Sharp rise in Rochdale children in care 'outside borough', says council

Rochdale's children's services department is set to be £5m in the red this year

Rochdale Council placed 105 vulnerable children in care outside the borough between April and November of last year, according to council statistics.

The figures suggest this approach is becoming far more widespread - there were only 91 such cases in the whole of 2017-18 and 77 throughout 2016-17.

The council said the cost of housing young people outside the borough was one reason for a predicted £4.8m budget shortfall for children's services.

It intends to hire more foster carers.

Rochdale Council said it was also planning to "involve families more" when they are struggling to cope.

'Troubled times'

Head of Children's Services, Councillor Kieran Heakin, said: "There are many different reasons children come into care. It can be a relationship breakdown and in some cases families going through stressful times - it can be austerity measures having an effect on households.

"In some cases it only takes a redundancy or someone losing their job and it will effect them quite significantly. These are troubled times unfortunately."

He added: "I think we need to try and involve families a bit more.

"Children can be looked after by a grandparent or family relative, it's good when a child is known to them.

"If we can get more that's a better way of dealing with it - keeping it in the family."

The average cost of external foster placements is about £41,000 per year, while annual residential costs come in close to £165,000 according to figures published by the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Council bosses are unable to say exactly where children have been placed for safeguarding reasons.

Some children have to be placed outside of Greater Manchester and the North West of England altogether - but Mr Heakin says Children's Services keep a close eye on how they are faring.

And he said there are currently 19 previously looked-after Rochdale children studying at university - one of the highest rates in the country.