Exploring care experience as a protected characteristic

Samantha Robathan, University of Birmingham graduate and recipient of the Jane Slowey Memorial Bursary for 2025/2026, shares key findings from her dissertation research.

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I was inspired to return to academic study after many years by my daughter, whom we adopted from the care system 12 years ago. As her parent, I have seen how difficult it can be for care‑experienced young people to access the support they need. That perspective motivated me to understand the wider structural issues they face, and studying Social Policy enabled me to explore these questions in more depth.

Being awarded Commonweal’s Jane Slowey Memorial Bursary gave me the financial support and mentorship I needed to complete my dissertation. It also connected me to a wider network of organisations working in this space – for which I am incredibly grateful.

Aligning with Commonweal’s focus on the challenges faced by at‑risk youth, my studies deepened my interest in the rising risk of homelessness for young people leaving care. My dissertation centred on the question: “Addressing the Care Cliff: Should care experience be recognised as a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010?”

To explore this, I examined the policies and structural factors that increase care leavers’ risk of homelessness, how institutional practices produce social harm, and whether the Equality Act 2010 could meaningfully mitigate these harms.

First, I reviewed over 2,600 academic papers, policy documents and grey literature (including blogs and working papers) published since 2017. This assessment of existing evidence gave me a clear picture of the policy landscape and insight into the lived experiences of young people. I specifically drew on sources that centred care leavers’ voices to examine the wider structural conditions shaping their experiences.

Using a social harm framework helped me explore not only what is happening, but why these harms persist and how they limit young people’s ability to flourish. Four themes appeared repeatedly across the literature: abrupt transitions at age 18, inconsistent local authority support, unrealistic expectations of independence and inadequate preparation for adulthood. Overall, these challenges are still reinforced by an “instant adult” narrative that portrays care leavers as fully independent the moment they turn 18 and leave the care system.

 Sam’s presentation slide. Click here to access the full presentation deck.

While these factors may explain how homelessness occurs, they do not explain why. Looking beyond housing shortages helped me see that a significant issue is the invisibility of care leavers in homelessness statistics in England.

Local councils record care leaver status through systems like the Government's quarterly statutory homelessness data collection, H-CLIC. However, the granular information disappears when it reaches national reporting. Instead, care‑experienced young people are aggregated into broad categories, with no specific breakdown by age or support needs, making it difficult to monitor trends and subsequently understand their outcomes or design targeted intervention.

In contrast, the data collection systems used in Wales and Scotland directly ask about care experience and, when identified, trigger a rights‑based support process. For example, Scotland's homelessness system, HC1, records care experience and sends this data to the Scottish Government. This allows outcomes for care experienced young people to be tracked and responded to at a national level. Such visibility enables targeted interventions such as the Promise in Scotland - a national initiative focused on meeting the needs of care leavers. In Wales, the prevention pathway is mapped in the WCPP Youth Homelessness and Care Leavers Report, which outlines measures to support this group to prevent homelessness.

My research concluded that recognising care experience as a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010 would improve visibility and outcomes for care leavers, but it cannot address these structural issues alone. Meaningful change requires a shift from England’s welfare‑based policymaking approach to a rights‑based framework grounded in human rights principles.

A welfare-based approach is needs-led, whereas rights-based aims for long-term systemic and structural change by ensuring legal rights to protections and entitlements and holding institutions accountable.

As a result, a rights-based approach, as adopted in Scotland and Wales, treats care‑experienced people as a distinct group entitled to protection, ensuring they have access to support under law.

The findings from my research have strengthened my commitment to keep learning and exploring these issues. As such, I will be returning to the University of Birmingham in September to study a part‑time Master’s in Social Policy. I am also looking to build experience within the charity sector to deepen my understanding of how policy translates into practice.