Toni-Marie Smith is the Programme Operational Co-ordinator worker for Young Carers in Focus (YCiF) at The Children’s Society Include Programme.

She works to increase national awareness and support for young carers and their families and promote whole family working.

During her time with The Children’s Society she has also worked to build professional partnerships that will lead to early interventions for families to prevent a child taking on an inappropriate caring role; supported the running of the National Young Carers Festival and, through consultation with them and other young carers, helped to ensure young carers’ voices remain central to delivery.

Toni-Marie currently works on the Young Carers in Focus Programme, working with partners to provide Young Carers Champions with resilience, skills and knowledge to support them to raise awareness and advocate for change on a National and Local level. She is also working with the Champions to run a safe social network for all young carers and to roll out and monitor the Young Carers in Schools Programme.

Prior to this Toni-Marie gained a BSc (Hons) Psychology with Criminology from the University of Portsmouth.