3.1.10 Family and Friends Policy

RELEVANT LINKS

See the Brighton and Hove Family and Friends Flowchart.

Introduction
Principles Underpinning Family & Friends Policy
Children Cared for by Family & Friends Carers
Family and Friends Foster Carers and Looked After Children
Private Fostering
Residence Orders
Family and Friends Care Outside of LAC Procedures – Assessment and Agreement Process
Family & Friends Foster Carers
Support Services to Family & Friends Carers, Family & Friends Foster Carers and Carers That Proceed to Offer Permanence Through a Residence Order or Special Guardianship

1. Introduction

This policy defines the different sort of arrangements that lead to children being cared for by people from within their wider family and friendship network and the role of the Department within those arrangements. It highlights the key principles underpinning the policy, the assessment, planning and decision making process and support services that should be available to the children and carers.

2. Principles Underpinning Family & Friends Policy

The child's welfare is paramount.

If a child cannot live with his/her birth parents, care by Family and Friends carers or Family & Friends Foster Carers for Looked After children is the placement of first choice, provided this meets the needs of the child.

It is essential that a pro-active approach is taken to considering family and friends in the child's network that may be able to offer either short term or long term care.

The family need to be involved in the decision making about future planning for the child and a Family Group Conference needs to be actively considered in all circumstances where children may not be able to live with their birth parents or where the birth family may need additional support to enable them to continue to care safely for their children.

Every child has the right to have the opportunity to develop secure attachments to carers who are capable of providing safe and effective and loving care for the duration of his/her childhood, so that child can thrive and develop.

For most children, the best prospect for their emotional, physical, social, cultural, language and legal needs to be met will be to remain with, or return to live, with their birth parent/s.

If however, a child cannot return home within a timescale that meets his/her needs, then long term care by Family & Friends carers or Family & Friends Foster Carers is the placement of first choice to meet these needs, provided this is consistent with the child's welfare. Under these circumstances, the carers should be supported to obtain an appropriate legal order giving them legal responsibility for the child through a Residence Order, Special Guardianship Order or Adoption Order.

This policy supports the 'No Order' principle of the Children Act 1989, 'the aim …of the Children Act 1989…is to ensure that an Order is granted only where it will positively improve the child's welfare', (Children Act 1989 Guidance and Regulations, Vol. 1).

The family and friends policy supports processes for children, who need to be cared for away from home, to be cared for by carers from within the family & friends network, and for the child not to become a Looked After Child unless legal proceedings are essential to safeguard the welfare of the child.

Families themselves are usually best placed to find their own solutions and to make safe plans for children within the family: intervention from the Local Authority should be at the minimum needed to safeguard the welfare of the child and support the family.

Family and Friends carers and the children they care for will be supported in the community by universal services as well as by appropriate services from Children & Young People’s Trust.

The majority of Family & Friends carers will have had a previous, or ongoing significant relationship with a child for whom they are offering to care and whose needs they can meet, in circumstances where it has been assessed the child cannot live, either temporarily or permanently with his/her birth parent/s.

Family and Friends arrangements coming within the scope of this Policy and Procedures will have been initiated, facilitated, or supported by Brighton & Hove Children & Young People’s Trust.

When a child is in Family & Friends care, his/her birth parent/s retain legal parental responsibility, as the child is not looked after or subject to any legal order investing parental responsibility in another party. It is therefore essential that clear agreements are made with the birth parents about the day to day care of their child by the Family & Friends carer.

3. Children Cared for by Family & Friends Carers

They are children who are referred to Children & Young People’s Trust and who are assessed via an Initial Assessment as being Children in Need. They may, for whatever circumstances, be children in need of protection from their parents.

The Initial Assessment and Core Assessment for the child and his/her family will have determined that the child cannot live either temporarily or permanently, with his/her birth parent/s, and so needs to be cared for away from home. A Family Group Conference should always be considered in such circumstances.

The child's circumstances will be such that, if Family & Friends had not come forward to be assessed to care for the child, then the child would be placed with stranger foster carers, or be in residential care, or be adopted.

The child cared for by Family and Friends Carers will not become a Looked After Child, unless he/she needs to do so in order to secure his or her well-being. Consideration will be given to securing the placement by private law orders if necessary.

