Children and young people

March 28th, 2015

Our vision

All children in care and care leavers should be able to take part in decisions which affect their lives and the opportunity to shape plans for the way services are delivered. IROs should promote the active participation of children and young people wherever possible. The extent to which children and young people take part will depend on the situation.

Participation and Consultation

There is sometimes a lack of clarity about what’s meant by participation – it is often confused with consultation.

Participation is the process by which children and young people can proactively influence decision-making and bring about change. This could involve children and young people influencing decisions about their own lives for example children being supported by their IRO to have their say about their care plan, or it could mean a young person influencing the development and implementation of service delivery.

Consultation involves children and young people being asked for their opinions. This includes asking their opinions on various suggested options, or retrospective satisfaction surveys and evaluation exercises.

IROs can actively promote children and young people’s participation and in a variety of way – the following examples of best practice are not exhaustive:

Recruiting and selecting staff – read a testimony from a young person on the interview panel to appointment an IRO.

Peer mentoring and training – read about the Do You Know? training developed by children and young people

Planning, co-running and contributing to reviews – read about child-centred reviews

Being on forums or councils that lead to change – read about children and young people’s involvement in the work of a Children in Care Council

Consultation and involvement – read about the children and young people’s consultation toolkit

Influencing important decisions about the future – read about children and young people’s contribution to their child-friendly care plan

Why IROs promote participation

Children and young people have the right to be involved in the decisions which affect them as individuals. Local authorities must take steps to ascertain the views of young people and to take them into account in making decisions about services and activities for them, in line with Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). They should establish and maintain structured arrangements for doing so.

To inform continuous improvement, these arrangements should enable young people to report on the quality and accessibility of provision. As appropriate they should also be involved actively in service design, delivery and governance. Young people should receive the support they need to participate and IROs should bring to senior managers attention any shortfalls in meeting this fundamental entitlement.

The difference made to outcomes for children in care and care leavers

Our ambition to enable all children in care and care leavers to have the opportunity to participate in decisions which affect their lives is driven by the belief that the process of participation brings about many benefits for the organisation of services and contributes to improved outcomes for children in care and care leavers through:

enabling children and young people to make a positive contribution;
feedback from children and young people leading to improved services;
skills development of children and young people;
raised aspirations and confidence- building;
increased awareness and knowledge about services and how organisations work;
active citizenship;
services meeting actual rather than assumed needs and thus leading to better value for money;
children and young people bringing a fresh perspective and new ideas about services.