Working with Families and Professionals

1. Introduction

As a Foster Carer you have an important part to play in the lives of children and families that you may work with.

Some children who are looked after will go home, so it is important for them to keep their relationships with parents and other family members.

Parents or other relatives may visit a child in your home, or the child's social worker may feel these meetings should take place somewhere else. Contact will be set out in the child's Placement Plan and Care Plan.

See: Contact Between the Child, their Family and Others.

It is important that you develop an open and honest relationship with the parents and ensure they know at all times that the child is the most important person and their well-being is being looked after by you.

This will be difficult for parents, so you need to ensure you work sensitively with them. Sometimes no matter what they have done, a child will continue to love their parents; you should never speak about parents in a negative way.

During your time as a foster carer, you will also work alongside many other professionals including your Supervising Social Worker as part of a team around the child/young person that makes sure the child's needs are met and developed and they are safe from harm.

Professionals will include amongst others;

Each child or young person placed in foster care will have a social worker.

Children Looked After Social workers work with the whole family, not just the child/ren, and although their primary concern is for the child's welfare they do have to balance this with the wishes and needs of the parents. They should keep you informed about the progress of the plan for the child and any changes of plan or direction.

Their role is to:

Assess the needs of a child;
Develop a relationship with the child;
Plan for the child and regularly review that plan;
Work with you, the child and the child's family;
Share information with you;
Identify and obtain resources so that the child's needs are met;
Visit the child at the foster home within one week of the placement and then at least every four weeks or visit in line with the Care Plan.

If as a foster care you or the child in placement are having some difficulties contacting the social worker it is important to let your Supervising Social Worker know so that they can work to try and resolve this.

There are social workers working in different teams in Hertfordshire:

Family Assessment Teams

Assessment teams provide parenting assessments. The Family Assessment Teams are staffed by qualified social workers. As a foster carer you may be asked to liaise with a worker from the Family Assessment Team in your area if the child or young person that you are caring for is receiving a service from them.

Family Safeguarding teams

Safeguarding and FST social workers are responsible for the longer term intervention for children subject to a Child Protection Plan and Children in Need, and will work with children involved in Care proceedings.

Children Looked After Teams

The 6 CLA teams are responsible for working with children and young people who are in the care of the local authority. Each child in local authority care will have an allocated social worker.

Care leaver teams

Care leaver teams support young people who in the process and/or have left care. Care leavers are entitled to support until the age of 21 (or 25 if they are in further education).

0-25 Together Service

Each area has a Disabled Children’s Team (0-25 Together service) which covers all aspects of support for disabled children including those looked after by the local authority. This service work with those who have a physical and/or mental impairment that has a long term and adverse effect resulting in significant impact on daily living/development of the child or young adult.

SASH

The Specialist Adolescent Service Hertfordshire (SASH) aims to safeguard and support vulnerable young people, including those receiving a Youth Justice service, children at risk and children at the edge of care.

Education

Each school will have a designated teacher for Looked After Children. You should work with the educational settings to make sure the child is achieving what they should and that they have aspirations for their future. You will need to keep them informed of the child'/young person's situation.

Some children/young people will attend different education settings to a mainstream school setting.

Hertfordshire Virtual school has the responsibility for tracking the process of children looked after and care leavers by offering support and interventions to the child and the school. See more information on the Hertfordshire Virtual School Website.

3. The Independent Reviewing Officer

Each child or young person placed in foster care will have an Independent Reviewing Officer (IRO). Wherever it is possible, the IRO will meet the child before the first Looked After Review (CLA Review).

Sibling groups, whether or not placed together, should usually have the same IRO who will be allocated for the duration that the child is looked after.

The IRO has two roles: chairing a child's Looked After Review (CLA Review) and monitoring a child's case on an on-going basis. They can be a good source of support to you if needed when plans for a child are not going how it should, although it is the child's social worker you should try to speak to first.

4. Guardian Ad Litem

A Guardian is appointed by the court from CAFCASS (Children And Family Court And Support Service) when they want an independent view of what has been happening and what should happen in the child's life. They may also be involved in adoption proceedings.

You should support the child to share their views particularly about their future, and are supported to spend time with the guardian appointed so that the Guardian can tell the child's story in court where the child is not able to do this themselves.

5. Independent Visitor

The Local Authority looking after a child has a duty to appoint a person to be the child's Independent Visitor where it appears to them that it would be in the child's best interests to do so. The Independent Visitor will have a duty to make regular visits to the child and maintain other contact, by telephone and letter as appropriate.

Independent Visitors are particularly important where children have no contact with any member of their family.

The main purpose of the visits and contacts will be to befriend the child and give advice and assistance as appropriate.

Your Supervising social worker, the child’s social worker and IRO can support with making a referral to an Independent visitor

6. Advocate

This is a person appointed to speak on behalf of another person and/or to support them. All children who are Looked After should be given information about how to access an Advocate. The child's Independent Reviewing Officers should also make sure that this information is available to the child and assist the child to identify and appoint a suitable Advocate as appropriate.

