Wigan Borough’s pledge to children and young people who are living in care

Here are the things that children and young people living in care in Wigan Borough have told us are the most important things that we can do for you

Wigan Council and Partner Organisations promise to do our best to achieve them for you.

We will listen to you about the services we offer. . .

• We will ask you and listen to you about where you want to live. Wherever possible we will offer you choices about your own foster care or residential placement. If we cannot offer choices we will explain why.

• We will ensure that we listen to you about keeping in contact with your family and friends, this includes how often, where and in what way you have contact.

• We will keep brothers and sisters together, wherever possible.

• We will provide you with a social worker, their name and contact details. We will also give you a back up telephone number so you can talk to someone else who will listen to and help you, in case your social worker is busy and not in their office.

• We will make sure that you have a regular health check and can get to see a regular nurse who will provide information and advice about your health.

• We will keep things confidential and only share information about you when it is vey important to do so. If we need to tell someone else then we will explain this to you first.

We will make sure you get to have your say. . .

We will involve you and ask for your views about decisions that affect your life. We will take into account your age, ability, cultural and communication needs.

• We will always explain things to you in a way in which you understand.

• We will make your review meeting as comfortable for you as we can. We will listen to you about who should attend and where the review should be.

• We will provide support for you to help you make a complaint if you need to. We will also provide a Children’s Rights Service and an independent advocate (someone who will speak for you if you want them to).

• We will organise regular activities, meetings, or opportunities for you to tell us your views about being looked after and whether we are keeping our promises.

We will help you to achieve success in life. . .

• We will make sure that there is one teacher at every school who will understand your situation and will offer extra support to children and young people who are in care and help you with schoolwork if you need it.

• We will provide training, work experience and employment opportunities if you need them.

• We will let you know about education, training and employment opportunities while you are at school and after you leave.

• We will make sure that if you want to go to University you will not be disadvantaged because of money problems.

• When you leave care we will make sure that, where appropriate and in accordance with the law [Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000], you will get financial support to cover accommodation and living expenses.

• We will help you get the budget skills you need to manage your money well.

• We will help you find the right place to live when you leave care.

• You will get a support worker to help you get the skills you need to live independently and you will get the worker’s contact details so that you can get in touch with them when you need to.

• We will make sure that your achievements are celebrated.

We will help you to keep your identity. . .

• We will encourage and help you to get involved in social, cultural and leisure activities.

• We will help to give you good memories by helping you to complete life story work and make photo albums of important events and people in your life.

• We may want to look after some of your personal possessions and keep them safe for you. If we do this, we will explain this to you, and we promise to return them to you when you leave care.

If you do not think we are trying to achieve these things, please contact Wigan Council’s Children’s Rights Services on 07825 315974

Meanwhile, if you've got something you think we should include here, get in touch with us at linconline@wlt.org and we'll do our best to include it.