Dawn Primarolo (Minister of State, Department for Children, Schools and Families; Bristol South, Labour)

A "former relevant child" is a young person aged 18+ (i.e. legally adult) who was either a looked after child before reaching legal adulthood or a child who had left care after the age of 16 but before the age of 18, who would be entitled to continuing leaving care support from their responsible local authority.

Information on the number of former relevant care leavers for England only can be found in the statistical first release titled "Children looked after in England (including adoption and care leavers) year ending 31 March 2008":

http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/rsgateway/DB/SFR/s000810/index.shtml

Table LAG1 shows the number of looked after children now aged 19 years old and who were looked after on 1 April 2005 then aged 17 years old (in their 17^(th) year) by local authority. This table can be found in the excel link titled (3^(rd) set of additional tables).

Statistics on Children Looked After in Wales are produced annually by the Local Government Data Unit and the Welsh Assembly Government. Data for the period up to the end of March 2009 were released on 26 August 2009 and can be found at the following link:

http://wales.gov.uk/topics/statistics/headlines/health2009/hdw200908262/?lang=en

Table 7 shows a time series for the number of care leavers on their 19^(th) birthday.

The following link is to the Statistical First Release "Children looked after in England (including adoption and care leavers) year ending 31 March 2009":

http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/rsgateway/DB/SFR/s000878/index.shtml

Table LAG1 for the year ending 31 March 2009 will be available by the end of this year.