If the child needs to become a Looked After Child, his or her carers will need to be assessed as Family and Friends Foster Carers.

In the majority of cases, the child will have had a previous, or on-going, significant relationship with the Family and Friends Carers.

4. Family and Friends Foster Carers and Looked After Children

Some children who are placed with Family and Friends carers will need to be Looked After Children and these Family or Friends carers will therefore need to be assessed to become approved as Family and Friends Foster Carers

The Local Authority will always follow the 'No Order' principle in the Children Act 1989 and so reasons must be clearly demonstrated why the child needs an Order, or to be Accommodated, to secure his/her well-being.

The circumstances under which children in Family or Friends care may need to enter the Looked After system or an Order may be needed for the child, may be:

When birth parent/s may not agree, or may be inconsistent, as to their agreement to their child being cared for by the Kinship/Family & Friends Carers. Under these circumstances private law orders would not be appropriate.
When there is concern that the child's placement with Family or Friends carers may be seriously disrupted by a birth parent, whose behaviour may have been assessed as being potentially dangerous, or as posing a significant risk.
When a Family or Friends carer may feel threatened, or unsafe, in managing contact of the child with the birth parent/s.
When a birth parent may be untraceable, or incapable of giving agreement to the child being cared for by the Family or Friends carer. Legal advice should be sought about the appropriateness of a private law order under these circumstances.
In any of the above circumstances, it might be assessed that the Local Authority needs to share parental responsibility with the birth parent/s, in order to promote the child's welfare and to secure their placement with the Family and Friends Foster Carers.

A Legal Planning Meeting will need to take place under all these circumstances. If the child needs to become a Looked After Child his/her Family or Friends carers will need to be assessed and approved to become Family and Friends Foster Carers.

5. Private Fostering

In some circumstances, a child's parents may make their own arrangements for care of their child and the Local Authority will not therefore be involved in the setting up of these arrangements.

Private Fostering is an arrangement made between the person with legal Parental Responsibility for a child and the private foster carers: if the Local Authority is involved in making the placement, then the arrangement is not private fostering.

Relatives within the Children Act 1989 definition of relatives (grandparent, aunts, uncles, siblings, step-parents) cannot become private foster carers.

If the care arrangement for the child is to last for longer than 28 days, (in one continuous period, or accumulatively over a year) the private foster carer, or the person with legal parental responsibility for the child, has a duty to inform the Local Authority of the arrangements for the child.

Financial arrangements for the care of the child are made between the person with parental responsibility for the child and the carers. However, the child and his/her carers have the same right as any other family in the community to be assessed for help, including financial help, under Section 17 (Children Act 1989).

Once informed of the private fostering arrangements for the child, the Local Authority has a duty to satisfy itself that the welfare of the child is being satisfactorily safeguarded and promoted. (Children Act '89 Part 1X Section 67 (1)).

There is a duty on the Local Authority to visit the private foster carer’s home and assess the suitability of the placement: to ensure the home is safe: to obtain information on the private foster carers to ensure they are not disqualified from fostering and to visit a child in a private foster home regularly and to make a record of each visit. All statutory checks on the private foster carers and all adult members of their household need to be carried out. Regular reviews of the arrangements also need to be undertaken.

The Local Authority can prevent the placement if the person is disqualified under the terms of the Children Act 1989 or falls within the prohibitions of the Act (Part 1X, 'Private Fostering' Sections 68 & 69).

6. Residence Orders

A relative or friend who is considering offering to care for a child, or a Family and Friends Carer or Family and Friends Foster Carer already caring for a child, may want to apply to the Court to make an application for a Residence Order in respect of that child.

A Residence Order confers shared Parental Responsibility, with day-to-day responsibility for the child being held by the holder of the Residence Order. The Residence Order states the arrangements for where the child should live.

A Residence Order for a child replaces any Looked After Child legal arrangements or Family and Friends Care arrangements as it will automatically discharge any Care Order.

In exceptional circumstances, Brighton & Hove Children & Young People’s Trust may assist a carer with the costs of applying for a Residence Order for a child.

In circumstances where a Family and Friends Carer is caring for a child on a long-term, or permanent basis, the optimum way of offering that child legal security would be for his/her carers to apply for a Residence or Special Guardianship Order (from 2005), so that the day-to-day parental responsibilities that the carers take on for the child would be legally protected and defined by the legal order.

