The Corporate Parenting panel has had a very successful year, and work is based around the following themes:

• Home
• Education
• Health
• Leisure, Youth Services, Play
• Leaving Care

Young people were involved in creating a child friendly Corporate Parenting Plan. Two versions were produced, one for 0-10 years and another for 10+ years. These plans have been shared with young people.

Conwy’s Elected Members are very committed to Corporate Parenting having successfully developed a new Corporate Parenting Strategy to cover the next three years. This revised strategy document will be launched in May 2016.

The Social Services and Well-being Act includes a new duty to offer any Looked After Child in Foster Care the opportunity to remain within their stable and nurturing family environment until they are ready to move on. Rather than that young person moving out at 18, they can now remain in Foster Care until they are 21, or up to 25 if they are in full time Education. The When I Am Ready scheme also extends a new duty to those young people living with Kinship Foster Carers and Connected Persons, which is very positive.

We have actively contributed towards the creation of a regional policy across the six Local authorities in North Wales.

• Information leaflets have been created for young people, Foster Carers and siblings.

• Training has been provided to key staff involved with “When I Am Ready”. Train-the-trainer sessions have also been provided in order to reach the wider workforce.

• To help us meet needs around “When I Am Ready”, new joint protocols with Housing Benefit and Welfare rights have been developed to ensure that Foster Carers and young people are aware of their entitlements and that they are not disadvantaged financially.
• There has been a regional approach to engagement with Independent providers, particularly with regard to the need for them to transfer over to the Local Authority if they become “When I Am Ready” Foster Carers
• Information about “When I Am Ready” has been sent to all young people (16+) via the newsletter developed by the Personal advisor team, which targets all young people (16+) entitled to a leaving care service.

Looking ahead in terms of likely demand, over the next 12 months we have up to six young people who are likely to need to continue their placement under a “When I Am Ready” arrangement, with a further ten young people the following year.

Looked After Children require a range of placements to meet their needs. In order to build up our range of in-house fostering placements, we needed a revised strategy to ensure that our marketing tools and recruitment process were fit for purpose. Working in partnership with an Independent company, we have reviewed our current processes and refreshed our existing marketing tools.

As a Local Authority we are competing with the independent sector to recruit Foster Carers, and felt we needed a strong brand identity. After consulting with existing Foster Carers and staff, we now have stronger marketing materials, aligned with Conwy.  Prospective Foster Carers now get a clear message that we ‘’Need Foster Carers to Foster Conwy’s Children”.

The Information packs for Foster Carers have also been refreshed, and existing Foster Carers have been involved in the creation of four videos, focused on the following areas:

• Fostering siblings
• Fostering Children with Disabilities
  (Short breaks)
• Assessment and Support process
• Fostering Teenagers

These videos have been shared on social media (Facebook, Twitter and YouTube), to modernise the way we recruit Foster Carers.

The Conwy website has been updated to ensure that it’s more engaging and enquiry forms can now be completed online.

Whilst recruiting new Foster Carers is a priority for us, it’s important for us to retain those we already have. Therefore, new methods to aid retention have been developed, such as quarterly newsletter and a Looked After Celebration day to celebrate the achievements of Looked After Children.  An incentive scheme for existing Foster Carers is also in place, whereby rewards can be earned for referring new prospective Foster Carers to apply. Existing Foster Carers also support information evenings, and community recruitment events.