 Care Review chair Josh MacAlister has set out an argument for one per cent of all teachers to foster a child at their school. In his recommendations to the government, MacAlister called for the recruitment of 9,000 new foster carers in England over three years. “Family group decision making processes should identify adults known to the child (e.g. teachers, community workers or the parents of a child’s friend) who might be willing to foster,” the review's final report states. Following its publication, MacAlister shared a poll by Teacher Tapp on Twitter which shows that almost half of teachers asked said they would temporarily foster a child from their class.  However, of those who said they would, 30 per cent said their decision would “depend on the child”.
Some 50 per cent of those polled said they would not foster a child from their class. MacAlister said in a series of tweets accompanying the poll results: “Young people with care experience told me time and again that they wished their teachers would have been asked to care for them. “Having a teacher or another adult who already knows a child becoming a foster carer might not be possible or right for every child (or the teacher). But going into care can be enormously isolating, can disrupt school life and can fracture relationships. “If only one per cent of teachers stepped forward to foster a specific child, there would be 4,610 new homes available for children. Surely this is worth a try,” he said. Teachers, care leavers and sector leaders have shared mixed opinions on the idea on Twitter. Some called for more clarity around the idea of “temporary” arrangements. Richard Barker, emeritus professor of child welfare at Northumbria University, described the poll as “worthless”, writing: “Not least because it doesn’t define temporary – a weekend, a fortnight, a year?” Lisa Cherry, schools, services and systems consultant, added that MacAlister's call was a “disappointing discourse, for many reasons”. “Teachers are working 60-hour weeks and children and young people who are 'looked after' need connection on speed. “Fostering and teaching perform entirely different functions that cross over as the most important domains in a child's life. This is a lame recruitment strategy,” she said. One person, who has experience of foster care, added: “Teachers were often the only stable and consistent relationships I had. “I wouldn’t have wanted to jeopardise that by it becoming a formal arrangement, and at the risk of the placement breaking down and then being moved on from the one person that I trusted.” However, one adoptive parent, who works in an alternative provision, said: “I love this. If my boys or their siblings had been able to have been looked after by someone who knew them when they were taken into care, even if it was just for a little while then the huge trauma of being separated from everything they know would have been a little bit easier.” Source: www.cypnow.co.uk  Foster Care Fortnight™ is The Fostering Network's annual campaign to raise the profile of fostering and show how foster care transforms lives. Foster Care Fortnight 2022 takes place from 9-22 May.
Foster Care Fortnight™ is the UK’s biggest foster care awareness raising campaign, delivered by leading fostering charity, The Fostering Network. Established in 1997, the campaign showcases the commitment, passion and dedication of foster carers. It also supports fostering services to highlight the need for more foster carers. Thousands of new foster families are needed every year to care for children, with the greatest need being for foster carers for older children, sibling groups, disabled children and unaccompanied asylum seeking children. Running from Monday 9 May until Sunday 22 May, our theme this year is ‘fostering communities’ and we will use the campaign to shine a light on the many ways people across the fostering community support each other. Throughout the fortnight, The Fostering Network will be running events, sharing content on our social media channels and making as much noise as possible about the transformative power of foster care, and we want you to get involved too. Whether you’re a foster carer, a social worker, young person or supporter of foster care you are part of a community making a real difference to the lives of young people, and we want to celebrate the impact you all have. How to get involved Join the conversation Use #FCF22 and #FosteringCommunities on social media to join in with the campaign, sharing your stories and experiences of how the fostering community has supported you, or what fostering means to you and your community. Resources are available here to help you get the word out. Fundraise and donate The Fostering Network works hard to influence change, promote fostering and provide support, and every donation we receive helps us to continue this work. Join in with Foster Walk, or make a donation to support our work. Join an event The Fostering Network is hosting a number of events for our members throughout the fortnight, which you can find out about and register for via our website – we hope to see as many of you as possible! If you have any queries about Foster Care Fortnight please contact FosterCare.Fortnight@fostering.net Source: www.thefosteringnetwork.org.uk  Regulator says rise in placements is not enough to meet growing and increasingly complex demand England’s care system needs an “urgent boost to the number of foster carers” to avoid reaching “breaking point”. That was the warning from Ofsted as it released its annual fostering statistics last week, which showed there were 88,180 approved fostering places, 55,990 of which were filled, and 45,370 approved fostering households, as of 31 March 2021. But despite the latter being a record figure, Ofsted said the statistics painted a “bleak picture”, with “too few carers with the right skills” to support the number of children needing a placement. Over the past five years, the number of approved places and approved households have only increased by 2% while the number of children in placements rose by 9%. Increases driven by family and friends carers And this increase has been driven by a rise in family and friends carers, who are usually approved to care for specific children and the vast majority of whom do not offer other placements. Over the past five years, the number of approved households whose primary placement offer was for family and friends care rose from 5,855 to 8,045. Discounting these, the number of approved fostering households decreased by 3% to 37,325, with no change in the number of placements primarily for permanent care and a fall in those for non-permanent care. And of 8,880 households newly approved in 2020-21 and still active at the end of the financial year, 3,525 (40%) were family and friends carers. These figures correlate with the government’s children looked after statistics for March 2020, which showed that the proportion of children in foster care not with a relative or friend had decreased to 57% from 60% in 2018. Lucy Peake, chief executive of charity Kinship, said the figures showed that it was becoming “increasingly urgent” that the government recognises and values kinship care.  ‘Bleak picture’
