ARU Final Report

Full Report – March 2021 9 so people who already struggled found it very difficult and felt the impact of the isolation ten times more. I feel like if I’d have still had even just a 10 minute walk or face to face catchup with my social worker or someone important I rely on it would have made the world of difference.” (Q: Female, 18) 1.3.4 Support from services During the pandemic, 73.1% of care leavers received some form of support from Leaving Care Services. In particular, 51.1% said their personal advisor/social worker supported them with both practical and emotional struggles: “My PA gave me weekly check-ins by email which were really nice.” (Q: Male, 21) “Personal advisor and children’s social worker have supported me and helped me so much especially with my mental health.” (Q: Female, 24) However, the support from Leaving Care Services got slightly worse for some care leavers during the pandemic, as 64.2% thought it was very good before which dropped to 58.7% during the pandemic . In particular, some care leavers did not receive support despite reaching out for it, often due to issues with their personal advisor/social worker being unavailable due to illness or leave: “Absolute nightmare… I was moving house and I needed help setting up my exemption for council tax. I was trying to get in touch for twoweeks and couldn’t get in touch with anyone… The woman on the phone said the PA had left the job and I hadn’t been informed, and the new PA hadn’t introduced herself… She did call yesterday to ask how I was but up until that point I’d had nothing. There was no one even on the end of the phone not even in the general office...” (FG: Female, 20) Just having someone to talk to was very important and having someone proactively checking-in to see if they were okay was hugely appreciated by care leavers: “Ensuring that YP are being checked up on, all it needs to be is a text. It makes the world of difference to CLs to know that the LA actually care about them.” (Q: Female, 23) Involvement and participation teams, as well as charities working with care leavers, also had an important role to play in providing support, for example by organising online meetups and generally staying in touch: “Involvement Team have been amazing always putting in effort to make sure all their young people where okay I think they are amazing I had a mental breakdown during this and they was checking I was okay and get the right help…” (Q: Female, 25) Inaddition toservices, 73.3%ofcareleaversreceived support from family and 70% from friends , while a few also talked about how their foster carers had gone above and beyond to support them during the pandemic: “My husband and friends are my lifeline.” (Q: Pangender, 21) “My family have been a big support as my support bubble.” (Q: Female, 18)