7. Children and Young People’s Mental Health Services (CYPMHS)

The Children and Young People’s Mental Health Services (CYPMHS) take referrals for Looked After Children. Some of these children, due to their experiences, may have higher levels of behavioural, emotional and mental health problems. Your role will be to highlight any issues of concern about a child/young person that may result in the need to refer to this service. The referral will be made by the child's social worker. If the service is needed, you should make sure appointments are kept and work with professionals from the service.

For more information about CYPMHS in Hertfordshire, please see Hertfordshire Partnership Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS).

8. The Looked After Children Nurse

You will work alongside the Nurse for Children Looked After and other health professionals to make sure the health needs of Children are met. Children looked after have an annual health check carried out by the Nurse for Looked after Children.

9. Children Services Safeguarding Out of Hours Service (CS SOOHS)

The Emergency Safeguarding line provides social care and advice in emergency situations, outside office hours, in order to support families in acute difficulty.

Emergency Safeguarding Line
Tel: 0300 123 4043
Out of office hours
7 days a week

Please note that as a Foster carer you must contact the Emergency Safeguarding Line when the following occurs outside of office hours:

When a child in your care goes missing from placement;
When a child in your care is hospitalised and in need of emergency treatment;
When a child is involved in an accident and/or an incident involving the police;
The safeguarding team will not automatically call you back but may decide to do so after assessing the situation or if you specifically request that they do so.

10. Fostering Support Out Of Hours

Fostering Support is provided outside of office hours.

Our County Wide Fostering Support (Out of Hours Service) telephone service is provided by Fostering Service Staff, specifically for support with Fostering related issues, from 5.30 pm till 11pm every day, including Saturdays and Sundays.

The support is there for carers who would like advice and support for urgent issues which cannot be delayed till the next working day. It is not for non- urgent issues and queries (payments, cancelling appointments etc.) that can hold until the next working day. It is telephone support only and workers will not be undertaking outreach visits as part of the service.

There are two separate numbers for carers depending on which side of the county you live. Your supervising social worker will provide you with the number once you are approved.

11. Adoption and Fostering Recruitment Team

The fostering and adoption service has a specific team responsibility for the recruitment of adopters and foster carers. We have a group of foster carers who act as Recruitment ambassadors to support local recruitment of foster carers.

We are always looking to get more carers involved in supporting recruitment.

The Fostering Recruitment Team manages the overall recruitment strategy and organises an overarching plan of events for the year. Foster carers are encouraged to attend these events wherever possible as they are a great opportunity to talk to members of the public about fostering. Your Supervising social worker will be able to let you know about planned recruitment opportunities. Alternatively, if you know about any events or opportunities for publicising fostering, please email: fostering.recruitment@hertfordshire.gov.uk.

12. Adoption Service

The Adoption Service is responsible for finding adoptive families for children who cannot remain with their birth families and where the care plan is Adoption.

In Hertfordshire there are 5 Adoption teams in total.

There are 2 Adoption assessment teams, one for the West and South of the County (West Adoption Team) is based in Rainbow House St Albans, the other for the North and East (East Adoption Team) is based in Farnham House. The adoption team is responsible for recruiting, assessing, training and supporting adopters. They also provide support on adoption issues to parents, children and other professionals.

There is also an Adoption family finding team based at Farnham house who will work closely with Social workers, foster carers, birth family and adopters to match children to adopters who can meet their needs.

We also have the Adoption Support Team that provides a service to all those affected by adoption, birth families, adult adoptees, adoptive families and adopted children. The Adoption Support team is based at Rainbow House St Albans. The team carry out Assessments of Adoption support needs and ensure support is put in place to suppor the famliy with their adoption related needs. The Team also manages letterbox and direct contact for birth families, counselling and support, birth families’ support groups and support for adopted adults to access their adoption records.

When the adoptive family is linked with a child, they have a period of introductions before the child goes to live with them. As a foster carer for a child transitioning to adoption, you will play an important role in supporting the child through this time and introductions. It is important that the child sees you working alongside the adoptive parents. You can also give valuable advice and support to the adoptive parents who will be feeling anxious about getting it right. Your Supervising Social Worker will guide you through this and should be contacted if you have any concerns.

13. Brokerage Accommodation Team

The Brokerage Service exists to source, facilitate and monitor care packages and placements for children known to Children’s Services aged 0-18. Brokerage has a function to obtain best value for the council and to gate-keep arrangements for children who need to access support within their own homes and in placements sourced by the Brokerage Service. The Brokerage Service will provide financial monitoring and processing for CLA. Brokerage will provide data on trends in provision matched against needs to help the current/forward planning for Children’s Services. Brokerage will produce a data set to support inspection process and support senior managers in making decisions based on placement and package trends/resource allocation.

This list is not exhaustive, during your role as a foster carer you may work with other agencies and individuals to ensure the child/young person receives the support and advice they and you need. Your Supervising Social Worker will discuss this with you.