Ofsted’s figures also showed the effective capacity of the system had fallen over the past five years, with the number of vacant places plummeting from 21,160 to 14,005. This was mainly due to the rise in filled places over this time, but it was also caused by the 3,525 rise in “not available” places, which reached 17,390 in 2021. Yvette Stanley, Ofsted’s national director for social care, said the figures painted a “bleak picture”. “[Year] on year we see more children coming into foster care, and too few carers with the right skills to give them the support they deserve. How long can this go on before the care system reaches breaking point? “We rarely see children coming into care who don’t need to be, but with the right help earlier, some may be able to remain with their families. We also need to urgently boost the number of foster carers, making sure they, and the children they care for, get the right support.” Fewer enquiries leading to applications Ofsted also highlighted the fact that the proportion of enquiries from prospective fostering households that led to applications has decreased in recent years. While the number of enquiries from prospective fostering households increased by 57% to 160,635from 2015-16 to 2020-21, .the number of applications only rose by 18% to 10,145. This means the proportion of applications from enquiries decreased from 8% in 2015-16 to 6% in 2020-21. A lower proportion of initial enquiries to independent fostering agencies (IFAs) converted to applications (4%) compared to local authorities (15%). The proportion of fostering applications processed in the year that were approved also decreased, from 44% in 2015-16 to 32% in 2020-21. Sixty five per cent of foster carers approved in the year to March 2021 were over 50 while 26% were over 65, both similar rates to the year before. Directors call for ban on profit-making agencies The Association of Director of Children’s Services (ADCS) said the figures showed government needed to invest in recruiting more foster carers. “A wider pool of foster carers, who can meet the diverse needs of children and young people coming into care, will lead to greater placement choice, and as a result greater placement stability,” said Edwina Grant, chair of ADCS’ health, care and additional needs policy committee. “However, without the support from national government this is becoming increasingly difficult as the number of children coming into care continues to rise.” Grant also called for an end to “significant profits being made by a small number of organisations from fostering” and urged the care review to address this. “Such practices cannot be justified, and we reiterate our call on government to introduce legislation, similar to that in Scotland, which prevents for-profit operations in this area,” she said. Call on government to fund recruitment drive Andy Elvin, chief executive of fostering charity TACT, also agreed that more foster carers were needed and called on central government to intervene by funding a national carer recruitment campaign. Elvin alluded to his idea – proposed for consideration by the care review – of a “national care family”, where responsibility for recruitment of foster carers would be taken out of councils’ hands. “152 local authorities working separately are never going to join up effectively to do this. We need to move towards larger regional and/or national structures to operate the care system and take responsibility for adopter and foster carer recruitment,” he said. The network said the increases in carers reported by Ofsted fell short of what was needed to meet demand. ‘Children should be listened to’ It previously estimated that 7,300 more foster families were needed in England when considering the specific need for households willing to care for teenagers, sibling groups, disabled children, and unaccompanied asylum-seeking children. Katharine Sacks-Jones, Become’s chief executive, said the recruitment of carers had to be specific to children’s needs. “Children need foster carers who can welcome sibling groups to prevent young people’s trauma being deepened through further separation,” she said. “They need foster carers in their local area to enable them to retain the relationships and links to the communities which matter to them. “Children and young people in care should always feel their thoughts are listened to and acted on where possible during the process of matching them with suitable foster carers”. More recruitment ‘could be costly’ However, Harvey Gallagher, chief executive of the Nationwide Association of Fostering Providers (NAFP), said simply recruiting more foster carers could be costly and inefficient “If it were possible to recruit many more foster carers to offer more choice for children, we would have to be willing as a society to fund vacancies,” he said. “Foster care, as well as being a vocation, is also income for foster carers to be able to pay their bills, and they only receive fees when a child is living with them.” Gallagher called for better support for children in placements and also said tackling poverty and poor mental health in families could ease demand on the care system. ‘Not everyone can be a foster carer’ He defended IFAs’ lower rate of applications resulting from enquiries about being a foster carer. “Not everyone is suited to being a foster carer, so IFAs undertake a stringent process when speaking with anyone enquiring about being a foster carer,” he said. A spokesperson for the DfE said: “Local authorities are responsible for all children in care in their area, including those in foster care. “We have made significant additional funding available in response to changing pressures on children’s services and we are investing in different approaches to help councils provide foster care places, including through digital tools that make it easier to match children with foster carers, and by trialling different ways to plan placements.”
