As part of Somerset County Council’s commitment to support care leavers, the council has agreed to extend its Care Leaver Guaranteed Interview Scheme to anybody who was in care as a child, wherever that was, and whatever their age now.
This means people who have been in the care of a Local Authority for a significant period before the age of 16 and apply for a job with Somerset County Council will be guaranteed a job interview – provided they meet the essential job criteria.
For many years the Council has offered guaranteed interviews to care leavers from Somerset for apprenticeships and more recently for its Kickstart Scheme. However, this latest move extends the scheme so that it applies to all posts within the Council and covers people who were in care outside of Somerset.
Councillor Frances Nicholson, Somerset County Council Lead Member for Children’s Services, said: “As a Council we are determined to support care leavers and I am very pleased that we have been able to extend the Guaranteed Interview Scheme in this way.”
There will be an opportunity on all Somerset County Council job applications for candidates to state if they would like to take advantage of the initiative.
The scheme is in addition to the similar initiatives Somerset County Council already has in place as part of its commitment to being a Disability Confident Employer and a signatory of the Armed Forces Covenant.
There are currently more than 500 Children Looked After in Somerset, with a large number of these children aged 12 and over. With around 200 in-house foster carers, Fostering In Somerset are always recruiting. To find out how you could help change a child’s story as a foster carer, call 0800 587 9900 or visit www.fosteringinsomerset.org.uk