Children's homes

Plymouth City Council no longer operate any children's homes (residential units for children). In 2005 we decided to close all our children's homes. The government's modernising agenda requires us to put the following people at the centre of our planning and services:

• children and young people who are looked after, in need or vulnerable to serious social exclusion for a variety of reasons
• families under pressure or in crisis
• foster carers struggling to meet the needs of the young people with complex emotional and behavioural challenges

We have co-ordinated our services and redeployed the experienced skilled staff from the children's homes in order to offer a more effective and responsive service. This new service is the Children's Action Support Team and its key objectives are to:

• reduce the numbers of young people becoming looked after by supporting families
• increase the stability of placements by supporting foster carers
• improve the life chances of looked after young people by offering a more flexible service
• increase the proportion of looked after young people being looked after close to their communities by reducing current reliance on in house and independent residential placements

We fulfil these key objectives through:

• practical support to families and foster carers that can be responded to quickly and flexibly
• dedicated support to young people who are marginalized by their emotional or behavioural challenges
• targeted engagement of young people out of mainstream education
• direct access to child and adolescent mental health services
• mentoring, advice on further education, benefits and employment

For the very few children whose emotional and behavioural challenges cannot be met by any of our services, we are planning to purchase packages from the independent sector that will meet children's individual needs

Please contact our advice and assessment service if you have any concerns about to a child's safety or welfare. Alternatively if you are concerned about a child who is looked after then please contact our fostering service.