The Scottish Care Leavers Covenant supports Scotland’s corporate parents, carers, practitioners, managers and decision makers in fulfilling their duties to improve the life chances of all of Scotland’s care leavers. Care leavers often struggle on their journey into adulthood. For many the leap from care to independence is just too great, and too many continue to experience problems that lead to much poorer outcomes than the general population.
These outcomes are not inevitable and should not be accepted as the norm.
The Covenant builds on the principles of Getting It Right for Every Child (GIRFEC)1 by taking a holistic, young person-centred approach. It focuses on the long-term wellbeing needs of care leavers; highlighting the need for early intervention and help that is appropriate, proportionate and timely. It also needs high standards of cooperation, joint working and communication between agencies locally and across Scotland. Aligning the Covenant with GIRFEC will make sure that the ‘one child – one plan – one care journey’ principle continues beyond the young person’s care setting.
