The government has announced a new £8.4 million national service designed to help care leavers in England rebuild relationships with family members, former carers, teachers and old friends they have lost touch with. Modelled on the television programme Who Do You Think You Are?, the initiative will employ specially trained coordinators who will use social care records, school reports and public registries to help young people safely locate important people from their past. Officials say the aim is to reduce the isolation that often follows years of instability and to give care leavers a stronger support network as they enter adulthood.
The service builds on existing local family-finding programmes that have already shown positive results. According to government figures, young people who took part in those schemes gained an average of almost two additional meaningful relationships. The new national version is part of a broader effort to place “enduring relationships” at the heart of children’s social care reform, an approach echoed in recent legislative changes. The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 now requires local authorities to promote and facilitate contact between siblings in care, placing sibling relationships on an equal footing with contact with parents. Campaigners including Chris and Jonny Hoyle, who fought to be reunited when they were teenagers in foster care, had pushed for that change for years.
Disproportionate risks and the limits of relationships
While many care leavers make a successful transition to independent living, the system’s history of fractured connections has left a disproportionate number exposed to severe hardship. Data from the last financial year shows that 4,610 care leavers aged 18 to 20 faced homelessness in 2024–25, with 67 per cent already homeless by the time they received support. That figure has risen by 37 per cent over five years. The risks extend beyond housing. Research by the Nuffield Trust indicates that care-experienced individuals are seven times more likely to die before the age of 25. In the year to April 2026, 106 young care leavers died in England, up from 91 in the previous 12 months. The majority were aged between 16 and 21. The government has described the number of deaths as “unacceptably high” and called it “a serious problem which impacts wider society”.
Ministers have commissioned a review into the deaths, led by social worker Clare Chamberlain and care-experienced author Ashley John-Baptiste, which will examine individual cases to identify gaps in support during the transition to adulthood. A formal notification system for care leaver deaths, introduced in 2023, has focused attention on the scale of the problem. The government has acknowledged the “horrifying fact” that too many young people leaving care die young.
The mental health challenges facing this group are well documented. To improve healthcare access, care leavers in England are now entitled to free prescriptions, dental care and eye care up to the age of 25. Yet the underlying instability that fuels poor mental health remains. As of March 2025, there were more than 81,000 children in care in England. In 2024, one in ten children in care moved homes three or more times in a single year, and more than one in five were living more than 20 miles from their home community. Such frequent moves can mean repeated changes of school, disrupted friendships and a loss of contact with trusted adults.
Employment outcomes are equally stark. An interim report by Alan Milburn on young people and work found that over one million young people in the UK are not in education, employment or training (NEET). Care leavers are hit particularly hard: 40 per cent are NEET by age 20, nearly three times the national average. Milburn’s report noted that the frequent moves care leavers experience are often interpreted as unreliability by employers, and that a lack of investment in meaningful employment support leaves them “set up to fail”. A pilot scheme offering paid internships and a guaranteed interview scheme for NHS roles has been introduced to improve employment prospects, but the scale of the challenge remains enormous.
Essential as the new relationship-building service is, campaigners and experts warn that it cannot compensate for all the losses and material difficulties that accompany life in and after care. The “cliff edge” that most care leavers face at age 18 – when formal support falls away – is a continuing source of vulnerability. The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 has made “Staying Close” support, which provides ongoing help with housing, health, education, training, employment and relationship advice up to age 25, a requirement for all local authorities. But the broader obligation, as Alan Milburn’s report argued, remains for the state to take more responsibility for helping care leavers with the practical challenges of early adulthood. Reunions with old friends are of limited use to young people who lack housing, access to education or a job.
