dialogue bulletin june 2021
Welcome to the first of our monthly summaries. We will be working to provide regular updates on issues affecting the residential sector. If you’re not already subscribed you’ll find more information on our news page.
recent news
A summary of recent research reports and articles affecting the residential sector. This month we include links to research on young people's views about what helps when they've been missing from care and a position statement from the ADCS on the care system with ideas for future development, as well as information about the consultation now open for unregulated provision. Welcome Thank you for your interest in the first of our bulletins for anyone working with children in residential care. We've written and curated information from across the sector and will provide a free [...]
missing children
Evidence suggests that looked after children can be at increased risk of many of the harms known to be linked with going missing. It is therefore important that professionals and carers responsible for a child’s care prioritise the response to missing and know how and when to report an incident to the police. Children who are looked after in the care system are disproportionately likely to go missing. One in every ten looked after children will go missing compared to an estimated one in every two hundred children generally. Young people want: Agencies to recognise there will [...]
what becomes of the open-hearted?
Why we must support resilience in children’s homes staff, by Margaret Davies, Trainer and Consultant at Children’s Homes Quality. Children in care need staff who can connect with them open-heartedly, yet the experience of working in the residential sector is often personally intense and challenging. Staff are commonly at risk of experiencing ‘secondary trauma’ or ‘moral distress’ which will lead to protective responses and blocked care if we do not have well-developed programs of staff support. As we know, children who can’t live with their families, who may have been abused and neglected, need warm, open-hearted carers, [...]
the sufficiency enigma
The residential childcare sector is known to have insufficient capacity to meet the needs of the children coming into care. However, the available figures belie this fact suggesting that we have an excess of up to 3,000 places unoccupied at any one time. This paper by the ICHA looks at why this situation has arisen. It finds that there is no one cause but an interplay of factors. Furthermore, the situation was almost inevitable due to the regulations that govern and have shaped the sector, the increasingly complex needs of the children and, to a lesser extent, the way [...]