Regardless, love can’t be measured by what happens on any one specific day, whether Galentine’s or Valentine’s. It’s got little to do with heart-shaped boxes of chocolates or bunches of roses.

What happens on every day of the year is what matters – knowing we’re in someone’s thoughts and actions, that they’re loyal to us, kind and loving – especially when times are tough. Love isn’t a word commonly associated with politics. Yet it’s right there in Scotland’s National Performance Framework: that our children “grow up loved, safe and respected”. Tragically, there’s a huge gap between this ambition and the day-to-day reality of many children who grow up in Scotland’s care system. This is true for most countries, and like them, Scotland has a long history of commissioning “care reviews”.

In her speech closing the 2016 SNP conference, the First Minister acknowledged Scotland’s care system didn’t support its children and young people to grow up and fulfil their dreams, didn’t give a sense of family, of belonging, of love.

Fiona Duncan is Chair of The Promise, the body responsible for ensuring the findings of the Independent Care Review are implemented, and CEO of Corra

She announced yet another review – but this time with a difference – it would be “driven by those who have experience of care”... “not something that any other country has ever done before”.

The emotion could be heard in her voice. Possibly because the First Minister wasn’t simply making another speech to delegates, she was speaking directly to members of the care community in the audience listening. People whom she’d met to hear the stories of their lives. Press cameras capture them, tears in their eyes, waving pink hearts. This time had to be different.

Three years ago, on 5 February 2020, the First Minister commended the conclusions of the Independent Care Review to parliament. The main report, “the promise”, sets out a vision drawn directly from the stories heard. Over half of the 5,500 were told by those who had experienced Scotland’s care system first-hand. The Review secured cross-party support.

Imagined by the care community, “the promise” must be made to all Scotland’s children and families. When kept, it would ensure they do grow up “loved, safe and respected”.

Over the Review’s three years, the First Minister continued to listen, making time for more than 1,000 care experienced children, young people and adults. She told parliament she would “carry these conversations in my heart for the rest of my life”.

This year, two days before Care Day, the annual celebration of care experience, and two days after Galentine’s Day, the First Minister, a long-standing, loyal friend of the care community, broke and warmed many hearts with some carefully chosen words during her resignation.

This decision came, she said, from “a place of duty and of love”, and she would continue to champion “’the promise, the national mission so close to my heart”. Hearts broken by the loss of Nicola Sturgeon as Scotland’s First Minister, while warmed by her affirmation the care community is “in my heart”, her dedication “lifelong”.

Today people are left wondering how “the promise” made by all parties will be kept? What needs to be different is simple – we all need to be true friends to the care community, in all our actions.

The promise will only be kept when it’s felt by every child, every day.

Fiona Duncan is Chair of The Promise, the body responsible for ensuring the findings of the Independent Care Review are implemented

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Love can’t be measured by what happens on a single day - Fiona Duncan

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