An announcement from our Chief Executive

An announcement from our Chief Executive, Baroness Cathy Ashley

Leading Family Rights Group for the past 22 years has been an extraordinary privilege. I have been very fortunate to work alongside an exceptional team of staff and trustees. I have learnt so much from families and young people involved with the charity and am consistently in awe as they draw on their own, often very painful, experiences to inform the need for reforms to the child welfare and family justice system for the benefit of others.

I am still reeling from the honour of being appointed to the House of Lords. However, given the workload involved in my current role and the time and energy I will need to devote to being a working peer, I have decided that I need to stand down as Chief Executive of Family Rights Group.

The charity is therefore starting recruitment of a new Chief Executive, and given these things take time, I have agreed to stay on until Spring 2027.

Family Rights Group has had a disproportionately large impact on the child welfare and family justice system, including securing significant changes in legislation, policy and practice.

There is a great deal that the charity can be proud of.

We have championed family-led approaches, including family group conferences, designed so those who know and love a child are central to plans made about them.

Mothers and fathers who sit on our parents’ panel have led the way in demonstrating why those with experience of the child welfare system should be central to shaping it.

We instigated the creation of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Kinship Care and have secured major reforms, including extensions in legal aid to special guardians, a requirement on local authorities to produce a kinship care offer and changes in benefit regulations.

Most recently, we secured a change in the law to strengthen the rights of children in care to have contact with their brothers and sisters.

Our expert advice team supports thousands of parents and wider family and friends through some of the most difficult moments of their lives, helping them navigate the complexities of the child welfare system. Across all our work, we are helping more children grow up safely within care of their family and community.

I sat on the Care Inquiry in 2013, which concluded that the care system too often breaks relationships for children, separating them from people who care about them, with often devastating effects. I am indebted to all – the young people, local authorities, funders, academics and colleagues and politicians – who took a leap of faith and worked with us to develop Lifelong Links – our innovative approach designed so that children in care and care leavers have lasting, loving relationships.

I’m delighted that we are getting ever closer to our ambition that every child and young person in the care system is offered Lifelong Links.

I am deeply grateful to everyone at Family Rights Group and to the many people beyond the charity who have supported our work. Of course, there’s still so much more to do. I will continue to work with an exceptional team at Family Rights Group over the next few months to deliver for children and families.

And as a working peer, I remain determined to work to address significant injustices within our child welfare system, and will continue to champion the values that make this charity stand out.

Cathy

More information about the recruitment process for Family Rights Group’s Chief Executive can be found here. Closing date: Sunday 15th November 2026.