David Kidney MP tells Fostering Network forum to use support care and preserve families

Councils should use support care to keep children out of the care system, an influential MP will tell a conference next week.

David Kidney, who chairs the associate parliamentary group for children in and leaving care, will tell delegates at a Fostering Network conference that support care is effective in keeping families together and easing the financial pressure on children’s services departments’ budgets.

Support care schemes – currently run by around 35 English and Welsh local authorities – aim to help families that are experiencing some form of crisis. Children remain at home and spend perhaps one night a week with a trained carer, rather than being moved to a foster family or residential unit.

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