Policy and influencing in Wales

To change lives, we need to change laws

We campaign to raise public awareness of the issues affecting children and young people in Wales and we influence government using our own evidence-based research to make change happen.

Our campaigns and influencing are currently focused on:

• child poverty
• mental health and wellbeing
• child sexual abuse and exploitation
• whole family support 
• young people leaving care and looked-after children

Our recent influencing work in the Senedd

• We worked with the children’s sector to respond to Welsh Government’s Child Poverty Strategy.
• We responded to Welsh Government’s Draft Budget for 2024-25 including raising concerns around funding for services relied on by children and young people.
• We highlighted the importance of early intervention and prevention services, such as our Baby and Me model, as well as the need for therapeutic mental health support for all care experienced young people.  

Our key achievements in 2022-23

• Barnardo's Wales held focus groups to influence policy on mental health. 
• We gave evidence as part of scrutiny of the Health and Social Care (Wales) Bill which seeks to end profit-making in children’s social care in Wales.
• We supported children, young people and parents to attend the Senedd, meet with the First Minister and hear directly about Welsh Government’s plans to better support care-experienced young people.

Contact us 

To organise a meeting, speak to someone about our work, or to arrange a visit, contact Amy Bainton from the Wales Policy Team at [email protected].