Our Impact Goals

We will continue to work to ensure that families involved with the child welfare system and family justice system are treated fairly, have their rights respected and can make informed decisions. We want families to be able to access the support they need as early as possible to prevent difficulties escalating.

Over the next two years:

• 10,000 calls a year to be answered;
• 1 in 2 callers report our advice has made a positive difference to the child remaining or returning to their family, and/or to the local authority plan for the child and services provided;
• Over 750,000 unique visitors per year accessing information and advice from the website or discussion forums.

We want to increase advocacy provision to support those families in most need, including advocating for them with children’s services.

We will provide innovative solutions, using appropriate technology, enabling more families, particularly those from minoritised and disadvantaged groups to get the advice they need.

Over the next ten years we will:

• Develop legal projects to help demonstrate the need for, and the impact of, early legal advice.
• Analyse the legal aid regime, and publish our proposals for reforms to improve access to legal advice and justice for families.
• Provide learning opportunities for the public, as well as legal practitioners, about the evolving legal landscape.

In a family group conference (FGC), family and friends are supported to come together to make a plan to safely address concerns about a child. Underpinned by a clear set of principles and standards, there is substantial evidence that family group conferences can safely avert children entering or remaining in the care system.

As the foremost experts on family-led decision making, our aim is that by 2034:

• all local authorities have an accredited family group conference service;
• Family group conferences are offered to all families when they come into contact with the child welfare system.

We will continue to be the leading authority on family group conferences in
England and host of the national FGC Network.

We will promote consistently
high standards, be the principal source of legal expertise, and pioneer research
and practice developments.

Family Rights Group will continue to be recognised as the national policy and
legal authority on kinship care and provide the Secretariat to the All Party
Parliamentary Group on Kinship Care.

Over the next ten years we want to ensure that:

• A clear definition of kinship care is enshrined in law, recognises all forms of kinship care arrangement and provides a foundation for an
  effective support system.
• At a local level there is a transformation in what support is available to kinship families, with the law requiring local authorities to develop with kinship families a local kinship offer.
• Employment rights, including paid leave are awarded to all kinship carers. There is a fair and
  accessible financial support framework for all
  kinship carers.
• That the Government recognises and addresses the cliff edge affecting young people raised in kinship care as they turn 18 years old, particularly disabled young people and those with special educational needs.
• There is a dedicated fund, that helps guarantee that children and young people raised in kinship care have access to counselling and therapeutic support that is tailored to their needs.
• Gaps in research evidence are addressed including into the experience of children from black minority ethnic communities who are being raised by kinship
  carers.

Lifelong Links is a pioneering and highly successful approach developed by
Family Rights Group. It helps build lasting support networks for children in care and creates a culture in which the care system values children’s relationships from the outset.

Over the next five years, we want every local authority in the UK to offer an accredited Lifelong Links service to children in care and care leavers.

We will lead future innovations in Lifelong Links which are tailored to the needs of care-experienced children and young people involved in the criminal justice system, adopted children and children in kinship care.

We are committed to ensuring that young people and families with experience of the child welfare system make up at least half of our trustee board and continue to determine the charity’s priorities, activities and campaigns. We will:

• Continue to support our vibrant parents’ and kinship carers’ panels, and promote their impact, diversity and prominence.
• Co-develop engagement platforms for young parents and those who have grown up in kinship care or in the care system.
• Ensure that young people and families’ voices and insights are integral to our work.

Our ambitions over the next ten years are that:

• All local children’s services, central government and other child welfare and family justice agencies have mechanisms by which young people, parents and kinship carers influence policies, practice, research and evaluation and the
  commissioning of services.
• Young people and families with experience of the child welfare system are directly involved in the co-production and co-delivery of education, training and
  professional development for legal and social care practitioners.