Leaving Care

There are a variety of reasons that make care leavers more vulnerable to becoming homeless. Despite a gradual increase in the numbers of care leavers remaining looked after until their 18th birthday, around 8,500 16 to 18 year olds leave care every year. Despite intensive initiatives by government, care leavers still have lower rates of educational attainment and participation in further education after the age of 16 than their non-looked after peers. They also have higher levels of unemployment and welfare benefits dependency once they are eligible to claim mainstream benefits at the age of 18 years.

The Homelessness Act 2002 has significantly changed the way in which homelessness in England and Wales is tackled. The Act's main features are:

A new duty on local authorities to carry out a review of homelessness in their area
A new duty on local authorities to publish a strategy to tackle and prevent homelessness
A new duty to provide settled accommodation for unintentionally homeless people in priority need
Reforms to the framework by which councils allocate housing.

Councils are now obliged to take a strategic approach to tackling homelessness in all its forms. Particular emphasis must be placed on preventing homelessness. The Homelessness Act 2002 repeals the main duty in the 1996 Homelessness Act, which required local authorities to provide temporary accommodation for priority homeless people for only two years. The 2002 Act removes this time limit and replaces it with a requirement to provide temporary accommodation until the applicant has been provided with settled accommodation. This is of particular relevance to care leavers because the Homelessness Act also extended the groups of homeless people with a priority need of accommodation to include:

16 and 17 year olds
care leavers aged between 18 and 20
those who are vulnerable as a result of having been in care, the armed forces
or prison, or as a result of fleeing violence or threat of violence.

The inclusion of care leavers on the priority needs list has meant that the numbers of care leavers who become homeless should, in theory, have lessened. However the disputes between social services and homelessness sections within housing departments still occur. This has been tackled in some local authorities through joint protocols between housing and children’s services. In addition, a new code of guidance for local authorities has been published to replace the previous one, which recommends that bed and breakfast accommodation (B&B) is not likely to be suitable for 16 & 17 year olds. However, it steers away from an outright ban on councils making use of B&Bs for this group.