Source: https://www.communitycare.co.uk  A continued lack of capacity in the foster care sector is leading to vulnerable children missing out on the care and support they need, Ofsted says.
Despite numbers of fostering households and foster carers in England being at their highest levels ever, these increases are not keeping up with demand in the sector, according to Ofsted’s annual fostering statistics. The number of foster carers in England has only increased by 4% since 2014, while the number of children in foster care has increased some 11%. And while the number of fostering households and carers has gone up, Ofsted research suggests that the range of carers available aren’t always able to meet children’s increasingly complex needs. As the number of children in care continues to grow, matching them with the right carers becomes increasingly difficult. This makes it more likely that very vulnerable children will face placement breakdowns and further disruption to their lives. Meanwhile, the number of family and friends fostering households is at its highest level yet. These carers are a vital part of the system – but their impact on overall capacity is limited by the nature of their role. Although record levels of enquiries were received from prospective fostering households last year, statistics show these aren’t translating into applications. Of 160,000 initial enquiries from prospective fostering households, only around 10,000 resulted in applications – a decrease on previous years. Yvette Stanley, Ofsted’s National Director for Social Care, said: "Today’s statistics paint a bleak picture. Foster carers make such a difference to children’s lives. But year on year we see more children coming into foster care, and too few carers with the right skills to give them the support they deserve. How long can this go on before the care system reaches breaking point? We rarely see children coming into care who don’t need to be, but with the right help earlier, some may be able to remain with their families. We also need to urgently boost the number of foster carers, making sure they, and the children they care for, get the right support." Source: www.gov.uk Fostering News: Lemn Sissay urges chidren in care to ‘reach for the stars' as he is made OBE11/6/2021
 Lemn Sissay urged people who have grown up in the care system to “reach for the stars” as he was made an OBE. The poet and playwright was honoured for services to literature and charity in the Queen’s Birthday Honours. Sissay detailed his experiences in the British care system in his autobiography of his early life, My Name Is Why, and shared the abuse he suffered over 18 years as a child in the one-off show The Report at the Royal Court. The writer, who was the official poet of the 2012 London Olympics and in 2019 won the PEN Pinter Prize, told the PA news agency: “I’m chuffed to bits. If I could say to my 17-year-old self or my 25-year-old self, in 2021 you will receive an OBE, I just would not believe it. “I do the work that I do as best as I can. I wish I was a better writer. I wish I could do more in particular areas and then it’s like somebody tapping you on the shoulder and saying, ‘just keep going, just keep doing what you’re doing’. “Because you can’t be an activist if all you’re bothered about is who’s looking at you, if you’re bothered about the impression you’re giving, you’ve got to get on. “For anybody who thinks that that for all kinds of reasons, I shouldn’t accept this honour, just walk a mile in my shoes, be the child that I was, go through the journey that I’ve been through in my life. And then you tell that child who’s become a man that they shouldn’t accept an honour, which honours who they are, where they are. “Success to me is being able to look in the mirror in the morning and know that I’m OK. Success to me is being able to treat the people that are close to me kindly, and for them to treat me kindly. “Those are the parameters of success and they have been all my life, I don’t have a family who are going to call me and say ‘well done’, and I’ve never had one. “So, my parameters of understanding of what successes are actually about the people around me and also about how I feel about my self without, wanting to be too self centred, as well.” Sissay released his first book of poetry when he was 21 and in 1995 made a BBC documentary, Internal Flight, about his life. His one-man show Something Dark detailed how as a baby he was given up by his Ethiopian mother in the 1960s and renamed Norman Greenwood, only finding out his real name at the age of 18. The drama was adapted for BBC Radio 3 in 2006, winning the UK Commission for Racial Equality’s Race in the Media Award (RIMA). Asked what he would say to young people in care today, he said: “I would say to the young person who’s in care, you’re gonna be okay. Be kind to yourself, be good to yourself, you’re going to be okay. “I guess I would also say, reach for the top of the tree, and you might get to the first branch, but reach for the stars, and you might get to the top of the tree. “I’ve always reached for stars, they are my poems, the blank page is like the universe to me and finding stars is like writing a poem and being able to build a constellation or be part of a constellation, that is the challenge of every day.” He continued: “Celebrating ourselves and celebrating each other, that’s the one of the things that that is missing in the care system. “I don’t