This is the 2018 Stability Index, an annual measure of the stability of the lives of children in care. The Index was launched by the Children’s Commissioner in 2017 to report on the stability that these children experience. It aims to shed a light on the issue of stability, provide data that allows stability to be monitored over time, and ultimately drive improvements in stability for children in care.
The 2018 analysis involves a number of developments over last year’s. We can now report longer-term measures of instability, as well as richer findings based on better analysis of these measures. We have also dramatically improved our data on social worker stability, which now covers a majority of local authorities.
This report provides the national overview of the 2018 analysis and findings. An accompanying technical report provides the full details behind this work.