Agenda item

Barbara Carter, Group Manager for Fostering and Kinship Care, explained that Kinship Care was when family and friends were approved as carers, often Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles or even older siblings.

The Council aimed to recruit 25 fostering households a year; in 2017/18 17 had been recruited but 21 had stopped fostering. Households stop fostering for a number of reasons such as reaching retirement age, it not being compatible with work or their own children or because there has been changes in their personal life. It was a particular challenge to find foster families for teenagers.

Placement Plus households took young people who had been through previous placement breakdowns. The placements had a high level of support from a social worker, a psychologist and family support worker. The scheme was being reviewed so that learning could be used for the whole service.

More placements were now being made with families and friends, which was both good practice and a statutory duty. Following trying to keep children with their parents, the second course of action should be to try to keep children with other family members. 28% of looked after children in Worcestershire were with family and friends which was higher than the national average.

It was explained that Section 20s were voluntary agreements where the parents retain parental authority even when the children are living apart from them.  Care Orders occur when the Local Authority has parental authority. 21% of Looked After Children were under Section 20 Agreements and 79% were under Care Orders.

Going forward a lot of work was being done on Early Help, Targeted Family Support and Edge of Care which was a range of early intervention support which aimed to reduce the numbers of children who became looked after.

It was hoped that Partner Agencies would assist in recruiting Foster families. A question was asked about whether there were any policies about recruiting minority groups and it was clarified that they recruited across the Board with the important characteristic they were looking for was whether someone could parent a child. For Kinship care agreements people living all over the world had been assessed.

Members queried whether other Counties paid more to Foster Carers. It was explained that 3 years ago Worcestershire raised the fees they paid so that they were competitive compared to independent agencies. There was a Government set amount of Foster Care Allowance and The Council paid allowances for clothes and events rather than just paying an amount at set intervals.

There was a high drop out from the Skills to Foster Course as some people found it was the wrong time for them or that fostering would not fit in with their own children. Members appreciated there were various reasons for people to drop out but hoped it wasn’t because they were being scared by the Council with a list of challenges they would be facing.

ACTIONS

·        Corporate Parenting Board Members were invited to watch the Fostering Recruitment film There was a boy, which could be found at https://www.worcestershirefostering.co.uk/therewasaboy/