want to be down on it because I know a lot of people from it but I do want to say that celebrating the existence of young people in care is a wonderful thing. “Harry Potter was a foster child, Superman was also fostered, Jane Eyre, Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights. We can celebrate the nature of children and care inside popular culture inside literature, but also as our next door neighbours.” Sissay was previously made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2010 New Year Honours. Source: www.irishnews.com The Fostering Network welcomes the joint statement from the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) and the British Medical Association (BMA), and also the joint statement from RCGP Cymru Wales and BMA Cymru Wales, which encourage GPs to deliver vital medicals for prospective foster carer assessments. As GP practices have been rightly focused on COVID-19 and the vaccination programme, medicals have been subject to significant delays which in turn have impacted on services’ capacity to place children with potential foster carers.
A particular issue for our members in England and Wales, since September 2020 we have increasingly heard of the difficulties of securing medical reports to meet the current requirements for foster carer approval. Fostering services have reported that these difficulties have been a combination of Coronavirus regulatory amendments and increasing pressure on GPs during the pandemic and vaccine rollout. In a survey of our members conducted in February this year, we heard that for assessments started after 25 September 2020:
Based on these figures we believe the actual number of placements unavailable for children nationally to be much higher, due to the delays in completing foster carer approvals. As part of the assessment of prospective foster carers it is important to ensure that considerations are given to physical and mental health. Gathering this information will inform the wider assessment and review process, identifying the strengths that applicants may bring and balancing their ability to provide quality of family life with being aware of their overall physical and mental health. These delays have added to existing pressures on services where new foster families are in demand, potentially delaying the right family for a child. The Fostering Network believes that every effort needs to be made to support the process prior to approval. While we welcome these statements and hope they go some way to alleviate some of the difficulties currently being experienced by fostering services, we will continue to monitor this through our membership and hope that it marks the beginning of a relationship between RCGP, BMA and the fostering sector. The Fostering Network wants to hear from its members about the experiences they have had accessing medicals during the pandemic, and whether this improves over the coming months following this week’s statement. Please contact policy@fostering.net if you have an experience you would like to share in relation to this issue. Source: www.thefosteringnetwork.org.uk  With the coronavirus vaccine rollout underway, The Fostering Network is urging UK governments to issue guidance to local authorities and health services that all foster carers fall within priority group two as an essential part of the social care workforce.
Foster carers are a vital part of our social care system, and are currently putting themselves and their families at increased risk of contracting the virus through exposure to multiple households as they maintain contact with birth families, as well as meeting with social workers and other professionals in the course of their work. If they are not given this priority access, foster carers remain extremely vulnerable to infection and we face the very real potential for part of the social care system to be seriously diminished at a time when it is needed more than ever. The Fostering Network’s helplines have been exceptionally busy, with calls from foster carers indicating that they are increasingly under pressure to support face to face contact and to take children to school, regardless of the risks to their own health, that of their family and other looked after children in placement. Kevin Williams, chief executive of The Fostering Network, said: ‘We have already called on the UK governments to give foster carers priority access to vaccines, and this need is only increasing in urgency every day as foster carers are expected to interact with a range of people from other households in the course of their work. ‘Priority access to vaccinations is the only way to ensure the safety of our foster carers and the children they care for, as well as to prevent a potentially catastrophic impact on the social care system itself.‘Foster carers perform a vital role in society and must be well protected alongside their health and social care peers.’ The Fostering Network has launched a campaign action to encourage its members and supporters in England to ask their MPs to contact the Minister for COVID Vaccine Deployment, Nadhim Zahawi, to urge him to include foster carers in priority group two for the vaccine roll out, alongside health and social care workers. Source: www.thefosteringnetwork.org.uk  Official statistics show 3% increase in filled places, from 2019-20, but with unavailable places also rising and an ageing population of carers, Ofsted warns of trouble for the future.
