Family Fostering

joolesw1972

ali-t wrote: »

It is not a deliberate ploy because it is cheaper, it is because family should be looking out for family and should take responsibility for other family members.
In my opinion, it was a deliberate ploy, simply because she knew exactly what she was asking us to agree to, but she didn't give us enough information to make an informed decision. I thought it just meant they wouldn't pay us, but the reality is that we won't get any support, emotional, practical or financial. We are "looking out for family members" and have been for some time, we have given the family emotional, practical and financial support over the last few years - if we hadn't all 4 children would probably be in the care system now.

Why should extended family members receive money to look after other members of their family (outside universal benefits like child benefit and tax credits etc)?
Because we have stepped in to a situation, not of our making to prevent our nephew from going in to a very expensive care system and need some assistance with the costs incurred by giving our nephew a home, we've already bought him some things - for example he arrived with 3 pairs of shoes - all with holes in. None of which we had budgeted for this month. Our lives and careers are not set up to accommodate a teenager or childcare, we can both end up working long hours and we both commute (in different directions!) to work - life choices we may not have made had we had children! We need a bit of help to adjust our life.

Foster carers receive around £30K PA depending on the child(ren) they are fostering and there was an advert today seeking foster carers in a neighbouring local authority to mine where they are paying £30-£40Kpa for foster carers. Why would a gran/aunt/cousin receive this sort of money for caring for a family member.
If the LA are prepared to pay this for a stranger to foster our nephew, why is unreasonable for us to receive some financial assistance to support him?? We are not looking to make any money off this, but we want to give him the support he needs and some financial assistance would help us to do that.

To the OP, well done on taking in your nephew. I hope it works out for you and you see him blossom under your guardianship. All the best
Thank you, we hope so too x

OP, you say that they were happy to give you him without doing checks on Monday. There is no way this would have been the case, they would have checked both police and social work records before any child would have been placed with you. They may not have explicitly told you that they would have done this but it would be very bad practice to place a child anywhere without background checks carried out.

Well unless they did them VERY quickly, I doubt it! We met with the SW for less than an hour, she only took our names and address 5 minutes before she left and didn't leave the room or make any phone calls before she left, we have only lived at this address a month - to do any background check she would need more info than that (DOB, previous addresses etc) but they claim not to be 'placing him' with us, that is the argument we are having, but it still concerns me that they don't have the level of concern for his wellbeing that we think they should.

The main reason for pushing for this to be a fostering arrangement is not for us to get money, without the recognition of this being a fostering arrangement, we aren't getting any assistance with his care, he is a damaged little boy (& no wonder when you know everything that he has been through) we can't get him in to school for at least 3 weeks, if there are any places, school ends in about 5 weeks? which means if we don't get him in to school - we've been told that we can't then access CAMHS etc, I think he needs either counselling or psychology input, but if we can't request this until September, how long will he be on a waiting list? If he was a looked after child, social services would have the responsibility to put a plan in place for him and a plan in place to support us - this is what we want.

AlwaysSmiling

Have you thought of possibly applying for residency for the young person? If you do, you may be entitled to residence allowance from the LA. It may be worth looking at this option and then looking to seek support for the other issues. Support can be offered at a lower tier to what the Social Services provides, these services can be for example long-term intervention and mentoring type services. You're LA may have details of children's services on the web so it may be worth giving some services a ring and making a referral yourself if you see a service that suits.

Details of residency orders:

http://www.cafcass.gov.uk/the_law_about_children/contact_and_residence.aspx


Good luck.

gizmo111

freejunkie wrote: »

I am in a simular situation but I am a year on now. We wanted to do what wa best for our nephew and ended up involving LA. It is a deliberate ploy for the LA to place children with family members with as less resposibilty as they can get away with, because it is cheaper.

They realise that family members only want to do what is best for the child and we are clueless to the procedures. (The mother was claiming benefits for him even though she didnt have him, and refused to help us). So for us we had to insist that if we didnt recieve funding we would have no alternative but to hand him into LA care, so nephew is a 'looked after child' and we now recieve 'Kinship Carers Allowance.' We also recieve child care fees on top of kinship payment.

