On Friday 3 October, five members of the Wildfire team (Debby, Sarah-Anne, Kate, Claire and Danny) will be sleeping rough in London (with quite a few other people in the PR/Media IT industry) in order to raise money for the NCH and help get homeless children off the streets as part of Byte Night.

We’ll be in the fortunate position of only having to do it for one night with plenty of warm clothes, hot drinks and brollies, but plenty of children sleep rough every night without such luxuries so we’d be really grateful for any support you can give.

Donating is easy – just go to http://www.justgiving.com/wildfirepr

Thanks!

Here are some shocking stats about children in care in case you need any further persuasion:

• 60,300 children were in care at 31st March 2006. These youngsters will have dramatically different life chances than other children and young people, as highlighted through the following statistics:
• Children in care are three times more likely to be cautioned or convicted of an offence.
  (Working with children, NCH, 2006 / 2007)
• Children in care are four times more likely to have a mental health disorder.
  (Handle with Care – an investigation into the care system, Centre for Young Policy Studies)
• One in five homeless people are care leavers.
  (Working with Children, NCH, 2006 / 2007)
• Over 30 per cent of care leavers are not in education, training or employment at age 19 compared to 13 per cent of all young people.
  (Dfes Care Matters green paper, October 2006)
• Only seven per cent of young people left care with at least five GCSEs in 2005 to 2006
  (Dfes stats: http://www.dfes.gov.uk/rsgateway/DB/SFR/s000691/SFR44-2006.pdf)
• Those leaving care at 17 or 18 were 50% more likely to be unemployed or out of school than those leaving care at 20 or 21.
  (Dfes Care Matters green paper, October 2006)
• More than a third of new cases of homelessness last year were young people aged under 25. Just under a quarter of people who became homeless over that period were forced to leave their last home because parents were no longer willing to accommodate them.
  https://www.odpm.gov.uk/index.asp?id=1002882&PressNoticeID=2364
• There is a huge percentage of the UK’s youth who are vulnerable to homelessness, unemployment, loneliness and sexual exploitation. Their situation is often the result of leaving residential or foster care or leaving home early because of violence, abuse or family conflict.