Our Foster care watch introduces our blogs – certain key facts to maintain and promote awareness of the position in relation to fostering in the UK. Currently, over 8,000 new foster homes are needed and on 31st March 2017, 72,670 children were in the care of local authorities.

Foster care: competing priorities – are they being funded adequately?

Consider a complex subject like foster care provision: it has many elements and differing priorities. There are also many competing opinions. But, we can all agree on one thing: because vulnerable children are not responsible for their predicament, they need help. This is only the start: how much help? How much should be spent, and in what ways. It’s not long before the issue is beset by problems and competing orthodoxies. Opinion is cheap and in plentiful supply. In fact we, have been deluged by it – largely as a result of the recent Government inspired foster care stocktake. But has this meant we can expect any real progress – and what would this look like anyway? And when might it start to be visible. The problem is that introducing change can be like turning the proverbial oil tanker. There are quite a few reasons why we should feel uneasy about the fate of looked after children. Perhaps not in the immediate sense, but with only six per cent going on to higher education, the long-term outlook for these children looks bleak – at least in terms of parity of opportunity.  And the government must realise this. Talk is cheap, but delay is usually far more expensive and brought about by even more talk. We are in a fog: what we need is what the marketing folk call ‘cut through’. What do we need to know to understand the extent of the government’s commitment to vulnerable children and young people? Is there one thing that we can rely upon to provide the answer. Because if there is, we have the necessary ‘cut through’ providing us with the answer. All that is needed is one indisputable fact. And now we have one – which means we can set aside the trading of statistics and promises of yet more initiatives. The simple fact is  – iterated by Stuart Gallimore, ADCS President – local authorities have seen a fifty percent reduction in their budgets since 2010 whilst many more children with complex needs have been coming into care. This is a fact that can’t be spun. Worse, cuts – we are told – have had to be made placing yet more strain on families. This, predictably, has meant more youngsters needing to be found foster homes. All too depressingly familiar territory: government espousing solutions to a problem they bear the responsibility for.

Money is not a panacea by itself. Resources have to be managed. But they have to be adequate in the first place. So a judgement has to be made within the context of an overall strategy. The antics of the chancellor in the recent budget promising an additional £400 million for schools – which will forever be linked to a slightly higher amount earmarked for potholes – makes plain the lack of strategic thinking in relation to expenditure. Not really what one would want in a chancellor –  ‘shooting from the financial hip’. And an astonishing demonstration of a lack of political nous.

Foster care needs to be protected from other negative impacts in the care sector

Politicians seem notoriously bad at making connections. Or perhaps they are just poorly advised. Of real concern are the findings from the recent ‘ Social Workers: Working Conditions and Wellbeing Survey 2018 – UK’. Here we learn that sixty percent of social workers are looking to leave their current job within the next fifteen months compared to (alarming enough) fifty-two per cent last year. Worse, nearly forty percent of respondents are looking to leave the profession altogether. Not good numbers for foster children desperate for continuity and stability.

It is obvious to all that there is simply not enough money in the system to meet the rising level of demand. This has also been a week that has seen; inconveniently for government, a report published by the Early Intervention Foundation. Its view is that –

“small, short-term, single-issue funding pots from national government’ are unhelpful in comparison to the benefits of long-term funding for services.”

Such behaviour indicates that when the government talks about strategy, it is only paying lip service to the idea. The term is used as a ‘sound bite’ – shorthand to imply something is being done, and whatever it is it has been thought through.

Independent Fostering Agencies (IFAs) have not been getting the most favourable press recently. But they are doing a valiant job of finding and training the kind of foster carers needed to look after increasing numbers of traumatised children coming into care. This cannot be done without a strategic approach to meeting need and the government is fortunate then IFAs are there. This seems to not be properly appreciated by the government – who, after all, have contributed to the problem by not adequately protecting the most vulnerable families from the effects of ‘Austerity’. Recruiting people to become dedicated and motivated foster cares is both costly and time-consuming. The very least the government could have done to help would be to have funded a nationwide public awareness campaign about fostering. The need for such a step did not materialise from the ruminations of the foster care stocktake – perhaps this would have been to acknowledge just how far the government has fallen behind in relation to its obligations to vulnerable children. As council leaders have warned of a looming £3bn funding ‘black hole’, a government that pleads ignorance will have no credibility left if swift action is not taken to remedy the situation.

Why consider a foster care career with Rainbow?

Because we are a team – ‘Team Rainbow’. And you can only be a proper team if you have the very best in your ranks. We are glad to say we know this is assuredly the case: knowledge confirmed again in our ‘2018 Foster Carers Awards’ held this Saturday. This was a celebration of the work of our truly amazing foster carers. We need some more very special people to join our team of dedicated carers.  Rainbow fostering are looking to recruit across London, Birmingham, Manchester and the South Coast.

So if you have been considering a career in fostering – and what to join the very best team around, this is the time to pick up the phone. Call our Rainbow recruitment team – or you can place a  message on our website. Make sure you inform us of the best time to call you and we will be in touch: 020 8427 3355 or 0330 311 2845 (our National Line) will get you through. In the meantime, you can find more information about what foster carers do at thttps://bit.ly/2OkgCzS Please also visit if you live in Birmingham or Manchester. https://bit.ly/2zdLb4G and https://bit.ly/2SyrFIU

Catch up with foster care news at https://bit.ly/2kJHpsO

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