Social Services Complaint

forchristsake

Ok...If social services phoned a person who had a very good bond with the child, who the child expressed a wish to live with - and asked them if they were able to care for this child, and said person said , i could if i had some financial assistance and continued support for this child who may have emotional difficulties. Wish to take him on long term.

Surely this is best interest for the child. a carer who knows him, his history, his life, cares for him etc. a person the child already has close bonds too.

puddy

but why would you foster this child ? this is not a permanent situation, why not go for a special guardianship order which gives you PR. there is still a financial package with sgo but it differs between authorities

how old is the child, why is the child in care? what skills do you have which would enable you to work with the child's needs?

esmy

As things stand the people with PR would also have to agree to the placement - LA do not have PR and can't determine where the child lives without agreement. There doesn't seem to be any advantage to the child to be fostered as Puddy says.

jayII

forchristsake wrote: »

Ok...If social services phoned a person who had a very good bond with the child, who the child expressed a wish to live with - and asked them if they were able to care for this child, and said person said , i could if i had some financial assistance and continued support for this child who may have emotional difficulties. Wish to take him on long term.

Surely this is best interest for the child. a carer who knows him, his history, his life, cares for him etc. a person the child already has close bonds too.

Is this the person who has already rejected the child once?

forchristsake

The advantange is..more indepth support from LA.

Training...

What special skills to look after child? - Knowing them for 7 years already. Having a bond with them. Child having no other family at all. Child wanting to live with this person also.

Child coming from history of parents who substance abuse...Lie, etc etc Domestic violence. Child is at higher risk of showing challenging behaviours. Stealing etc, Lying. Could lead to bigger things....

Fostering him long term gives him a chance of permancy, but at same time, if behaviour were far to challenging in future, or having an impact on other children in family, would not be tied in

forchristsake

jayII wrote: »

Is this the person who has already rejected the child once?

When has anyone rejected this child before?

puddy

forchristsake wrote: »

The advantange is..more indepth support from LA.

what specifically does the child need, what are you referring to

Training...

true

What special skills to look after child? - Knowing them for 7 years already. Having a bond with them. Child having no other family at all. Child wanting to live with this person also.

you need to be specific about how you will work with these problems that you refer to below, 'knowing' the child is not enough, you need to demonstrate 'competency' in any fostering assessment, how do you propose to do that

Child coming from history of parents who substance abuse...Lie, etc etc Domestic violence. Child is at higher risk of showing challenging behaviours. Stealing etc, Lying. Could lead to bigger things....

unless you are clear about how you are going to work with these issues, which will be deeper than just the acting out behaviour, there will be a lot attachment and emotional development issues.

Fostering him long term gives him a chance of permancy, but at same time, if behaviour were far to challenging in future, or having an impact on other children in family, would not be tied in

tied in? like a fixed rate mortgage?

unless you're really good at faking, any fostering assessor would be concerned about your proposals and more importantly the reasons for it

eezer

forchristsake wrote: »

Ok....



Arnt social services meant to do whats in the best interests of the child and not what is cheaper and less work for them?

a residency order and them clearing off with what was an emotinally challenged child seems a little naive and poorly planned? Where are the risk assessments, impact on family?

As Gizmo said, the LA will plan for permanency. There can be no doubt that the best interests of any child are served via planning for permanency rather than foster care.

A Residence Order just does not happen without any thought or planning. The Court will ultimately decide if it's right for the child or not and in this case it would appear that at the time it was.

jayII

hazydays wrote: »