Fostering capacity remains “not anywhere near enough to meet demand”, despite a small increase in capacity revealed by official statistics released today, Ofsted has warned. The inspectorate estimated that there were 89,200 approved fostering places as of March 2020, 1% up on the figure a year previously of 88,370, based on data submitted by agencies. While filled places rose by 3% to 56,500, there was also an increase, from 15,465 to 16,555 (7%), in the number of approved places that were not available, for example, because of carers taking a break or due to the needs of children currently in placement. The statistics come against a backdrop of year-on-year increases in the care population, and widespread evidence of substantial pressures on places, leading to children being placed far from home or in unregulated provision. The figures also showed that two-thirds of carers were aged over 50, with a quarter over 60. ‘Storing up trouble for the future’ Commenting on the figures, Ofsted’s national director for regulation and social care, Yvette Stanley, said: “Although today’s statistics show a small rise in foster carers and places, there still isn’t anywhere near enough to meet demand. The difficulty in recruiting carers with the right skills and experience, along with what is potentially an aging carer population, is a mix that could be storing up trouble for the future.” She said addressing the problem, as well as the urgent need for more residential provision, had to be a priority for the government’s long-awaited care review, which children’s minister Vicky Ford said last week would be launched imminently. The figures follow last week’s report by Ofsted on the challenges of matching children with foster families. This found that the shortage of carers was the biggest barrier to successful matches, particularly for siblings, disabled children and teenagers, which meant that “making a decision about the best place for a child to live was often a tricky balancing act between looking for what was ideal and what was possible”. The matching study – which was carried out last summer but whose findings were still relevant, said Ofsted – was based on case studies of 24 children and focus groups with professionals in four local authorities, meetings with independent fostering agencies and birth parents of children who had been fostered, and online surveys of children in foster care, carers, former foster children and fostering service managers. The report stressed that there was much councils and agencies could do beyond recruitment, and social workers Ofsted spoke to were able to identify what worked and what could have gone better in terms of successful matching. ‘Little evidence’ good practice learned from However, Ofsted found “little evidence…that this has translated into wider organisational learning that could improve practice across the whole service”. For example, meetings to consider learning from placement breakdowns were not always held, even when required by local authority policy. It said there were several areas of practice that could improve, particularly in relation to making the matching process more child-centred. Over two-thirds of children in foster care who responded to Ofsted’s survey felt they had not been asked about their wishes and feelings before they moved into their foster home, while very few of those who were consulted felt their views had made a difference.. Ofsted said that, when children were involved, this helped family finders know what they were looking for in a foster family, help prospective carers know what was important to children and made it more likely that children would feel that decisions were being made in their best interests. Also, it found that few survey respondents with past or current experience of care received information about their foster home before they moved in, with those that did receiving it too late to help them prepare for the move. This was despite the study finding that being informed helped children to settle, particularly when they were shown pictures of the family, empowered them to ask questions about their prospective carers and helped them start seeing themselves as part of the family. Lack of information for carers Similarly, carers felt that the information they received about the children coming to live with them was variable. Though, perhaps unsurprisingly, information sharing was worse when children were moved in an emergency, Ofsted found that, in several cases, information gaps were not filled after the child moved in. Carers also said they found information from previous carers of the child to be “invaluable”, but it was sometimes left to them to initiate liaison with previous carers, rather than it being facilitated by the local authority. The study also found that carers who were treated as professionals were typically more likely to feel empowered to ask questions about the child, including from previous carers, though in most areas this was embedded in practice. Ofsted also said social workers needed to do more to help carers support contact between the child and their birth family, with fewer than half of carers surveyed saying their supervising social worker helped them to do so. The inspectorate also said social workers and foster carers needed more training in helping trans-cultural matches work more effectively, with matches more likely to be influenced by carers’ availability, location, skills and experience, rather than ethnicity, religion or cultural background. The report’s conclusions were broadly welcomed by fostering and care organisations. Katharine Sacks-Jones, chief executive of children in care charity Become, echoed Ofsted’s conclusion that matching need to be centred around a child’s background, wishes and needs and that this needed to be a theme in the care review, which the “government needs to bring forward with urgency”. “Children and young people in care should always feel their views are important and are meaningfully listened to and acted upon – whether that’s by social workers, foster carers or other professionals in the system,” she added. Kevin Williams, chief executive of The Fostering Network, said the charity welcomed the report’s focus on maintaining relationships with previous carers and that “relationships between children and their previous foster carers are too often overlooked, and more needs to be done to support these relationships”. TACT, the