to their recommendations, whether they will be introduced into a programme in advance of the next election? Who knows.

Let’s remind ourselves about the issues. Let’s consider our ‘three stooges’.  Imagine three 17 year olds with similar needs, challenges and aspirations.  One lives at home with a caring family. He or she will receive the support of the family as they grow older. There are no ‘cut off’ points based on age. They know the family will be there for them practically and emotionally into adulthood, and indeed, for the rest of their lives. 

Let’s assume the other two 17 year olds are in care, but to all intents and purposes have identical backgrounds, needs, fears and hopes to the young person growing up amongst family. One of these is placed with foster parents and the other in a children’s home. Will they be treated differently? Well, it seems that under the current implementation of the ‘Staying Put’ initiative that is exactly what will happen.  The fostered 17 year old may now expect to stay in care to be looked after and supported as any seventeen year old might expect in their home until they are 21. The other 17 year old living in a children’s home must leave and fend for themselves.

We at ECLCM see this as unjust and discriminatory. We believe that ALL care leavers must be given options according to their needs, not based on their accommodation. To us, it is pure and simple - discrimination is wrong. That’s why we are coming to London because EVERY Child Leaving Care Matters.