Wokingham borough council has launched a new £3 million contract to support young people in care or who are maturing to adulthood.
Providing children’s and adult social care is one of the core responsibilities of local authorities in England. This duty is no different in Wokingham, where hundreds of children receive some form of care.
Additionally, the council supports ‘Care Leavers’ who are people who used to be in care and have matured into adulthood.
According to figures from April, the council supports 157 children in care and 213 care leavers, with 39 young people currently placed in supported accommodation.
These provide people with their own home or shared living space, with support workers either visiting or staying on-site to help with daily tasks like cooking, budgeting, or medication.
Supported accommodation is provided for young people aged 16-17 and care leavers aged 18-25.
Complementing this, ‘floating support’ is provided for people aged 18 and over to help them sustain accommodation, develop independent living skills, maintain engagement with education, employment or training, and reduce
the risk of homelessness or crisis.
The council is currently on the lookout for a single provider to deliver an integrated Supported Accommodation and Floating Support service for children in care, care leavers and vulnerable young people.
To that end, the council’s executive has agreed to begin a tendering process for a contract worth £3.14 million to deliver this accommodation and support.
The approach has been justified to provide better integrated services for the people who need it.
Prue Bray, deputy council leader and executive councillor for children’s services, said: “We are providing more and more local accommodation for our care leavers and young people who need accommodation.
“As a result, the rather fragmented methods of support we had in place are no longer suitable.
“So we need a unified contract that covers everything, that will be much easier to manage, it will also provide better value for money, and will be fit for purpose going forward as we increase the amount of accommodation of this type that we have.
“So it will be much more sustainable and a much better deal for the council as well.
“I don’t think there is anything not to like in this, it is a sign we are doing more for young people locally who need our help with accommodation, particularly our care leavers and vulnerable people.”
The executive, made up entirely of the ruling Liberal Democrats, unanimously agreed to begin a competitive tendering process for a Supported Accommodation and Floating Support contract during a meeting last month.
