Cultural change needed in fostering

Cultural change is required if we are to improve the lives of children in care, deputy chief executive of the Fostering Network, Raina Sheridan, will tell a conference of social care professionals today.

Holding a workshop at the Community Care Live conference, Sheridan will explore the positive impact a foster carer can have on a child’s life. She will say that, as child care experts, foster carers can help a child to reach their potential. However, in order to achieve this, foster carers must be recognised and respected as equals to the other professionals working with a child.

Sheridan said: "Foster carers play a vital role in looking after some of the most vulnerable children, but too often they are not treated with the respect or recognition they deserve. For example, they are rarely given the authority to make everyday decisions that will allow a child to live a full family life, such as if the child can go on a school trip, or have non-emergency medical treatment.

"Unless this culture change comes about, recruitment and retention of foster carers will continue to be a struggle, and as a result too many children in care will miss out on the chance to experience positive family life."

Chief executive Robert Tapsfield will be addressing the conference to talk about the importance of everyone involved in fostering working together to achieve the ambitions for children in care set out in the Care Matters White paper – that 'the aspiration of the state should be no less than each parent should have for their own child'.

Tapsfield said: "In our work with foster carers and fostering services we see that people want to achieve the ambitions of Care Matters. We also see that there is a shortage of funds making this difficult and that services are falling short for a range of other reasons.

"That is why the Fostering Network has launched Together for Change. By working together we can move from a position where foster carers are still excluded from meetings because they are not regarded as part of the team, where they are not routinely seen as child care experts, where they are not given the information they need, to one where they are regarded as equals to the other professionals working with a child.

"Together for Change is about achieving a cultural change in the way foster carers are regarded – it is about making foster care work for every fostered child and every foster family."