largest voluntary fostering agency, said that it was pleased that the report highlighted the importance of providing carers with “balanced, full and asset-based information” about the child, with too often information being “partial and focused on negative factors”. Government recruitment efforts ‘ignoring fostering’ However, TACT also stressed the problem of there being insufficient carers to provide suitable matches, and criticised the Department for Education’s emphasis on adoption – set out most recently in a speech last month by education secretary Gavin Williamson. “It is clear that we need additional foster carers, but again and again the DfE are prepared to fund national advertising campaigns to encourage people to adopt while ignoring fostering,” said TACT. “At this unprecedented time when so many people are having to look to make a change in their lives it is an ideal opportunity for a national advertising campaign to promote fostering. Having a sufficient pool of foster families would have a very positive impact on matching and the on the lives of many vulnerable children.” The Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) also emphasised the national shortage of carers in its response, saying this would be exacerbated by the pandemic, and needed to be addressed through the care review. The extent of the pressures on the system was also highlighted by Harvey Gallagher, chief executive of the Nationwide Association of Fostering Providers. “Certainly, the pressure on local authorities to find foster carers for children at short notice is one such significant pressure,” he said. “This may mean that local authorities can only consider those foster carers who have an appropriate vacancy that day, not even next week or soon afterwards. Children may then have little say in where they will be living. Matching can be seen as a luxury when time and availability is against a local authority, and that should never be the case.” Source: www.communitycare.co.uk  We welcome Ofsted’s latest research on matching in foster care, published today. It finds that good matches are not down to luck and chemistry but are something that can be developed through good practice.
Stability for looked after children is vital, this is why matching in foster care is so important. When matches do not work, fostering arrangements breakdown which causes instability for the child and, sometimes, results in the foster carer taking a break from fostering or leaving the workforce altogether. Ofsted’s report also highlights that the most significant challenge in making successful matches for children is the shortage of the right type of foster carers to match the needs of the looked after children population. However, there were several areas of improvement that did not depend on recruiting more foster carers. The report’s findings show that best practice when matching children and foster carers includes:
We are delighted to have been advisory board members for this research project and hope that fostering services across England can incorporate the findings into wider organisational learning. Chief executive of The Fostering Network, Kevin Williams, said: ‘We were pleased to see the importance of confident and empowered foster carers and how this improves the matching process and other aspects of the fostering experience for the child. ‘We also strongly welcome the consideration of maintaining relationships with previous foster carers in the matching process; relationships between children and their previous foster carers are too often overlooked, and more needs to be done to support these relationships.’ Read Ofsted’s full report here. Source: www.thefosteringnetwork.org.uk  FosterTalk is a not-for-profit organisation providing high quality independent advice and support to foster carers and their families throughout the UK. Part of the Martin James group of companies, FosterTalk is currently supporting 20,000 fostering families through its comprehensive membership package. It also delivers Fosterline England on behalf of the Department for Education, offering advice, support and information to foster carers and prospective foster carers via an interactive website and free to use helpline.
On July 14, the government announced in a written statement that most of the amendments introduced to the Adoption and Children [Coronavirus] [Amendment] Regulations 2020 are no longer required. However, these legal provisions will remain in place until September 25, and it is stated that some of the amendments may be extended beyond this date. Since the introduction of these amendments, FosterTalk have been concerned that rather than strengthening the core duty of safeguarding children in care, the flexibility of these regulations may have the opposite effect. Concerns centre around the fact that the amendments relax some of the statutory duties to be carried out by fostering services and presented potential safeguarding risks for both children in care and foster carers. FosterTalk has acknowledged that the government’s intention is that amendments are to be used in exceptional circumstances. However, it also believes that proper planning removes the need for the majority of amendments being implemented. For example, FosterTalk highlighted that existing legislation already allowed for panels to be conducted virtually with a full complement of members, but the amendment allows for a reduction to three panel members and also, if deemed necessary, removal of the need to hold a panel altogether. This reduction in panel numbers means that assessments for carers and adopters can be approved with reduced rigour. There has also been a relaxation in the timescales for the production of a placement plan and care plan from five days to “when reasonably practical”; emergency placements can last for six months; there is no requirement for temporary foster carers to have a connection with the child; all of which leaves the foster carer and child at potential risk. The concerns have also been echoed by other organisations. Harvey Gallagher the chief executive of the National Association of Fostering Providers [NAFP] highlighted his organisation’s concerns in an article published in Community Care back in April and was present alongside FosterTalk at a recent discussion regarding the use of the amendments with the DfE. Children’s rights charity Article 39 has also been granted a judicial review