In circumstances where a child is Looked After and is placed with Family and Friends Foster Carers the plan for the child to achieve permanence through his/her carers applying for a Residence Order or Special Guardianship Order will be considered via the Looked After Review system.

7. Family and Friends Care Outside of LAC procedures – Assessment and Agreement Process

In situations where a child or children need to be cared for away from the birth parents because the parents are not able to safely or adequately care for a child for whatever reason a pro-active approach needs to be taken to consider the suitability and availability of a temporary or on-going placement within the extended family or friendship network.

It is not possible to prescribe for the many types of situations that a fieldwork team may be presented with but it is important to highlight the principles of the policy towards family and friends care and to ensure that the needs of the child are at the forefront of all decision making.

Example 1 – initial assessment, short term support to extended family member but no need for continued social work involvement.

The Area teams will be presented with some situations that do not meet the threshold for Section 47 investigations, however the parent may be temporarily unable to provide adequate care for their child for a variety of circumstances.

An Initial Assessment will be undertaken and because of the particular circumstances, a parent may make arrangements or be supported to make arrangements for their child to be cared for by a relative. (If a child is cared for by a non-relative for more than 28 days and the placement has been made by the parent then private fostering regulations are applicable).
The Area team may decide they need to offer some very short term financial support via Section 17.
The Area team Managers have the discretion to decide that in view of the fact that the parent appears to be making adequate arrangements no further assessment of the proposed family carers needs to take place apart from the basic carefirst check. They may also signpost the family to other support services.

Example 2 – Section 47 assessment or initial and core assessment in respect of a child that would meet the threshold to be accommodated or care proceedings to be initiated.

In many situations the Area teams will be involved in a child protection matter or a case that would meet the threshold for accommodation. An initial and core assessment or assessment under Section 47 is undertaken.
An agreement is reached with the birth parents that the child or children concerned need to live elsewhere due to certain risk factors.
Active consideration must be given to making a referral to Daybreak for a Family Group Conference. Family Network meetings can be set up and chaired by the relevant fieldwork manager as appropriate and should involve all the key family and friends members and seek to involve the family in making agreements about the short term care of a child within the family. Family Network meetings should be meetings that are organised and set up speedily to help inform and involve the family and friends network following an emergency or crisis occurring within the family. They do not replace the need to plan for a Family Group Conference which is chaired by an independent person and empowers the family to consider the risks and solutions to providing safe and stable care for a child.
Basic checks will be undertaken on the family or friends carer that is offering to care for the child, this will need to include appropriate checks on all the adults in the household. CareFirst checks or a check with the appropriate local authority social services database, register for children subject to a Child Protection Plan checks, Police Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) and Health checks will need to undertaken. (It may be necessary to gain a PNC check until a full CRB check is returned). Where the family and friends carer is already known to Brighton & Hove CYPT or another Social Services Department all efforts must be made to gain key background information to inform the decision to support a child in such a placement.
The accommodation will need to be seen and considered adequate to meet the child’s needs and initial arrangements for contact with birth family and for education and health needs to be met agreed with the birth family and family and friends carer.
A basic agreement will need to made between the parties involved which details the expectations of the carers and the parents and the support and supervision arrangements that will be provided by the social work team involved.
The child will need to have been consulted as appropriate dependent on the child’s age and his or her views recorded.
The Service Manager will be for responsible for agreeing a placement on an emergency basis following the basic checks and the support plan for an arrangement for the child to be cared for by a family and friends carer outside of the LAC system. Financial assistance can be considered to support such placements up to the level of the family and Friends fostering allowance.
It is intended that most of these situations will be short term arrangements for the care of the child. If the child cannot be cared for by their birth parent in the longer term then the family and friends carer should be supported to consider applying for a legal order which gives them parental responsibility and therefore affords the child greater protection and stability.
Some family and friends carers will live at some distance from Brighton & Hove. Any plan for support needs to identify appropriate local resources that can be accessed.
On some occasions a family and friends carer will be identified to care for a parent and their child offering a parent and baby placement. If the family and friends carer is to play a key role with responsibility for the baby and potentially the parent (if that parent is under 16 years) this arrangement needs to be considered in the same way as other family and friends care arrangements outside of the LAC process and appropriate checks made and agreements and support plans put in place.

