Kinship responds to children’s social care reform announcement

We’re pleased to see the government take additional steps to reform children’s social care early in its tenure, with the stated ambition that, where children cannot remain at home and it is in their best interests, they are supported to live with family and friends in kinship care.

Specifically, it’s welcome that Virtual School Head support to children in kinship care will be put on a statutory footing following the recent extension in September this year. We know that support from the Virtual School can have a transformational effect for many kinship families. We look forward to playing our part in ensuring all kinship carers have the information they need to access help from their Virtual School through our national training and support service for kinship carers in England and through our online resource hub, Kinship Compass.

However, our Forgotten report, published in August, revealed that only half of kinship children were getting the support they needed in education. We would urge the government to go further to equalise and improve educational support for kinship children. Access to educational support is currently based not on need but on legal status and journeys into kinship care. Steps need to be taken to extend pupil premium plus and designated teacher support to all children in kinship care, not just those who were previously looked after in local authority care.

It is positive that future legislation will embed the opportunity for all families to receive an offer of family group decision-making before care proceedings. This will help ensure that wider family networks can be more effectively involved in decision making about the children they love and may act to subsequently increase the number of children looked after in some forms of kinship care.

However, the government must consider further reform which does not necessitate entry into local authority care to deliver well-supported kinship care arrangements for children. Whilst it is right that kinship care options with family and friends are prioritised when a child must enter the care system, we must not simply see increasing the number and proportion of children looked after in kinship foster care as a measure of success. Our Out of Order paper highlighted that too many kinship families feel unable to move from kinship foster care to more permanent kinship arrangements, such as special guardianship, due to a lack of guaranteed support, with significant implications for those families and for local authority budgets.

As noted in the government’s paper, it is expected that the legislative framework for children’s social care will need to change further, particularly following the Law Commission’s forthcoming review into kinship care for children. This must make recommendations which will act to end the perverse incentive for children to be looked after in local authority care just so that they and their kinship carers can receive guaranteed financial and other support.

The government must take all the upcoming opportunities available through the Children’s Wellbeing Bill, the multi-year spending review and the Law Commission review to ensure that all kinship families get the urgent financial, practical and emotional support they need, and to lay the legislative groundwork for a kinship care system which recognises the unique needs, strengths and experiences of all kinship families.

Kinship’s CEO Lucy Peake said:

“We’re pleased to see the government take additional steps to reform children’s social care early in its tenure, with the stated ambition that, where children cannot remain at home and it is in their best interests, they are supported to live with family and friends in kinship care.

“The government must take all the upcoming opportunities available through the Children’s Wellbeing Bill, the multi-year spending review and the Law Commission review to ensure that all kinship families get the urgent financial, practical and emotional support they need, and to lay the legislative groundwork for a kinship care system which recognises the unique needs, strengths and experiences of all kinship families.”