1
00:00:00,800 --> 00:00:01,840
Hi, I'm Tony.
2
00:00:01,840 --> 00:00:03,960
I'm a team manager for Caerphilly Local Authority.
3
00:00:03,960 --> 00:00:06,000
I'm a manager of a children's care home.
4
00:00:06,240 --> 00:00:08,920
So obviously I left school with no GCSEs,
5
00:00:08,920 --> 00:00:10,360
no qualifications whatsoever.
6
00:00:10,360 --> 00:00:12,000
I didn't sit any GCSEs,
7
00:00:12,000 --> 00:00:14,400
I’d finished the academic year quite early.
8
00:00:14,400 --> 00:00:15,360
School wasn't for me.
9
00:00:15,360 --> 00:00:17,480
So it was a massive sort of path of learning.
10
00:00:17,480 --> 00:00:19,720
And before that I'd obviously spent
11
00:00:19,720 --> 00:00:21,360
over a decade in the building trade.
12
00:00:21,360 --> 00:00:23,240
For me it was a bit of a career change,
13
00:00:23,240 --> 00:00:26,720
I’d obviously been in the care system back in the early 90s,
14
00:00:26,720 --> 00:00:28,000
a bit of a criminal past.
15
00:00:28,000 --> 00:00:29,680
So again I felt like I had a bit of something to
16
00:00:29,680 --> 00:00:31,640
give back to help young people, to support
17
00:00:31,640 --> 00:00:33,400
them so they don't fall into the same sort
18
00:00:33,400 --> 00:00:35,640
of lifestyles as what I did
19
00:00:35,640 --> 00:00:38,640
and just to try and make them see sense as such as in,
20
00:00:38,640 --> 00:00:41,480
there's a different path in life you can follow and
21
00:00:41,480 --> 00:00:43,680
it's not always the be all and end all of you know,
22
00:00:43,680 --> 00:00:45,240
perhaps you haven’t done well at education
23
00:00:45,240 --> 00:00:46,280
or you're not doing so well.
24
00:00:46,280 --> 00:00:48,400
You haven’t really got a strong family network,
25
00:00:48,400 --> 00:00:50,680
but you can still progress and do well in life in general.
26
00:00:55,960 --> 00:00:57,760
The learning and development path is really good
27
00:00:57,760 --> 00:00:59,880
it’s obviously funded by the Welsh Government.
28
00:00:59,880 --> 00:01:00,760
Part of the Welsh Government
29
00:01:00,760 --> 00:01:03,640
for supporting the funding for qualifications
30
00:01:03,640 --> 00:01:04,720
is that you do your
31
00:01:04,720 --> 00:01:08,400
Key skills Maths and English because they see that if you want to
32
00:01:08,400 --> 00:01:10,360
pursue another career that obviously you take your
33
00:01:10,360 --> 00:01:13,080
literacy and numeracy with you anyway and it helps you in day to day life.
34
00:01:13,080 --> 00:01:15,280
So I don’t think the job is for everyone.
35
00:01:15,280 --> 00:01:17,000
I think people have different aspects of the job
36
00:01:17,000 --> 00:01:19,360
obviously I thought the job, was you know care,
37
00:01:19,360 --> 00:01:21,400
it was sort of stereotypical as a female job, perhaps an older female.
38
00:01:21,400 --> 00:01:22,800
But working in the industry
39
00:01:22,800 --> 00:01:24,320
now there’s a lot of young males that work
40
00:01:24,320 --> 00:01:26,200
and a lot of young people in general that sort of like
41
00:01:26,200 --> 00:01:28,000
bring their life experience on.
42
00:01:28,000 --> 00:01:29,200
I think you’ve got to want to be there.
43
00:01:29,200 --> 00:01:30,240
It's not just a job,
44
00:01:30,240 --> 00:01:32,160
it is a career path you need to follow.
45
00:01:32,160 --> 00:01:33,200
If you just turn up for a nine
46
00:01:33,200 --> 00:01:36,200
till five, it doesn't work, the children can see fake a mile off.
47
00:01:36,200 --> 00:01:37,520
They know the people that want to work
48
00:01:37,520 --> 00:01:39,360
with them, interact with them and support them.
49
00:01:39,360 --> 00:01:40,760
And I think you've got to bring that.
50
00:01:40,760 --> 00:01:42,560
You've got to bring a bit of positivity
51
00:01:42,560 --> 00:01:43,400
to wanting to be there.
52
00:01:43,400 --> 00:01:44,640
The idea of just turning up,
53
00:01:44,640 --> 00:01:46,240
cashing your check and going home.
54
00:01:46,240 --> 00:01:47,080
It doesn't work
55
00:01:47,080 --> 00:01:49,200
and it quickly sort of finds
56
00:01:49,200 --> 00:01:52,280
the gaps and people don't last in that sort of environment then.
57
00:01:57,880 --> 00:01:59,720
For me, one of the main important values
58
00:01:59,720 --> 00:02:01,200
for somebody that’s going to be a child's,
59
00:02:01,200 --> 00:02:03,680
support to work with children is to have that understanding.
60
00:02:03,680 --> 00:02:05,120
So even being a parent,
61
00:02:05,120 --> 00:02:08,120
our children haven’t come from sort of like secure backgrounds.
62
00:02:08,120 --> 00:02:10,000
They haven’t had that massive family
63
00:02:10,000 --> 00:02:13,000
network, they’ve seen a lot of trauma,
64
00:02:13,240 --> 00:02:16,240
whether that be in the family outside in the community.
65
00:02:16,240 --> 00:02:18,760
So it’s having that understanding of what they've seen,
66
00:02:18,760 --> 00:02:20,880
why they present different behaviours
67
00:02:20,880 --> 00:02:22,840
and what we can do to support them
68
00:02:22,840 --> 00:02:24,760
it’s having that understanding of what their needs are,
69
00:02:24,760 --> 00:02:26,440
because their needs might be very different.
70
00:02:26,440 --> 00:02:27,440
Their cognitive ages
71
00:02:27,440 --> 00:02:29,040
could be very sort of a lot
72
00:02:29,040 --> 00:02:32,120
lower than what they present sort of as people.
73
00:02:32,120 --> 00:02:34,800
And it's just knowing sort of how to interact
74
00:02:34,800 --> 00:02:35,720
with them on what level
75
00:02:35,720 --> 00:02:36,680
and what level of support
76
00:02:36,680 --> 00:02:38,360
they will need daily to meet their
77
00:02:38,360 --> 00:02:39,760
needs, their personal needs.
78
00:02:42,120 --> 00:02:43,360
The job is very rewarding.
79
00:02:43,360 --> 00:02:45,040
I think there's a lot of lows,
80
00:02:45,040 --> 00:02:47,280
there's a lot of lows, and you always reflect on stuff,
81
00:02:47,280 --> 00:02:48,200
you know, the bad times.
82
00:02:48,200 --> 00:02:50,120
But I think the good always weighs it out.
83
00:02:50,120 --> 00:02:52,080
So it’s a thing for me i’m really proud of watching young people
84
00:02:52,080 --> 00:02:55,480
achieve is their progression from living within the homes
85
00:02:55,480 --> 00:02:57,680
where it’s supported by the staff
86
00:02:57,680 --> 00:02:58,960
to moving on to independence.
87
00:02:58,960 --> 00:03:03,640
So working alongside them, creating plans and watching them
88
00:03:03,640 --> 00:03:05,200
gain the relevant life skills
89
00:03:05,200 --> 00:03:06,840
that they're going to need to sort of live
90
00:03:06,840 --> 00:03:08,160
on their own later on down the line.