The Verbatim Formula: Sometimes a Hug Goes a Long Way

The Verbatim Formula (TVF) is an AHRC-funded participatory action research project based at Queen Mary University of London that brings together a range of partners from the children's care public sector, higher education and the arts to support young people entering and leaving the care of the state. Responding to the adoption into UK law of the 1989 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1992, that 'corporate parents' are legally obliged to give due regard to children's wishes and feelings in matters affecting them, the project aimed to explore the extent to which creative practice can support better listening by adult professionals.

Using verbatim theatre, a form which requires care-ful listening and performance of recorded testimonies, TVF works with care-experienced young people as co-researchers, whose knowledge of care and education qualifies them as 'experts'. The project's 'Portable Testimony Service' gathers testimonies for 'pop-up' events in arts centres, social services' and universities' offices, and in policy fora. TVF invites meaningful, face-to-face dialogue between young people and adults, aiming to create attentive and spontaneous dialogue in the increasingly transactional life of education and care. As participatory action research it aims to empower and support its participants, building platforms from which to define gaps in provision, expose structural inequalities, and advocate for change.

Since the project began in 2015, various indicators show that the care system is under ever greater pressure due to a long period of austerity. Increased numbers are entering care, and there are insufficient foster carers who can provide the support that is needed for vulnerable young people. In 2017-8, more than 6000 young people experienced unplanned endings to their placements in foster care. Such instability exacerbates looked-after children's well-documented vulnerability to mental health problems and jeopardises the continuity needed for their educational and life success. In spite of the statutory requirement to hear children's voices, an over emphasis on procedures and paperwork blocks effective communication and hinders the trusting relationships with both foster carers and social workers that children need to project a positive future.

In the course of TVF's AHRC research period its young co-researchers repeatedly testified to the detrimental effects of transactional relationships with social workers, and the need for more loving foster care. As one 15-year-old told TVF, 'Young people who go into care have been through a lot. Sometimes a hug goes a long way'. Since the outbreak of Covid-19, questions of isolation and the importance of social contact have become even more evident. This follow-on project will deepen engagement with young people in applying TVF's practices to enable foster carers and social workers to understand the affective aspects of their practices within their professional roles and to consider the consequences of these for relationships. In a new partnership with socially engaged arts circus company Upswing, and sound artist Ian Dickinson, the TVF research team will work with young people, social workers and foster carers from Wandsworth and Manchester in creative workshops that integrate accessible physical trust activities with caring and careful practices of listening.

A range of outputs will support the work of third sector partners Coram Voice, in listening to young people's voices in the development of good practice, and the Fostering Network in recruiting foster carers. These include a performance at Battersea Arts Centre and in the Manchester International Festival with audience interaction that will generate press coverage; a series of films based on young people's real life experiences that combat the stigmatisation of social care; digital training materials centring young people's advice; and an interactive workshop ready to be offered to UK Local Authorities.