In this world of spurious and often superficial victims, the nightmarish plight of the parentless child — bereft of both parents in formative years, lost, annihilated, paralysed with fear and utterly, utterly alone and passed permanently into the care of strangers and institutions for the entire duration of childhood and adolescence — demands our utmost compassion and relentless determination to do all we can to make the burden that life has placed upon their young shoulders that much easier to bear. The care of orphans — the most vulnerable people of all — is no place for experimenting with trendy new social or behavioural therapies or, worse, for engaging in political point-scoring in support of dubious alternative lifestyles. The interests of the child don't merely come first, all other considerations come nowhere at all.

At present, care is provided through either adoption, fostering (formal and informal), residential care (for children under 16) and hostels (for 16-18 yr olds) — and many of those passing through the system and many of those working within it agree that in many ways it is a horrible mess. It is not all bad by any means and the staff are amongst the most attentive and committed of those working within the caring professions, but with children in care accounting for a frighteningly high proportion of those dropping-out of school, becoming very young teenage mums, falling into drug and alcohol abuse, getting into trouble with the police and winding up in prison, for the sake of the valuable young people in care, new approaches must be tried, and fast. And it is a core duty of government to ensure that those trying new approaches in this area are not 'hung out to dry' when pilot-schemes fail, sometimes miserably.

In government we will trial the following changes :

At The Child's Request, Extraordinary Measures Employed To Allow Some Contact With Parents To Continue

Even after abuse has occurred, any child wanting to still see their natural parents must be allowed to do so — even if all manner of steps need to be taken to enable this to happen safely and responsibly. The vital thread that joins the child to their real, natural parents could be kept alive by merely talking on the phone, seeing one another from a distance, having only occasional supervised and tightly controlled meetings, exchanging videos of one another or merely corresponding. And no matter what has occurred in the past, it is that thread that gives the child a sense of where they have come from and so who they are, and no matter how bad that has been it is something that is real so can then be acknowledged, targeted, helped, healed and then built upon — whereas 'no contact' scenarios can tend to create a void and inculcate a sense of 'never knowing' rootlessness, which can lead to aimlessness, apathy, frustration, anger and the descent into destructive behaviours.

Part In-Care, Part Living-With-Parents Options Developed

Rather than an all-or-nothing approach, the emphasis would be on maximising the contact with natural parents (if that is what the child wants) and only taking the child into care at the times of day, days of the week or weeks/months when the parent(s) is/are unable to cope.

As Far As Possible, Children In Care Allowed To 'Choose Their Authority Figure'

One significant meeting each week with an authority figure that a troubled child can really relate to, is better than 7 days a week contact with someone they, for whatever reason, are quite unable to 'connect with'. A dating-agency approach should therefore be tried where all children in care can view video CVs of all the youth care workers within reasonable travelling distance of their location to see if they can find someone they feel they could 'connect with'. Wherever possible, regular meetings with the worker in question could then be arranged even if it meant travelling many miles.

The emphasis and spirit in which care professionals work to be not that of replacement parents, but merely informal role model and adult friend, there to try and affirm the child's genuine inner personality, help them discover their natural abilities and enthusiasms and teach necessary practical life skills.

As Far As Possible, Children In Care Allowed To Choose What Other Children They Have Contact With

Children in care have enough emotional issues of their own to deal with without having to deal with those of other children too (many of whom may simply want to vent their anger and frustration and otherwise dump all their emotional baggage onto someone else their own age rather than face up to it themselves). No child should ever be expected to endure this kind of thing, least of all a parentless child in care. Residential homes and hostels should therefore be required to take the most strenuous steps possible to ensure that children only live in close proximity to other children they are happy with. Children should have access to a childline-style telephone number where they can report their concerns if their wishes have gone unheeded by local caseworkers.

Sheltered Accommodation-Style Independent Living Quarters Made Available From Age 11-21

One of the most devastating emotional aspects to being orphaned or separated from parents is the powerlessness, so allowing children to have their own self-contained flatlets could be trialled within a larger sheltered accommodation setting (very similar to sheltered accommodation for the elderly). An on-site warden could supervise and intervene parent-like regarding any inappropriate activities/visitors etc and yet the young people would have their own independent space as a base for themselves. This would empower the older children and young adults in a non-trivial way and help prepare them for life outside care, and hopefully too, dilute the tendency within some care hostels for dysfunctional behaviours to be reinforced through being lumped-in with similarly dysfunctional young adults. This measure would also enable children in care to develop life skills in some areas ahead of children from stable backgrounds, increasing personal confidence.

Although all children should have the right to leave care at the age of 16, they should also have the right to stay in their familiar care environment until the age of 21 — allowing those who wish it, a few extra years to grow the temperament and skills needed to steer a successful course in life.

In-Care Ethos To Be More Practical, Structured Living and Less Psychobabble

When dealing with troubled youngsters needing to overcome huge emotional challenges (through no fault of their own) it will always be necessary for professionals to have occasional deeply personal discussions with them. However, to make these types of psychoanalytical conversations a regular occurrence can be overly invasive for a young child and cause older children (trying to play-up to adults apparently committed to a pychobabble ethos) to try and address their emotional issues in an unproductive, superficial or insincere way. Caseworkers should therefore encourage a new emphasis on continuing with the normal structure of life — no matter how bad the children may feel emotionally — and reserve heart-to-heart discussions for the times when they are naturally most meaningful, such as immediately after some emotional issue has surfaced in genuine emotional upset or disruptive behaviour.

Adoption Possible After 9 Months

At present, due to the understandable desire to give (a) struggling parent(s) a chance to 'sort themselves out', the decision to put a baby in care up for adoption is delayed so long that it cuts across the baby's critical bonding period which occurs between 6-18 months. The delay in putting toddlers and younger children up for adoption also increases the likelihood that behavioural problems will develop in the child. The interests of the baby and child must come first, so whilst not removing the all-important (and only fair) extension of a second chance to parents struggling with life and struggling to hold onto their child, the government should reduce the maximum time from a child being taken into care and being available for adoption to 9 months.

Informal Foster Carers Paid

For every child in a formal foster care setting, there are 5 (currently totalling approx. 300,000) raised in the informal foster care of grandparents, extended family or friends. Although performing an invaluable service to the child, the mother and the state, whereas formal foster carers currently receive £250/week, informal foster care currently remains unpaid and carers often struggle financially as a result. The government should therefore remunerate informal carers at the rate of £125/week on an approximate pro rata basis for the hours of care actually provided (with any benefits claimed by the child's natural parent(s) reduced pro rata).