ers to make this happen. Children’s social care needs to consider how to unlock family networks and identify kinship carers to be a source of support, whenever children and young people need help, protection, or care. This support can enable children and young people to remain living with parents and carers, and when this is not possible, allows them to grow up with lifelong loving relationships, even if it they are not living with their birth family. Expectations for practice Responding to the voices of children, young people, and families • Every area seeks and hears the views of children, young people, families, and family networks, including kinship carers, to understand how to design services 37 that support children and young people to stay living with, and connected to, those they know and love. • Every area supports children and young people to work with practitioners to identify their family networks and to discuss the support, love and trust they feel with them. • Every area seeks and hears the views of children and young people and uses them to inform decisions on how their family network can care for them. • Every area incorporates the views of parents into plans to keep children safe through their family network. Family networks are encouraged to report how much support they receive. How senior leaders should achieve this outcome in practice • Leaders recognise that networks are integral to effective support and protection for children, young people, and families. Support is not limited to parents and carers, as services recognise that extended family can play an important role in helping to keep children and young people connected to their family network. • Leaders should publish a local policy setting out the approach towards promoting and supporting the 