8. Family & Friends Foster Carers

The key regulations that apply to these family and friends foster placements are the Fostering Services Regulations under Section 23 of Care Standards Act 2000. Emergency and immediate placements by local authorities are covered by Regulation 38. The regulations state that where a local authority is satisfied that the immediate placement of a child is necessary, they may place a child with a person that is not an existing approved foster carer after interviewing him/her, inspecting the household and obtaining information about other persons living in the household. This arrangement can continue for a period of not more than 6 weeks. It is conditional on the following;

The person is a relative or friend of the child
The person has made a written agreement with the local authority to carry out the duties specified in the regulations namely:
1. To care for the child as if he/she were a member of that person’s family;
2. To permit any person authorised by the local authority to visit the child at any time;
3. To allow the child to be removed at any time if appropriate by the local authority;
4. To ensure that information that the person may acquire relating to the child, or his or her family or any other person which has been given to him/her in confidence in connection with the placement is kept confidential and not disclosed except to, or with agreement of the local authority;
5. To allow contact with the child in accordance with the terms of any court order relating to contact or any arrangements made or agreed by the local authority.
The local authority are satisfied that it is the most suitable way of performing its duty under the 1989 Children Act
Where a local authority make a placement under this regulation outside their area they shall notify the appropriate area authority.

When such a placement is made it becomes an emergency or immediate foster placement. The placement should be funded as a family and friends foster placement with appropriate foster care rate being paid. The social worker undertakes the basic checks in line with the regulations, plus CareFirst check or social services database check and commences CRB, child protection and health checks. Family and friends foster carers must have a full medical so the GP will complete the AH form which is sent to the medical advisor, for her views. Immediate or emergency foster placements are agreed by the relevant fieldwork Area Manager. The Area Manager will inform the Fostering Panel administrator and an interim report must be presented to Fostering Panel within 6 weeks. Once carers are approved as foster carers the full regulations and standards that govern ‘stranger' foster carers also apply to family and friends foster carers.

Once an assessment is commenced a booking to Fostering Panel should be made straight away as Panel papers are required 2 weeks in advance of Panel. Bookings to Fostering Panel should be made with the Fostering Panel administrator and the Family and Friends team Practice Manager alerted. Once a carer has been approved by the Agency Decision Maker following Panel that carer will be allocated a supervising social worker from the Family & Friends team.

It is recognised that in most situations a full BAAF F2 assessment will not have been completed in 6 weeks. An interim report must be presented to Panel within 6 weeks and Panel can make a recommendation for an interim approval of up to 3 months during which time a full BAAF F2 assessment should have been completed if family and friends fostering continues to be the care plan. Decisions will continue to be made by the Agency Decision Maker in line with other Fostering Panel recommendations and conveyed to the family and friends carers by the child's social worker immediately after Panel.

The interim report and the full F2 report have to be jointly owned reports by the child's social worker and the social worker assessing the carers. It is expected that both social workers will attend Panel with their Practice Managers if appropriate.

The interim report will comprise Part 1 of BAAF F2 which details the basic factual information about the applicants. They will need to understand the responsibilities the Department has, as the child is Looked After, to ensure key checks are undertaken and information about the applicants, their family and their capacity to care for the child and work in partnership with the Department is fully considered as part of the assessment process. The carers will need to sign a written agreement in relation to their care of the child and once they are approved on an interim basis they will need to sign the foster care agreement form. Further reports should address any concerns or issues raised by panel at the interim stage.

It will be a requirement for the first interim assessment that three referees, including two non-family members are identified in relation to the application. They should be visited and separate reports on these visits appended to the assessment report. Any difficulties obtaining such references should be recorded within the report. It may be appropriate for further references to be obtained as part of the full assessment. It will also be a requirement that referees are checked against the register for children subject to a child protection plan as part of the full assessment.

