How we influence

Staf is not just here to help professionals interpret and put into action national policies regarding young people leaving care in Scotland. With your help, we can play a major part in defining those policies to ensure the best possible support for those who need it.

Our unique access to the experiences and ideas of both care-experienced young people and the individuals and organisations who support them gives us the vital insights that are needed to shape the future of the sector. We’re listening to the voices that matter across the country – and we’d love yours to be one of them.

Be a part of our platform

By becoming a Staf member and joining our network of more than 70 organisations, you can help us make sure we are advocating for the care legislation the sector needs. You’ll be able to contribute in a number of ways, including:

• Managers forums and practitioners gatherings
• Focus groups and peer-to-peer networks
• Online polls and telephone enquiries

BECOME A MEMBER

Where we’ve been influencing

Staf aims to influence all the most important legislation regarding young people leaving care in Scotland. Some of the areas where your voices have enabled us to have an impact include:

Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014

This is the biggest legislative influence on service delivery in our sector in the last 10 years and drives a lot of our work. The Act defined new Corporate Parents, giving more people and organisations duties towards care leavers, and provided a new category for leaving care. We have a whole section to help you understand the key areas and identify potential responses.

- Find your way around the Act and our work around it

Most recently, Staf has been working as part of a consortium of organisations discussing the implementation of Continuing Care (Part 11 of the Act). After our Supported Lodgings and Supported Carers focus group meeting in March highlighted similar concerns, including a very confused landscape of language and terminology, we produced a report to sum up problems – and potential solutions.

- Follow the progress and read our report on Continuing Care

Staying Put Scotland: Providing care leavers with connectedness and belonging

Young people leaving care continue to have poor outcomes despite the efforts and investment by services. Research clearly shows us that the transition period towards interdependence is when young people are most vulnerable. This is the time when responsible Corporate Parenting can make a difference to a care leavers life.

Believing firmly that end-of-care planning decisions should be based on meeting the needs of the individual rather than age or legal status, Staf was directly involved in the development of this guidance. The guide aims to help local authorities and Corporate Parents develop and implement strategies to enable care leavers to remain in secure, stable care placements until they are ready to move on.

- Discover what the Staying Put guidance means for you

Look under the Research and Resources menu to find more areas in which you're helping us influence policy -- and add your voice at one of our events