Foster carers urged to share concerns over respect

Foster carers said they feel they are not being listened to by the council

Foster carers have been urged to share their concerns with social workers after a council meeting heard many felt they were being treated with a “lack of respect”.

A North Yorkshire Council meeting heard rising costs and limited support from social workers was driving foster carers away from the role.

Council officers said they had underlined the importance of “relationships, respect and values” to the authority’s social workers.

The authority’s director of children’s services, Stuart Carlton, said it was “not acceptable” for foster carers to feel disrespected.

One long-time foster carer called Keith told a children’s scrutiny meeting that many social workers had become more distanced from children and their carers and too focused on “process, procedure, protocol and compliance".

According to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, he also said social workers got “told off for challenging the system, even when it’s in the interests of the child to do so”.

Jakki Wilby, vice-chair of the Scarborough, Whitby and Ryedale Foster Carers Association, said although “a modest package of improvements” had been implemented by the council last year, “we did not think these would solve either carers or the council’s problems”.

Ms Wilby added: “As we continued to listen to carers it was clear this is not about money, it was also about a lack of respect.

"Carers drift away from caring and too few new ones are coming forward.”

The council also heard foster carers were not being treated as professionals or feeling valued.

Councillor Peter Lacey, who spent ten years as a foster carer, added a lower age profile of children in care, children with more complex needs and fewer foster carers registering signalled “a perfect storm” of problems.

'Respect and admiration'

Council officers said if foster carers had any concerns they should escalate them to social work managers.

“We would really urge any carer who feels they have been tret disrespectfully and that it has not been dealt with appropriately by the service to come and tell us," Mr Carlton said.

The meeting heard the council’s payments to foster carers were last year raised above the rate of inflation, alongside the introduction of bridging payments, an improvement in mileage payments, a staff benefits scheme and a £500 “golden hello” for new carers, totalling an additional £300,000.

After the meeting, the authority’s children’s services executive member councillor Janet Sanderson said foster carers had her “absolute respect and admiration”.

She added: “They share their, homes, their families and their hearts with our children that come into care and there can be no thanks great enough for what they do."

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