Care Leaver Covenant
A unique approach to securing employment opportunities for care leavers In October 2018, the government announced the launch of the Care Leaver Covenant. The strategy has been designed to help those leaving the care system to live more independently, by opening new opportunities with some of the UK’s biggest businesses. We speak exclusively with Gareth Evans, Head of Partnerships at the Care Leaver Covenant to find out more about how the initiative has worked since it’s initial launch.
Last issue, Ashley John Baptiste those who are approaching independence often don’t have the same levels of confidence as their told us that we need to inspire peers. It’s important that we help them build their young people growing up in care self-worth so that they feel that they can apply for to believe that they have “access the same opportunities as others. to the same opportunities as But it’s not only about employment. Our approach their peers”. How is the Care is based upon enabling young people to build the foundations for a happy, and opportunity-rich life. Leaver Covenant working to achieve this? The Care Leaver Covenant We work across five specific objectives; to live was launched in October independently, to have access to employment, 2018. What impact has it had education, and training; to live safely and securely; upon young people since its to have access to healthcare and to have access to launch, and how do you see it financial literacy training. continuing to develop? These five strands anchor absolutely everything that we do. We believe that collectively they can enable a person leaving care to have a fulfilling life. We read Ashley’s interview with you, and what he spoke about is incredibly important. We speak to many people who are about to leave care, and we know that those who are facing the job market or
We’re continuing to work hard to increase our offerings via the Covenant. There are new opportunities being added on all the time. We see the Covenant as being a way of laying strong foundations for those who have grown up in the care system. We embrace the idea of the ‘Universal
Social Work News - 12
Parent’ which we use to mean that all of society has a role in parenting young people who are care experienced. We have a variety of initiatives which are far beyond just work experience placements. We have training programmes and access to financial literacy schemes to help support young people. Looking to the imminent future, we’re about to launch a new banking programme which will enable care leavers, and young people in care, to open a bank account without the traditional ID that most high street banks require. In addition to this, we’re tackling the high number of care leavers who get tangled up in the criminal justice system. We are developing a partnership with Tuckers Solicitors and are shaping a public offer to provide Covenant-approved legal defence for care leavers. This programme will impact individuals who have been arrested and detained in police custody. Additionally, we recently ran a roundtable discussion with the Greater Manchester Mayor and over 10 prominent higher education bodies and housing providers where we laid out our ambitions for