However since we have recieved this funding they now class us as on the payrole, so we have numerous L.A.C reviews 6 monthly, attend training courses, social worker appointments (could be once a month during office hours). Nephew comes from london and we fron the midlands, and we have to travel for various appointments and are not rembursed. Also you will have to be CRB checked, personal history, medical history checked. It is a big commitment you are taking on financally and emotionally, and I wish you luck x

Hope this makes sense I accidently deleted, and had to rewrite twice

Social Worker and Reviewing Manager should travel to you for LAC Reviews, it is a review of the placement and they should be seeing home conditions etc PEP's should be held at his school and statutory visits are just that - the social worker is responsible to get to you and make the visit to see the child. Refuse to travel - or insist on being reimbursed if you are happy to travel.

gizmo111

AlwaysSmiling wrote: »

Have you thought of possibly applying for residency for the young person? If you do, you may be entitled to residence allowance from the LA. It may be worth looking at this option and then looking to seek support for the other issues. Support can be offered at a lower tier to what the Social Services provides, these services can be for example long-term intervention and mentoring type services. You're LA may have details of children's services on the web so it may be worth giving some services a ring and making a referral yourself if you see a service that suits.

Details of residency orders:

http://www.cafcass.gov.uk/the_law_about_children/contact_and_residence.aspx


Good luck.

Don't apply for anything off your own back the LA will just walk away then - if theyare to pay any allowance then any application must be through them and they must pay any legal costs for you.

Foster carers receive around £30K PA depending on the child(ren) they are fostering and there was an advert today seeking foster carers in a neighbouring local authority to mine where they are paying £30-£40Kpa for foster carers. Why would a gran/aunt/cousin receive this sort of money for caring for a family member.

Foster carers receive around £30K PA depending on the child(ren) they are fostering and there was an advert today seeking foster carers in a neighbouring local authority to mine where they are paying £30-£40Kpa for foster carers. Why would a gran/aunt/cousin receive this sort of money for caring for a family member.

Why should extended families have to give up their careers or fund larger homes to take on the responsibility of a child that would otherwise be in care and the responsibility of the LA? Why should grannys have to take on the parenting role out of their own funds? They have bought their own children up and give up their freedom (just look at MOOLOO's life) in their latter years to take on another 16 years of doing this. The large amounts are for fee paid foster carers who have lots of expereince and offer an enhanced service with usually very difficult children or they are foster carers with a agency andagain take very damaged children who need a lot of attention.


OP - Insist on a face to face meeting and make it clear that unless you are assessed as foster carers or Special Guardians you are unable to offer your nephew a home as you simply cannot afford it. If they threaten you with foster care for him call teir bluff - they have a duty to place wth family first. If you need any further help either post here or feel free to PM me. I am a social worker and I'm sure Mooloo or others on her threads will verify my identity and advice.

Molly41

I can verify your identity Gizmo and have watched Mooloo's experiences first hand in real life. I know you have supported and advised Mooloo through a great deal and for that I thank you from the bottom of my heart x

marsamver

Hi there, Can anyone give us some advice on Kinship care in both England and Scotland.

Myself and my partner are currently going through the process of taking on a child under Kinship care, the child is not from close family on my partners side and actually lives in Scotland, we are in England. We thought it was the right thing to do after we heard he had been taken into care (currently in foster care). We already have two children of our own.

As a backup measure they are also arranging adoption incase we didn't go through with it.

We've been through the process since the start of the year of being accepted for kinship care, and have passed all the checks and interviews and home visits required so looks like this is going to happen sometime in the next couple of months hopefully.

The local authority (LA) in Scotland have said that under Kinship care they would remain responsible for him and therefore pay £50 a week Kinship allowance and the fact that we are in England would not change this. I've heard that Kinship allowances vary from LA to LA in Scotland but I can't find any info on what the situation is in England as Kinship care doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere.

The LA social worker has now came back to us and said they would like us to look into applying for a residence order to secure the child's future, but due to budget restraints they would not be able to pay any legal costs, we would have to pay ourselves for everything (we cannot get legal aid as we both work) and obviously if this happened then I believe the kinship payments would also end?

They have asked us to seek legal advice (which will also cost us) which we are now looking into. We've contacted the citizens advice in England, they have arranged a meeting with us, but have said we may need advice from Scotland CAB, but they will not even have a conversation with us as we're in England.

