Publications
This is a selection of my articles, blogs and publications I have contributed to. For the most part on topics connected to children's social care...
Caring for children and young people in state care in the 2020s
Chapter from The Future of Children’s Care Critical Perspectives on Children’s Services Reform , Policy Press, July, 2023
This is a blog edit of a chapter originally written for The Future of Children’s Care Critical Perspectives on Children’s Services Reform, edited by Robin Sen and Christian Kerr and published by Policy Press. It is an exploration of my views on what is needed to improve the quality of care provided to children in care. I recommend the entire book, which can be purchased here.
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The Fetishisation of Lived Experience…
Personal blog, Medium, Aug 19, 2022
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You have lived experience, don’t you? In the respect that you have experienced your own life. My guess is you would consider yourself an expert on your own life — an expert by experience...
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The Boy from the Kids Home…
Personal blog, Medium, June 28, 2021
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I was six years old when I stepped foot in a children’s home for the first time, although I have no recollection of that initial experience. It must have been confusing, but perhaps there would have been relief too...
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My leaving care story…
Personal blog, Medium, October 27, 2020
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Notwithstanding the garish colour scheme, Happy Eater was a slightly dreary chain of roadside restaurants scattered around the A roads of Southern England in the 1980s and early 90s. The kind of place I would probably...
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Before they can be independent, we need to give children in care opportunities to be interdependent
Article, Community Care, December 9, 2019
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Do you think you are self-sufficient? Do you think you have reached independence?
If you are reading this article, you definitely have not – unless you designed and built the electronic device you are reading it on...
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‘Ongoing contact between former children’s home residents and staff is fraught with potential pitfalls’
Article, Community Care, September 18, 2019
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A few months ago, a man in his late twenties stood outside one of the children’s homes I work at. The man was pacing about and seemed to be staring at the house. He was there for quite a while...
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‘Why didn’t you f*cking restrain me’: when physical restraint can meet a child’s need
Article, Community Care, June 17, 2019
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There are probably few more emotive topics in children’s care settings than the use of physical intervention, or restraint. Understandably so, because, as we have seen from various journalists’ investigations and public enquiries...​
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‘You need to work towards going back to foster care’: how the narrative around children’s homes harms young people
Article, Community Care, May 16, 2019
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Residential children’s homes are often seen as a last resort or second best to foster homes, and that has an effect on some children in care. Others have written and spoken eloquently about the use of language...
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