News

In North Tyneside foster carers are voting with their feet.

In the first five months of this year alone, the council has seen 10 of its 100 carers leave and move across to the private sector to be employed by independent fostering agencies (IFAs).

They could soon be followed by seven more foster carers, who are being assessed by independent agencies in the area. Paul Cook, children and families manager at North Tyneside social services, sees little prospect of replacing them.

"We are assessing six new carers but normally half drop out - it is getting harder to find them."

Over the past three years "we've lost one or two," Cook says, but puts the rising rate of migration from council to private employment down to IFAs increasing their profile, and to those who have already made the move "encouraging others to think about doing it".

The poaching of carers has been an accusation thrown at the independent sector for several years, but it has been a shout that has grown louder in the past six months, with local authorities across the UK saying the trickle has become a river.

It is an issue the department of health's Choice Protects review is looking at, and one that is sure to be debated over the coming two weeks during Foster Care Fortnight. At the heart of it is the amount of money and support local authorities can offer their carers for looking after children in state care. Some believe councils will never be able to match the independent sector when it comes to these two things.

"I can't see that we can ever be on a par with the private sector unless there is some kind of capping arrangement brought in (on what IFAs could pay carers)," Cook says.

IFA experts estimate that around 15 per cent of the 39,000 foster children in the UK are looked after by IFA carers. With a national shortfall of 8,000 carers, most councils now have to turn to IFAs to some degree, with serious consequences for their budgets. "We currently have five children placed with IFA carers but if we have to increase this because we have fewer carers our placement budget will come under massive strain," Cook says.

While pay is not the be all and end all for foster carers - nobody goes into fostering to become wealthy - Cook believes it is a major factor.

In North Tyneside, IFAs pay carers around £150 per child per week more than the council to cover maintenance costs.

"We can't match the allowances and, even if we did, the IFAs would just up theirs tomorrow. Pay is not always what it's about, but carers see it as rewarding their work," adds Cook.

In February, a Fostering Network survey showed that 56 per cent of English councils were paying less than their recommended minimum weekly allowances, which range from £103 for a baby to £187 for a young person aged over 16.

Unless this "postcode lottery in allowances" is addressed, foster carers will leave local authority employment in greater numbers and new carers may be put off completely, says Gerri McAndrew, chief executive of the Fostering Network.

"Councils don't know the true cost of providing the service," she adds. "The majority of them still pay below our recommended levels but what attracts carers is the whole package."

In addition to allowances, the package can include an element of reward payments, training, an equal say in the care team, and 24-hour support from social workers.

Most IFAs provide carers with all this, whereas some local authorities offer little more than a "voluntary fee", says Michael Lovett, joint chairperson of the Fostering Network's IFA Forum and director of the Fostering Agency. "Some authorities go through difficulties and carers want to leave, normally over a lack of support," Lovett says. "We are responding to their cries for proper support, not poaching them," he adds.

He says IFAs have actually "revitalised" some councils in the way they reward and look after carers through introducing higher standards of practice (see panel, top right).

He also believes it is unfair to say placing a child with an IFA costs more than with a council because it is not comparing like with like - IFAs will often include education, social worker support and management costs in its price.

"A borough may pay £600 a week for an agency to care for a child compared to £250 for their own carer, but if you look at what is included there may be some positive reasons for that cost difference," adds Lovett.


Another head of an IFA in the South East, accuses some councils of trying to poach its carers by bullying and blackmailing tactics.

Councils sometimes threaten carers with taking the child away "if you don't join us", he says, while others will take a child out of an IFA placement after six months "when one of their own carers becomes available".

Lyn Burns, director of social services at Bedfordshire Council and fostering lead at the Association of Directors of Social Services, says local authorities need to start seeing IFAs as partners rather than competitors.

"There are opportunities of operating alongside the private sector, but we are not smart enough in tapping into that," she adds.

Burns says directors should use the Best Value framework to test whether IFAs could provide a better service but "the overall driver has to be what the best possible outcome is for the child".

She says some foster carers won't work for IFAs because they don't like the idea of companies making money out of them, while looked-after children's organisations also say they are uncomfortable with companies making a profit out of care.

However, Lovett believes that the independent sector will continue to play an ever larger role in providing foster care and says the time is "not far away" when some authorities may contract out services completely to IFAs.

"Some boroughs are already looking towards block purchasing where they will have an ongoing need for X number of local placements, which they will commission IFAs to find. It will provide us with the security of knowing we've got ongoing demand," he says.

"But I think this will eventually lower the cost," Lovett says, offering a glimmer of hope to councils.

Case studies

Local authority foster care: the positive experience:

In 1998, David Hadjicostas, a foster carer for Southend-on-Sea Council, had a choice whether to join 20 of his fellow carers and jump ship to an IFA or stay and fight to improve the new local authority's terms. Under boundary changes Southend had just split from Essex Council.

"We went to the authority and said this is what we would like to happen for us to offer a good service. We negotiated hard for two years and got a service that has improved dramatically," Hadjicostas says.

A training package and reward payment scheme that recognises length of service and qualifications was put in place, as was a 24-hour helpline staffed by social workers.

"The changes said to carers 'we value what you do'. The council hardly loses anybody to the independent sector now and gets 25 applicants every time it advertises," he adds.


Local authority foster care: the negative experience:

Nancy McCauley, a London-based foster carer with IFA Tact, says the difference with IFAs is that "when you really need something, it's there for you", while "it can be a battle with local authorities".

She says that, in her experience, local authorities do not provide as good support as IFAs. "Children can come with a lot of different and difficult issues and I need a lot of support - I can phone up my social worker any time day or night."

McCauley adds that IFAs offer good support if carers get allegations made against them by children, "whereas authorities will take children away and hold meetings without you".

She says council foster carers often approach her to inquire about working for Tact and she believes more will move to IFAs. "Authorities need to be treating their carers better as they cannot provide the best support to children unless the carers themselves have good support."