challenging the legality of the amendments, stating that many of the changes made under the new secondary legislation had been seen before, under 2016 proposals to allow councils to opt out of some duties, which were heavily criticised at the time and then withdrawn by government. In response, FosterTalk has undertaken a survey to explore the impact of these amendments on its members and to better understand the ways in which the amendments have been used, with a view to presenting their findings to the Department for Education. In a report accompanying the survey’s findings, FosterTalk’s managing director Steve Stockley commented: “There is no question that foster families have faced exceptional circumstances and often been forced into making decisions in the absence of other professionals and social workers during the lockdown period. “Foster carers’ lives and the lives of children in care have been impacted upon and although the minister’s statement said the amendments were to be used to overcome exceptional circumstances, some of our foster carers have expressed concerns that the amendments have been used inappropriately or misinterpreted at best. “For example, while social workers had been advised not to make home visits or undertake face to face contact with children or families, we have been made aware of foster carers being forced to travel over 150 miles to make introductions with adoptive families, forced into attending family contacts, placing themselves and their families at risk, while social workers were following advice not to make face to face statutory visits.” Results of the Survey FosterTalk sent two surveys out to members to gauge how many fostering services had used the amended provisions and the affect upon foster carers where they had been used. Both surveys asked similar questions but framed from the perspective of the target audience. Fostering Services It is important to stress that the response to FosterTalk’s surveys reflect the views of those fostering services that chose to respond to the request for information. FosterTalk received 59 responses from fostering services. Of those fostering services that have made use of the provisions it is clear that they have been selective in the amendments used. There are some provisions that have proven to be beneficial to both the foster carers and the fostering service and it is these that need to be considered for extension after September 25. Fostering services have strongly been in agreement that with the appropriate preparation, the majority of amendments were either not required or necessary. 45 per cent of responding services indicated that they had made use of provisions outlined in the amendments, while 55 per cent did not. Detailing their reasoning as to why they believed the amendments were unnecessary, fostering services noted the following:
This runs contrary to the belief that fostering services had called for the amendments to be implemented. With the amendments, the potential to remove independent panels has raised concerns and potential safeguarding issues for looked after children. Although this removal of panels is minimal from the responses FosterTalk received, the risk would be amplified if they remain in place post September. One independent fostering service commented: “Through the temporary regulations, the independent panels which approve foster carers have become optional. This means that an assessment of a foster carer can proceed straight to the decision maker for approval. As an independent fostering agency, this would ultimately have a positive impact from a business perspective as speedy approvals could lead to more placements. However, our agencies view is that this is a retrograde step in terms of safeguarding children, as it removes a layer of scrutiny for these highly important decisions on the suitability of people in whom we will be entrusting the care of vulnerable children and young people. We are taught that a holistic approach is needed in securing better outcomes for children and young people. The diversity of expertise in panels supports this theory, and, to remove this, would fall short of promoting better outcomes for foster children. “We feel that a combination of the amendments would potentially culminate in a greater risk. If we take the temporary medical self-declaration by prospective foster carers in the assessment process. “The relaxed regulations provide for fostering applicants to be assessed and approved without a full medical report under the proviso that one is obtained as soon as is possible. A medical report on prospective foster carers is needed to ascertain the applicant’s emotional stability and physical health to prevent children being placed in a volatile environment. Approving foster carers with a temporary self-declaration on their health and without a full in-depth report from their GP places an additional layer of risk The emotional, mental and physical health of a prospective foster carer is a crucial part of the Form F assessment and we do not take short cuts when it comes to safeguarding children and young people. “In addition to the relaxed fostering regulations, DBS guidelines have also been amended during the Covid-19 period. The amended guidelines state that if a fostering applicant or adult member of the household has a DBS from a social care setting which was completed within the last three years, then this can be used by the fostering services. This again adds another layer of risk and undermines safeguarding of children, as an applicant could have had a conviction after the date of the last DBS.” Stockley commented: “On their own these risks present significant questions but when placed together the sum of all their parts could be devastating.” Survey responses from foster carers FosterTalk also hoped to establish a holistic view of the impact of the amendments and how they were affecting foster carers themselves. The organisation commented that it had received an increase in enquiries to its support services with foster carers expressing anxieties and seeking advice on good practice. 1,600 foster carers were included in the survey to help formulate a response. 