Co-producing your Local Offer: care leaver local offer trainingWrite the offer with the people it is for.

Story. Paige, 20, needs help with a deposit for her first flat. She searches the council website on her phone and finds a 40-page PDF. Housing is on page 31, and it says support “may be available”. She gives up and borrows the money.

Theory. What the law and the September 2026 guidance require: the new content on accommodation, homelessness prevention and financial support and literacy, the age range up to 25, what every department provides, and publication care leavers can actually use. We link it to the corporate parenting principles in section 1 of the Children and Social Work Act 2017, including taking account of care leavers’ views, wishes and feelings.

Action. Staff and care leavers audit your current offer against a checklist built from the guidance. Each requirement is marked as met, partly met or missing, and care leavers say whether they could find it on a phone in under two minutes.

By the end of this part people can say what the guidance requires a local offer to include, and name the gaps in their own.

You leave with A checklist of what the guidance requires, set against your current offer.

Story. Rio, 19, is invited to a consultation event about the local offer. The draft has already been signed off. He gives up an afternoon’s shift to be there, and he never hears what happened to what he said.

Theory. Laura Lundy’s model of participation (2007) says young people need space to speak, support to give their voice, an audience who will listen and real influence on the decision. Roger Hart’s ladder of participation (1992) helps a group see the difference between tokenism and shared decisions. Rio got space and voice, and nothing else.

Action. Staff and care leavers plan co-production for your council using Lundy’s four elements as headings: who takes part, how they are paid and supported, how they are kept safe, who the decision makers are and how care leavers will see the result. They name the groups who rarely take part, such as young parents, care leavers in custody and former unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, and how to reach them.

By the end of this part people can explain the difference between consulting care leavers and co-producing with them, and agree a co-production plan with roles, payment and support.

You leave with A co-production plan for your council, with roles, payment and support agreed.

Story. Back to Paige’s PDF. Her personal adviser tells her she is entitled to help with the deposit. The offer says “discretionary support may be available, subject to assessment”. Paige can’t tell which one is true.

Theory. The difference between statutory entitlements, which a care leaver can insist on, and discretionary support, which depends on the council. We add John Sweller’s cognitive load theory (1988): when someone is stressed and reading on a phone, every extra word and heading makes it harder to find the one thing they need.

Action. Language that Cares. Mixed tables of staff and care leavers take one section each, covering accommodation, money, education, training and employment, health and wellbeing, and relationships. They mark each item statutory or discretionary, rewrite it in clear, everyday language with who to contact, and test it on a phone with a care leaver who hasn’t seen it.

By the end of this part people can tell statutory from discretionary support in their own offer, and rewrite a section so a care leaver can understand and act on it from a phone.

You leave with A local offer checklist and rewritten draft sections to test with more care leavers.

Story. A year later Rio is asked to another consultation. His first question is “did anything change last time?” Nobody in the room knows.

Theory. Influence is the part of Lundy’s model most often missed: care leavers need to see what changed because they spoke up, and what didn’t and why. The guidance expects the offer to be reviewed at least every two years, and the corporate parenting board and scrutiny can hold each department to what it promised.

Action. Groups set a review cycle against your corporate parenting board’s calendar, name an owner in each department, and draft the first “you said, we did” update to care leavers from the changes made during the day.

By the end of this part people can set a review cycle with care leavers built in, and write a “you said, we did” update that tells care leavers what changed and what didn’t.

You leave with A review cycle with care leavers built in, and a “you said, we did” reporting template.