Some questions we would like answers for -

1. Can we claim child benefit for a "looked after" child when receiving kinship care allowance?
2. Does a Kinship allowance have to be declared as income or does it come under the foster care tax relief scheme?
3. Does Kinship care affect working tax credit?
4. Do Kinship allowances cease when a residence order is granted?
5. Do Residence order allowances exist?
6. Ballpark figure for the legal costs of a residence order?
7. Are any other costs covered for Kinship care by LA as they are in foster care?

I'm sure there a loads of other things we don't know about too, so any advice is appreciated.

Thanks

gingin_2

marsamver wrote: »

Hi there, Can anyone give us some advice on Kinship care in both England and Scotland.

Myself and my partner are currently going through the process of taking on a child under Kinship care, the child is not from close family on my partners side and actually lives in Scotland, we are in England. We thought it was the right thing to do after we heard he had been taken into care (currently in foster care). We already have two children of our own.

As a backup measure they are also arranging adoption incase we didn't go through with it.

We've been through the process since the start of the year of being accepted for kinship care, and have passed all the checks and interviews and home visits required so looks like this is going to happen sometime in the next couple of months hopefully.

The local authority (LA) in Scotland have said that under Kinship care they would remain responsible for him and therefore pay £50 a week Kinship allowance and the fact that we are in England would not change this. I've heard that Kinship allowances vary from LA to LA in Scotland but I can't find any info on what the situation is in England as Kinship care doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere.

The LA social worker has now came back to us and said they would like us to look into applying for a residence order to secure the child's future, but due to budget restraints they would not be able to pay any legal costs, we would have to pay ourselves for everything (we cannot get legal aid as we both work) and obviously if this happened then I believe the kinship payments would also end?

They have asked us to seek legal advice (which will also cost us) which we are now looking into. We've contacted the citizens advice in England, they have arranged a meeting with us, but have said we may need advice from Scotland CAB, but they will not even have a conversation with us as we're in England.

Some questions we would like answers for -

1. Can we claim child benefit for a "looked after" child when receiving kinship care allowance?
2. Does a Kinship allowance have to be declared as income or does it come under the foster care tax relief scheme?
3. Does Kinship care affect working tax credit?
4. Do Kinship allowances cease when a residence order is granted?
5. Do Residence order allowances exist?
6. Ballpark figure for the legal costs of a residence order?
7. Are any other costs covered for Kinship care by LA as they are in foster care?

I'm sure there a loads of other things we don't know about too, so any advice is appreciated.

Thanks

Hi Marsamver, I wonder if you started a new thread you might get more replies. There are lots of knowledgeable people but they might not see if it's tagged on to an old thread ( but you have not done the "wrong" thing in posting on this thread by any means). It just sounds like a serious question that needs good answers. Wishing you luck

gizmo111

Some questions we would like answers for -

1. Can we claim child benefit for a "looked after" child when receiving kinship care allowance? No
2. Does a Kinship allowance have to be declared as income or does it come under the foster care tax relief scheme?
It is disregarded same as foster care allowance for income tax.

3. Does Kinship care affect working tax credit?

As above - but you need to tell them you have the allowance

4. Do Kinship allowances cease when a residence order is granted? Yes - sometimes you get a residence order allowance.
5. Do Residence order allowances exist?

6. Ballpark figure for the legal costs of a residence order?

Nothing to you - the LA mst meet your costs - they want an RO not you. Go to court and tell the magistatres/judge you cant apply for RO as you have had no funding for legal advice and watch the LA get a roasting.
7. Are any other costs covered for Kinship care by LA as they are in foster care?

Kinship foster care is exactly the same.

I'm sure there a loads of other things we don't know about too, so any advice is appreciated.

Thanks



I have repiled as it is in Emgland - Scotland may vary slightly. The LA want a Ro as they have less responsibility than if a Care Order is granted. Personally I would say no the RO until the child has been with you for 6 months and you see if you need extra support from the LA or if a RO is the correct thing for you. If they don't agree then tell them to get lost - they'll soon change theirmind as they are legally obligated to place with family where at all possible.