53 per cent were part of an independent fostering agency, 44 per cent worked for their local authority and three per cent worked for the Children’s Trust. Of those carers, a majority of 59 per cent indicated they were unsure whether their service had used any of the amendments. Meanwhile, 38 per cent reported that their services had, with a mere three per cent indicating that their services had not done so. The responses seem to indicate that foster carers have used their resilience and maintained their fostering status quo with the majority of foster carers not knowing if the situations they have faced are actually within the amendments or not. It highlights that foster carers adapt and carry on, putting the wellbeing of the children they look after at the heart of what they do. FosterTalk’s previous survey, conducted with the Martin James Foundation, explored the mental health of foster carers and from the enquiries received through FosterTalk and Fosterline, indicate it is without question that fostering has experienced massive changes during the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet, the response to the survey seems that foster carers have been unfazed by the changes and continued to put children first. 33 per cent of those surveyed welcomed another child or young person into their home during the pandemic, and from those foster carers that welcomed children, just 40 per cent received a placement plan at the time of the child’s arrival. 21 per cent had still not received the plan at the time the survey was taken. One of the major amendments that foster carers have experienced relates to statutory visits taking place during the pandemic, with over 70 per cent of respondents reporting that visits were conducted virtually, compared to just over ten per cent saying that they had been conducted in person with social distancing in place. Stockley said: “The merits of virtual visits and supervisions should be evaluated with a view to retain the provision post September. A mixed balance of virtual and face to face visits would complement busy schedules of both social workers and foster carers and contribute to a more efficient way of completing statutory requirements.” But what does the future hold? The government has told councils that most exemptions from children's social care duties introduced in response to the coronavirus pandemic are no longer required. However, children’s minister Vicky Ford has said that the laws will remain in place until the end of September as planned and councils can still relax their duties to vulnerable children when they have “strong justification” to do so. Some restrictions may also be extended beyond September, the government has confirmed. In a written parliamentary statement, Ford said that the emergency legislation was brought in during the pandemic in anticipation of councils finding it impossible to meet their duties, due to staff shortages and sickness. In the parliamentary statement, it references protecting vulnerable children has been at the heart of the government’s response to the virus. These regulations formed part of that response, alongside keeping schools and other settings open for vulnerable children, substantial additional investment, and additional support direct to children, young people, and their families. The government states it has always been clear that these temporary amendments should be used only when absolutely necessary and only if consistent with the overarching safeguarding and welfare duties that have remained in place. What has been clearly evident in the communications FosterTalk have had with fostering services and foster carers alike is that a new way of working has arisen from the Covid-19 crisis. Forward thinking fostering services and foster carers alike have adapted and created positive engagements in the support of children in care. The initial evidence received by the Martin James Foundation has shown that placements were more stable with less breakdowns in the early months of lockdown. Stockley said: “If we truly want to place the child at the centre of their own care planning then we should look to conduct planning in an environment that they are more comfortable in rather than move children and young people into what we expect. “The use of virtual platforms has proven successful for conducting panels, training and supervisions. Conducting everything in the virtual space would increase potential safeguarding risks however a balanced combination and forward thinking could improve the engagement and availability of both foster carers and children in care. “While we would not wish to see all the amendments adopted nor dismissed the approach should be measured. Many will be familiar with the work Cornerstone produce with their VR programme and have evidenced that people trained within the VR environment report 340 per cent more confidence to employ what they have learnt. There is no reason why we could not apply this technology into the care planning for our looked after children.” Alison Alexander, CEO of The Cornerstone Partnership, added: “We now teach children through Zoom and so why can we not have a weekly check in with children in care using tech. Imagine the hours of travel time no longer needed and the increased flexibility – social workers and young people can meet virtually over breakfast or at gaps in young people’s day. It’s now time that children’s services are given approval, by the DfE, to make the leap and join the rest of the world in delivering their business using tech.” On July 16, the Department for Education opened a consultation on the amendments with a proposal to retain 3 main areas: virtual contact/visits; medical reports; and Ofsted inspection frequency, with the remaining amendments reverting to the pre-amendment situation. The consultation closes on August 5. Stockley concluded: “This is to be welcomed and in the next round of discussions we need to ensure our planning is capable of flexing to allow for our children returning to school, potential of local lockdowns, further reduction of social distancing, and any onset of a second wave entering the winter. “Most importantly we need to ensure safeguarding of children and young people is placed at the heart of all planning in social care. Children at risk in the community have not had the safeguards of teachers or other responsible adults looking for signs of neglect and abuse. We, in the fostering sector, fully expect there to be an increase in the numbers of children entering care once schools re-open and statutory visits resume.” Source: www.theparliamentaryreview.co.uk |
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