The ‘early plans’ of the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care’s identified ‘love’ as ‘perhaps the most important foundation’ of a good childhood (IRCSC, March 2021).

An explicit recognition of the importance of love in residential children’s care isn’t new. The opening principle of the statutory guidance to the 2015 Regulations affirms that ‘Children in residential child care should be loved, happy, healthy, safe from harm and able to develop, thrive and fulfil their potential’ (DfE, 2015, p. 6). And the goal of the Scottish Independent Care Review was to ‘put love at the heart of the care system’.

However, there are many understandable barriers to allowing and enabling our workforce to form mutually loving relationships with the children they care for.

This workshop is designed to support sector leaders to explore the benefits of, the barriers and the means to, create environments in their homes where love between staff and children can safely flourish. We want to support you to feel confident in giving your staff permission to love and be loved by the children they care for.

We will explore:

• What are our fears around this and how can we pay appropriate attention to them?

• Do we understand what the transformative power of love could achieve for children in care?

• How can we create a culture where love can flourish?

• How can we support our (abused) children to feel safely loved in care?

• What do we need to do to support staff’s capacity to love?

• How would we design systems and processes that are value based and emotionally informed?

• How the Children’s Homes Regulations, Quality Standards and the SCCIF can be used to support and evidence Lovein Care

Cost: £50 + VAT