My Placement may be Breaking Down

Disruption Meetings

Placements ending in an unplanned way nearly always leave all those concerned feeling bad. Your Supervising Social Worker will want to work with you to make sure that everything is done to support you with children and young people living with you and to manage difficulties.

When you are struggling, use your support mechanisms to help you to find a way forward. It is critical that you speak to your Supervising Social Worker at the earliest opportunity if you are experiencing difficulties within the placement and a Placement Support Meeting will be arranged (see below).

However, not all foster care placements work out the way we hope they will. Disruption is the word used to describe a placement which ends before it was supposed to.

A disruption can also occur when Children’s Social Care feel the placement is no longer meeting the child’s needs or you decide that you are no longer able to care for a child or the child decides they do not want to stay in the placement.

It is vital that for whatever reason the placement ended, you make the move for the child as positive as possible.

Placement Support Meeting

In the event of a foster placement being identified at risk it is the responsibility of both the allocated social worker for the child and the supervising social worker for the foster carers to liaise and organise a placement support meeting. This should be held within 5 working days of the risk being identified or within 72 hours if the placement is identified at risk of immediate breakdown. It is critical that the child’s ISRO is notified of the risk of placement disruption immediately and is invited to contribute to the placement support meeting in person or in writing alongside any other key professionals. The support needs of the child or young person and the foster placement must be clearly identified at this meeting, and the appropriate support package devised and put into place to prevent a placement breakdown. A placement support plan must be provided to all professionals, the foster carers and the child where appropriate (in writing) within 48 hours of the placement support meeting taking place. If there is no minute taker present at the meeting the chair will need to circulate a list of actions that make up the placement support and risk management plan to all attendees within 48 hours.

Please see North Somerset’s Long term Matching and Permanence Policy for further details.

Placement Disruption Meetings

Where it is agreed by all parties that the right course of action is for a placement to end a placement disruption meeting may be held after the placement has ended to understand what caused the placement to end and to learn from this going forward. It is an opportunity also to check that the child has had the opportunity to say goodbye to the carers and significant others, arrangements for staying in contact have been made and the child has all their possessions and records of their life story such as photos, special keep sakes etc. It is expected that a placement disruption meeting is always held unless there are exceptional circumstances in the case of the breakdown of a permanent log term placement.

These meetings may be held a little while after the actual disruption so that some of the immediate feelings of upset have reduced. They will consider all aspects of the placement in an attempt to understand what happened. Disruption Meetings can sometimes feel threatening, but it is important to recognise that their purpose is not to blame anyone but to reach a better understanding of what happened, including whether more support should have been provided. Most carers who have been through a placement breakdown have found the Disruption Meeting helpful.

Who may attend:

• You;
• The child, if appropriate;
• Your Supervising Social Worker and their Manager;
• The child’s social worker and their Manager;
• The proposed carer;
• Independent Reviewing Officer;
•  Any other relevant people. 

The Chair of the meeting should ensure that the circumstances that led to the disruption are reviewed, and that everyone has the opportunity to express their views in order to:

• Find out how and why the disruption happened;
• Learn from what happened and avoid the same thing happening again - for the child/others in your home;
• Identify the positive work and good experiences for the child amongst all the difficulties;
• Support all parties involved and help them carry on and recover;
• Contribute to the future planning for the child;
• Identify work to be done and who will do it.

The Chair will make sure minutes are sent to all those involved. The report of the Disruption Meeting may be presented to the fostering panel.

A Looked After Review should also be arranged.

A review may be held to look at your approval terms.