Agenda item

This item will provide an update to the Commission relating to recent national developments in Kinship Care and how the national developments have been applied locally.

The agenda item provided an update on the Local Kinship Care Offer, which included an overview of the recent national developments relating to Kinship Care and how these had been applied locally. 

The Chair welcomed to the meeting Jane Wood, Head of Service for Children in Care and Chris Macdonald, Service Manager for the Central Locality Teams and Family Activity Base.

The Chair invited The Service Manager for the Central Locality Teams and Family Activity Base to present the presentation, during which the following was noted:

The National Context-

• The Department of Education definition of kinship care was “any situation in which a child is being raised in the care of a friend or family member who is not their parent. The arrangement may be temporary or longer term’.
• There was a current focus on kinship care through new statutory guidance which was published in October 2024 via the Department of Education. The focus started from an Independent Review of Children’s Social Care in 2022.

The Rotherham Family Approach-

• What matters most and guides our work with families:

o   That children could understand what the service were doing, could tell their story and could be seen by the local authority as unique individuals.

o   That families could feel involved and respected, choosing their solutions where this would be possible.

o   That the local authority see’s children as located in a network, which would be more than their household, recognising the importance and contribution of family, friends and school.

o   That the service would do all that they could to support families to stay together safely, with a clear vision of how to get there.

o   That all social workers would have consistent, reliable supervision and management oversight.

Routes to Kinship Care-

• Kinship fostering, either temporarily or long term.
• Child Arrangement Orders and Special Guardianship Orders.
• Informal arrangements and private fostering.

Kinship Fostering-

• Where a Looked After Child would move to live with a ‘connected person’. Regulation twenty-four permitted placing the child after an initial assessment, but before full fostering panel approval, for up to 16 weeks.
• The local authority had parental responsibility, rather than the carer. Almost all kinship carers approved as foster carers continued to secure their own order.
• There was a statutory requirement to support.
• Fostering panel could approve kinship carers for the specific child only for the long-term.

Child Arrangement Orders-

• Child Arrangements Order’s provided the holder with parental responsibility and would specify that the child would live with them.
• It was not specific to family and/or friends, and it was the same order used to settle disputes between parents about where a child would live.
• Where the carer was a kinship carer, parental responsibility was held equally with the parents.
• There was no statutory requirement to support. The local authority policy included a financial allowance where the child was looked after, or would otherwise have become looked after, with specific criteria to assess against.

Special Guardianship Orders-

• Special Guardianship Orders (SGO’s),  could only be made to non-parents. The order gave the holder overarching parental responsibility but shared with parents.
• Where the child was looked after before, it entitled the holder and child to an assessment of need from the local authority.
• There was a statutory requirement to provide support, this was set out in the Special Guardianship Regulations 2005.
• Professional foster carers could sometimes apply, but the vast majority of SGOs were made to family and/or friends of the child.

The National Context-

• The Department of Education’s Kinship Care: Statutory Guidance, October 2024, required the local authority to:

o   Nominate a senior officer as lead for kinship.

o   Publish and regularly review the local authority Kinship Local Offer.

o   Offer family group decision making to all families before care proceedings.

o   Request the Virtual School nominate an officer for educational outcomes for children in kinship care arrangements.

o   The draft Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill that was before Parliament, included much of the above and included a duty to publish a Kinship Local Offer within two months of the bill becoming law. It was estimated that the local authority would produce their Kinship Local Offer for Rotherham, by May 2025.

The Local Context and Progress-

• The local authority had updated their Kinship Care Practice Guidance in November 2024.
• The service had nominated an officer to lead on kinship care, this was the Service Manager of the Locality.
• The role of the Virtual School Head was to provide advice and guidance regarding children in kinship care, and children with a social worker, this was already established.
• The service was utilising the Department of Education Means Testing Model, with effect from January 2025.
• Family group-decision making was exceptionally well-embedded. Approximately 60% of all families within the locality, including children in need and child protection planning, had engaged in family group decision making.
• There was a comprehensive pathway for kinship foster carers which drew on the local authority’s therapeutic service and community resources.
• The local authorities Engage Crisis Intervention Service supported kinship carers through their most challenging periods, where needed.
• There were long-running support groups for all kinship carers together, these were held monthly and included online and social media groups.

Current Focus of the Service-

• The service was focusing on developing and publishing a Kinship Local Offer. This was scheduled to be presented to Cabinet in July 2025. In order to completed the local offer, the following activities include were on-going:

o   Capturing and analysing data and demographic forecasting to understand the cohort.

o   Completing consultations with kinship carers.

o   Coordinating partnership offers of support.

o   Responding to research and evidence.

• The service aimed to ensure a straightforward pathway to support children and kinship carers, which would respond to their level of need.

The Chair thanked the relevant officer for the presentation and invited questions, this led to the following points being raised during the discussion:

·       A challenge faced by the service whilst implementing the new guidance on kinship care, was ensuring a balance between services being unique for kinship carers, whilst making sure that kinship carers were not isolated from mainstream services and resources.

·       Elective home education was an option for any child and any parent or carer. There were recommendations being considered in relation to children subject to child protection plans and whether additional safeguards were required, or oversight from the local authority to prevent those children from being electively home educated. As part of the kinship assessment process referred to during the presentation, the children and carers would work alongside the team who would encourage school placement and socialisation. The team would also explain the respite that school would provide to a carer for six hours a day.

·       The kinship local offer would be developed by July 2025.

·       There were two Virtual School Headteachers, one for primary and one for secondary age. The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill required the Virtual Head to provide advice and guidance. Part of this was strategic and required the Virtual Head to work with schools, to understand the specific needs of kinship children and kinship carers, for some families there would often also be advice and guidance provided by the Virtual Head directly to kinship carers. The Virtual Heads attended the Kinship Support Group on a quarterly basis to provide support and guidance. Any kinship carer could access support and guidance from the Virtual School, via their professional network.

·       Regulation twenty-four was helpful statutory guidance which allowed the service to make emergency and thorough assessments. An example was provided of immediate police checks that could be completed when required, to assist with placing a child quickly but safely.

·       There were two types of informal kinship arrangements. One was an informal arrangement between a parent and close relative, such as a grandparent, aunt or uncle. In this situation the parent retained parental responsibility and the ability to make decisions. In these types of situations there was no requirement to notify the local authority of the informal arrangement. The other type of informal arrangement was where a parent would make an agreement with an individual who was not classed as a close relative, such as a family friend or great aunt and/or uncle. In these situations, there was a requirement for the parent to notify the local authority, and a duty on the local authority to assess whether the arrangement was suitable via the private fostering process. There was clear data relating to private fostering arrangements, however capturing data on informal arrangements with close family members was a challenge as there was no requirement to notify the local authority. The service was working with schools to establish how common informal arrangements were within the borough.

Resolved:-  That the Improving Lives Select Commission:

1)    Consider the content of the report and associated presentation and acknowledge the updates in Kinship practice.

2)    Requests that the Rotherham Kinship Local Offer be presented to the Commission, in advance of being presented to Cabinet.

3)    Requests that a written response is provided to members relating to whether specific data is available on the number of children and young people electively home educated, who are looked after or in kinship arrangements.