Hi i am the friend that my friend is talking about. My nephew went in to care under section 20, voluntary. I do have pr, with is now shared with the local authority.i have chose to not have him back. I have been fighting for help and support for both myself, my family and nephew for two years.He came to me over 4 yrs ago. I knew nothing of how the care system worked, and trusted what the s/s told me. They knew we couldnt afford legal as all our money had gone in to a new house that we had bought b4 my nephew came to us.They were the ones who told me to go for the residency order, fostering or any other option was never discussed. i have since found out that this could of been one of the options. also to find out that we could of had residency payments. this came to light last year, my nephew had already been with me for sometime, i began to fill out the forms, but then found it intrusive to have to list my debts. I made it clear that this shouldn't really come in to it, as he is not my child. So it stopped there.It took a complaint letter the first time round to get them involved, is was obvious that before my nephew came to me that there was going to be emotional and challenging behaviour and support was going to be required. The residency order was in place with six weeks and within a month or two s/s were gone. for two years we continued on our own. It was never just about money, but for help and support for myself, nephew and family.
I had said two years ago without this i would be unable to continue to care for him.
It was made clear from the first assessment that there were issues that needed to be addressed support and help for myself and nephew. From this we had 1 or visits which were pointless.
It took 7 months and things to reach severe crises point and threats of my nephew having to leave to get social services to come out to us.
This took 15 calls a day over 5 days.This was what the straw that broke the camels back. I had been begging for help but got nothing. A meeting took place before xmas and we made it clear that they had done nothing to help and had come a little too late.
We did say that if things continued the way they were, we could no longer care for my nephew. s/s got him involved in youth club etc, but was not on a regular basis.
visits from s/s were hit and miss, often cancelled etc. Again after xmas we hit crises point again, putting enormous stress and strain on the family. we made it clear we could not continue like this and some thing had to be. We had thought my nephew would go to a relative, and arrangements, assessments were supposed to have been begun in feb. This was not the case. things were getting ever more strained at home, s/s were continually aware of this, the visits got less and less. during this we were hitting crisis point again and again.S/s were trying get the relative to take my nephew on with a residency order, which she refused. She had issues with housing to which she requested assistance with, and also wanted things in place for his emotional needs. s/s services told us that they were looking at foster care, at the time, this was not the case.we were being told different things, calls/letter being ignored by both myself and my relative. we wanted my newphew to move as smoothly as possible. 4 months later nothing has been done, things havent moved forward, again we hit crises point which was effecting myself and own children.
I put in writing that i no longer could care for my nephew and something had to be done.
I was told by s/s that that a foster search was done. a week later i wrote again, due to the s/s visit yet again being cancelled. I wanted a update on things, what was the procedure time-scale etc.
I got no reply to this, but got a phone that evening to be told that a placement had been found and he was going he next morning. This was less than 12 hours notice, it was not an emergency. It could of been more planned, giving me time to get his things together and say a proper goodbye, but it wasn't just very rushed and shocking experience. this was when I got the assessment, i was told by s/s that it had to look bad to get the foster funding for my nephew.I had a meeting the following week where i raised my many concerns with the assessment, as i found many parts unfair and untrue.I disagree with issues being insignificant, these insignificant things occurred on a daily basis for over two years. with no help and support with i requested many many times, turned this issues in to much bigger things that had an effect on myself and my children. I was told the bits i did not could possibly be changed, but that was up to the manager. I am still awaiting this assessment with the changes. as far as i am aware the assessment has gone ahead with out my say so. I was given no information on the procedures of my nephew going in to foster care and was left in limbo........

sorry its a bit long winded will continue with the rest , just want to give you an idea of how things went.

The person above made it clear that they could not continue to care for this child.

Whatever the rights, wrongs and reasons for it, the child would have understood their behaviour as a rejection. I.e. someone who cared for them, and saw to their every need, was no longer willing to do so.

forchristsake

The LA contacted this person inititally. stating they were the best person to care for the child and pushed for this

IT IS WHAT THE CHILD ALSO REQUESTED - THERE WISHES.

- Knowing the child is very important.

i.e. knowing there history - significant events that could impact or explain future behaviours.

Maybe the fact that this person may love them - and they may feel more of a sense of belonging within a stable family home.

"Tied in" isnt meant in a derrogatory way at all. But if there are risks - a residence order would mean no support at all, left alone, things may deteriorate beyond help. Isnt it better to be able to relinquish that responsibilty for whats in best interests of rest of the family if it were to reach extremes of not being able to cope with certain behaviours.

Also fostering would allow the child to b given chance of any school in area...even over subscribed ones (so pick of good education).

FinanciaL assistance that can be used to encourage after school activities - spent on keeping the child out of trouble, engaged etc.

providing a package that supports the child in a way that it can be a permanant home for them without any further disruptions