Training and support for kinship carers

Current action

In Stable Homes, Built on Love  the previous Government committed to investing in the delivery of a national offer of support and training for all kinship carers. After a competitive tender process, Kinship was  awarded a contract, worth £3m, by the Department for Education, to develop a training and support programme for all kinship carers in England. This contract will see Kinship lead a national programme delivering online and in-person training, supported by resources on website, the online information, advice and support hub for kinship carers.

The National Kinship Care Strategy also celebrates Kinship’s work to establish more than 150 peer support groups across England as part of the National Peer Support Programme and the role of the groups in building community and relationships for kinship carers. Funding has now been awarded to Kinship to continue building peer support groups, available to all types of kinship carer, across the country until at least March 2026.

The Department for Education also funds the Family and Friends helpline.

Our verdict

The commitment to fund a national training and support offer reflected a significant win for our #ValueOurLove campaign which had called on the Government to equalise access to high-quality training and support between kinship carers and foster carers. It also followed a recommendation from the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care that all local authorities should develop peer support and training for all kinship carers.

Delivery of a national offer of training, advice and information should help to deliver consistent and high-quality help for kinship carers of all types, and reduce the current postcode lottery of provision. This is crucial as only 2 in 10 kinship carers told us they’d received any preparation support before or shortly after their child moved in, and nearly 8 in 10 said they weren’t getting the local authority support they needed to meet their child’s needs. Of those who had received local authority support, 25% rated this as ‘very poor’.

A lack of independent advice, especially at the point of becoming a kinship carer, can leave kinship carers vulnerable to being exploited and unsure about the best option for them to pursue to support their new family. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has highlighted previously how special guardians were sometimes given incorrect advice and information by their local authorities.

Our Breaking Point report found that 35% of kinship carers rated the information provided about kinship care by their local authority as ‘very poor’, and only 7% had ever seen their authority’s ‘family and friends care policy’. It’s welcome that new statutory guidance on kinship care will reinforce the requirement for local authorities to publish a clear and accessible approach to how they support all kinship families. This is important as, highlighted by Foundations in their recent survey of local authority support, “kinship carers may commit to care arrangements that limit their access to support without being aware of these implications”.

What should happen next

We’re excited to deliver the new national training and support offer for kinship carers. This programme is being co-designed alongside kinship carers and is available to all kinship carers in England regardless of legal order. It will provide kinship carers with preparatory support at the beginning of their kinship care journey, as well as options for ongoing support. Partners who will play a key role in working with Kinship and kinship carers to design and deliver online and offline sessions to support carers at different points of their kinship care journeys include the National Association of Virtual School Heads (NAVSH), BookTrust, Anna Freud, Place2Be and Kinship Carers Liverpool.

As more details on the national training and support offer are announced, we continue to work with local authorities across England to develop and promote. In the meantime, we encourage all children’s social care professionals to join our Professionals Network, and for Directors of Children’s Services and managers of children’s social care services to get in touch to explore ways to work together.

In the meantime, local authorities should ensure they signpost to Kinship’s support and advice and other sources of information and advice for kinship carers. They should ensure their websites promote a clear, accessible and regularly-updated policy outlining their approach to supporting kinship families, including those without a legal order securing the family arrangement.