Member

We are aware that we need to do more work on this and, as a result, MHCLG’s dedicated team of youth homelessness advisers engage regularly with local authorities to help support them in delivering their statutory duties. The application of priority need for care leavers has, surprisingly, not been raised by local authorities—including by their children’s services and leaving care teams—as an area of local concern. This might change, perhaps, as more awareness is put out there, but we need to make it clear that the issue of vulnerability is there at the ages of 21 to 24. As the noble Lord suggests, making the definition of vulnerability clearer is a fundamental way of assisting those young people when they pass the age of 21.