<p>Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople</p>

Part of 3. 2. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Communities and Children – in the Senedd at 2:29 pm on 24 May 2017.

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Photo of Carl Sargeant Carl Sargeant Labour 2:29, 24 May 2017

Indeed, and we’re working through that piece of work that the children’s commissioner did. Your colleague David Melding chairs a group on looked-after children for me. The advice coming from that team is invaluable in terms of shaping a different way that we are able to support children in the social care system. I am absolutely committed to making some changes in that space, and we’ve recently launched the St David’s award of £1 million, which will be on its way to local authorities to distribute between under 25-year olds, whom I believe should have access to some finances as they grow up. I didn’t badge this as—. We badged it as £1 million St David’s Day award, but I kind of like to think about it as ‘the bank of mum and dad’, like all of us have for our children, where they are able to go to a guardian or to kin to say, ‘Look, I want to go here tonight’—like my daughter did, or like your family did. These young people are so disadvantaged, we’ve got to support them in some way, and this is, hopefully, one step in the right direction to helping to support a normal type of life.