Challenges of Transitioning from Care at 18

The process of becoming an adult is inherently daunting. However, for individuals who have spent time in care, navigating children’s services and a succession of social workers can intensify these difficulties. One council is actively working to facilitate this transition. Six months after reaching the age of 18, Chloe Morley moved from supported accommodation to a hostel. Her living situation is set to change again, as she has recently been offered a flat. Nevertheless, she believes she should not have found herself in this predicament. “No social worker will tell you how scary it is being 18,” she states. “I wish I been warned, because it is very scary.” Miss Morley currently serves as an apprentice at Cumberland Council and an ambassador for care-experienced individuals, contributing to the authority’s service development. Despite the difficulties, she reports observing significant improvements in the authority’s operations since children’s services were transferred from Cumbria County Council following a local government restructure in April 2023. Ofsted inspectors, who conducted a three-week review of the department’s management at Cumberland Council, confirmed the service’s improvement, elevating its rating to “good” from “requires improvement” under the previous authority. Miss Morley indicates that her experiences with the now-disbanded Cumbria County Council were not “the greatest,” but she asserts, “I would say there has been a big improvement.” She began noticing these changes approximately a year ago, shortly after Cumberland Council assumed control. She explains, “I had had so many different social workers and so many different people coming in and out of my life, but now I just have that set person and I don’t have to keep getting passed around.” She adds, “I think it’s good because I have strong relationships.” The ability to rely on a single point of contact is highly important to her, as care-experienced individuals “don’t really trust people” due to traumatic life events, she notes. Young people with care experience receive support in areas such as housing, finances, education, and mental health until they reach 25 years of age. Since turning 18, Miss Morley has had a personal adviser assisting her transition into adulthood. However, she believes further efforts are needed to prepare young people. She acknowledges, “There’s just a housing crisis for everyone, which I know is difficult.” Nevertheless, she suggests that enhanced support for locating housing options would be an improvement, as individuals “shouldn’t be in this situation six months after turning 18.” Despite this, she expresses “100% confident” that children entering care today would receive proper care, following recent systemic adjustments. The positive transformations she has observed have been acknowledged by Ofsted inspectors, whose report was released on Tuesday. Emma Williamson, Cumberland Council’s children’s services portfolio holder, stated that the authority faced “systemic challenges” upon assuming services from Cumbria County Council, including a significant number of children in care and difficulties with staff retention and recruitment. A new leadership team, established in March, has successfully consolidated the team and focused on staff development, according to Ms. Williamson. Williamson remarked, “One of the things that was really important was to review every single child.” She further stated, “I’m not afraid to say that, in the first week, two children went home and I cried, because I think we had a fresh approach, and what we should always be doing is trying to keep children with their families.” The authority is also developing an early intervention program to prevent individuals from being transferred between multiple departments before receiving appropriate support, she added. Despite the service’s overall “good” rating, Ofsted indicated that certain areas still necessitate improvements. Inspectors issued four recommendations concerning the council’s private fostering arrangements, its response to homelessness for 16- and 17-year-olds, its approach to children experiencing long-term neglect, and its handling of children who go missing. These specific areas had also been identified in prior Ofsted reports when the service was managed by the former local authority. Philippa Holmes, the council’s assistant director for children’s services, commented, “While they could see we had firm plans in place, we were literally just about to launch the new policies when Ofsted arrived, so what they couldn’t see was the impact of those policies and the positive changes that will be seen going forward.” She expressed being “incredibly proud” of the accomplishments made in a brief period and is “very confident” that the service will continue to enhance. Martin Birch, Director of children and family wellbeing, stated that while the issues identified by Ofsted were challenges also encountered by the previous authority, they no longer represent as significant a problem as they once did. He asserted, “Had Ofsted come in three or four months’ time, that would have been a very different outcome.” He concluded, “We’re really proud of our service, the staff have worked incredibly hard to deliver what we have achieved today and I’d like to thank them all.” Readers can follow BBC Cumbria on X, Facebook, Nextdoor, and Instagram, and submit story ideas to northeastandcumbria@bbc.co.uk. This content is copyrighted by BBC in 2024, with all rights reserved. The BBC disclaims responsibility for the content of external websites and provides information on its approach to external linking.