Thanks Calum. Appreciate you taking the time to join us!

Thanks for joining us Mary - really appreciate the support!

A photo of Steve Darling holding a placard reading "Value our Love" and "Kinship"

Kinship carers are family or friends who step up to care for a child when their parents aren't able to, such as during an unexpected crisis.

I joined the #ValueOurLove campaign in Westminster yesteday which is calling for financial, practical and emotional support for kinship carers.

This week, I met with @kinshipcharity.bsky.social and Wendy Turner, a dedicated campaigner, calling for paid parental leave for vital kinship carers 💛

Today, I wrote to @katedeardenmp.bsky.social to outline why the Government’s parental leave review must close this gap in the law.

I'm sorry for making Nadhim feel unsafe but honestly my toddler doesn't sleep very well.

Thanks Steve - we really appreciated you (and the Rt Hon Jennie!) taking the time to join us, and for your support for paid kinship care leave when the Employment Rights Bill was in the Commons.

Thanks a lot for joining us on Wednesday Bambos and for writing to the Minister too. Wendy is such a skilled and dedicated campaigner - I'm really glad you had the chance to speak with her.

Thanks very much for joining us Emily.

Emily with a board that points out that there is no difference between the work of parents and adoptive parents in comparison to that of kinship carers.

Emily stood in front of the Kinship background raising awareness of the #ValueOurLove campaign.

This week in Parliament, I met with Kinship UK to discuss the contributions of kinship carers and what more that needs to be done to ensure that kinship families get the support that they deserve.

A fond fatherly farewell | The Observer What a privilege it has been to trace each wobbling step along the parental path. I’m going to miss it

After seven and a half years of weekly parenting columns for the Observer, today's will be my last.

I started writing the column a few weeks before becoming a dad, so I've never parented without it.

I'll miss it more than I express in words, but I had a go anyway.

observer.co.uk/news/columni...

Sorry, no, Motability was not about 'helping the most vulnerable' - it was about providing people who need modified vehicles modified vehicles!

The balance between acute and preventative services has shifted dramatically. E.g. children's services

Spending on services like children's centres is down 79% in real terms, while acute services (e.g. looked after children) is up 71%

That contributes to rising acute demand in the long-term

Lovely to join the Kinship carers event at Whitton Community Centre for #KinshipCareWeek. With thanks to Anna from the Kinship London group – an absolute force of nature & tremendous advocate for kinship carers.

Kinship Care Week Kinship Care Week (6-12 October 2025) is a national week of awareness, recognition, and celebration of kinship families across England and Wales.

Learn more about Kinship Care Week and how to get involved. 👇

In The Same Boat | Kinship Care Week 2025 YouTube video by Kinship

Happy #KinshipCareWeek! 🥳

There's loads going on this week across England and Wales, but I'd suggest you start by checking out this incredible new short film which celebrates the power of peer support and community for #KinshipCarers.

Handle With Care: Annual survey of kinship carers 2025 Explore key findings from our 2025 annual survey of more than 1,900 kinship carers and learn more about kinship families and the policy context in 2025.

The new #Kinship report is clear that much more needs to be done to ensure that all #KinshipFamilies get the support they need and deserve. I’ll continue to advocate for #KinshipCarers and their children in South Shields. #KinshipCareWeek

kinship.org.uk/our-work-and...

In the new post-Strategy landscape, and with the lead architect of the Independent Review of Children's Social Care now at the helm of children and families policy in government, it's time to deliver that whole-system view of support for #KinshipFamilies and family networks.

We identify real opportunities for the government to deliver better outcomes - for families and the public purse - by accelerating plans to improve support, as well as considerable risks associated with the incorrect sequencing of reform which moves too fast in some places and too slow in others.

The rest explores key findings of relevance to the current policy context for #KinshipCare in England - particularly the forthcoming Kinship Allowance Pilot and provisions included within the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (e.g. kinship local offer, duty to offer FGDM etc).

In the report, we examine year-on-year trends around measures of health, loneliness, financial security, family stability and more for #KinshipFamilies in England and Wales. It's a real mixed picture - some positive signals but elsewhere significant continued challenges.

Here's one example...

Handle With Care: Annual survey of kinship carers 2025 Explore key findings from our 2025 annual survey of more than 1,900 kinship carers and learn more about kinship families and the policy context in 2025.

Check out our @kinshipcharity.bsky.social new report - Handle With Care - published today ahead of #KinshipCareWeek, featuring key findings from our largest ever annual survey of more than 1,900 #KinshipCarers.

#KinshipCare #ValueOurLove

The painful truth about foster care The foster care system in this country is collapsing. There are roughly 80,000 children who’ve been removed from violent or neglectful parents and need homes, but there’s a catastrophic lack of people...

I feel duty-bound to share this nonsense by Mary Wakefield for
@thespectator1828.bsky.social but it does demand some sort of response

www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-...

Plato vs Grok The revenge of the nerds is upon us and it's incredibly naff.

My latest: On the AI aesthetic, techno-millenarianism, and why the new right doesn’t understand genius.

Incredible that this is all the same article. How utterly pathetic

The leaders who make things happen: lessons in governing from community business - Power to Change Community businesses drive change where it matters most—locally. From leading Power to Change to advising Number 10, Vidhya Alakeson knows more than most th ...

'Too often, government is looking for one answer to a problem that it can scale; the perfect pilot that can make a difference everywhere. It still sees change as an industrial process.' Electric blog from Vidhya Alakeson, Deputy Chief of Staff to the PM www.powertochange.org.uk/evidence-and...

The Independent Group For Change (UK) is up for grabs again, for what it's worth

Really lovely shout out from former children's minister David Johnston MP highlighting @kinshipcharity.bsky.social's #ValueOurLove campaigning tactics and the impact this had on MPs and colleagues in government.

From this week's Policy Unstuck: policyunstuck.castfromclay.co.uk.

Thanks I hate it.

Please make it stop.

I am shocked, shocked I tell you.