Local authorities are increasingly beginning to use the Looking After Children (LAC) system to, ostensibly, improve ‘outcomes’ for children and young people in public care. This article explores aspects of the system which, it is argued, merit further analytical scrutiny. The discussion focuses, therefore, on the scheme's relationship to fears about ‘troublesome’ children and examines the centrepiece of the LAC enterprise, Action and Assessment Records (AARs). It is suggested that the AAR booklets are potentially oppressive and contain powerful sub-texts about, for example, ‘appropriate’ youth lifestyles and the nature of ‘work’. Concerns are also expressed about how the AARs, when viewed alongside developments relating to youth justice, could be used as aids to facilitate the surveillance, screening and profiling of this group of young people.
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