The narrative section of the form F2 Part 2 for interim assessments should include the following:

The reason for the placement, motivation of the carers and a brief outline of the care plan including any timescale for the placement, key court dates etc.
The nature and quality of the relationship between the carer and the child/ren including how long and how well the carer has known the child/ren. This should include the applicants understanding of the concerns that led to the child being looked after and capacity to work in partnership with the Department to provide safe and caring environment for the child.
Brief information on the child including whether the child is on the CPR and how the child is settling into the placement. The child’s views on the placement and the capacity of the carers to meet the child’s needs. This should include issues relating to the child’s physical and emotional well being as well as any issues that arise for the child’s ethnicity, culture, language, religion, sexuality or disability.
Brief information on the child’s health and education needs and capacity of the carer to meet those needs.
The nature of the relationship between the carers and the birth family. The birth family’s view on the placement and the arrangements for contact.
Assessment to date of the carers’ ability to meet the child’s needs and work with the care plan, this is essentially a risk assessment focusing on the strengths of the placement, areas of potential difficulty and support needed for the placement. It would be helpful to include in this section a brief description of the assessment work that is still outstanding. As with any assessment report it is important to be clear what information is self reported and what information has been independently verified and for the social worker to provide analysis and evidence for that analysis throughout the report.

There may be additional information on the child’s file, which could be helpful to append to the report. This could include a genogram and/or a chronology.

The Fostering Network Heath and Safety Checklist should be completed and the outcome of this recorded in the appropriate section of Part 1 of F2 form and information given on the sleeping arrangements for the child.

The report should be signed by the social worker undertaking the assessment and his/her manager. A copy of the report should be provided for the applicants and they should be allowed to submit any additional comments to Panel. The applicants will be supported to attend Fostering Panel when the full assessment is presented.

Once the family and friends foster carers have been given interim approval following the Decision of the Agency Decision Maker the Department must ensure that the Fostering Regulations are complied with.

The Family and Friends Foster carer will be required to sign the relevant foster care agreement.

The social worker assessing the foster carer will proceed as appropriate to complete the full assessment and present the assessment report to the Fostering Panel. Referrals should be made to the Family & Friends team in relation to the need for such assessments following the initial approval at Panel.

The assessment of the carers as family and friends foster carers is undertaken in circumstances where the Department has initiated care proceedings and has either placed the child on an emergency basis with a member of the child's family and friendship network or the child is cared for by 'stranger' foster carers and the Department is assessing relatives or friends as potential interim or longer term carers for that child.

The assessment of the family and friends foster carer will therefore be undertaken alongside the other assessment work taking place within the care proceedings.

It is essential when an assessment of a family and friends foster carer is undertaken that there is close communication between the worker undertaking the assessment and the worker for the child and the birth family. The worker undertaking the assessment needs to have read the case files and have a full understanding of the background information and the events that led to the initiation of care proceedings. The worker undertaking the assessment from the Family and Friends Team will not also fulfil the role of supervising social worker to ensure that the roles remain separate.

Assessments of family and friends foster carers have the added complexity of the family and friendship dynamics and the fact that the carers may have conflicting loyalties to the child and the birth parents. They may be placed in a very difficult situation e.g. grandparents wishing to care for their grandchildren but feeling they also need to provide support to their son or daughter that may be taking part in a rehabilitation assessment within the care proceedings.

These added complexities further underline the need for good and effective communication between the workers involved to support the carers and ensure the needs of the child are at the forefront of the decision making.

Assessments of family and friends within the child's network may take place within care proceedings whilst a child is placed with 'stranger' foster carers. This may be part of a twin or triple tracking approach to the care planning to ensure there is no delay in the permanency planning for a child. These assessments can be very complex because of the family dynamics. They may involve the assessment of for example a grandparent who perhaps struggled to care for their own children but may now be in a better position to offer safe care for a grandchild.

The assessments may involve considering relatives who perhaps have no current relationship with the child and therefore full information is needed in relation to the current needs of the child to ensure the assessment can take full account of their ability to meet the child’s needs.

It is essential that in these situations the social worker for the child is pro-active in seeking out potential carers within the wider friendship and family network and consideration is always given to holding a Family Group Conference. This is a question that has to be considered at legal planning meetings when the decision is made that there are grounds to initiate care proceedings. It will have to be addressed within any care plan presented to court within the proceedings and if the plan for the child becomes adoption the Permanence and Adoption Panel will need information on the work that has been undertaken with the wider family as well as the birth parents before being able to recommend adoption as being in the best interest of the child.

If a child is subject to an Interim Care Order the social worker for the child must undertake a viability assessment of any relative or friend who is offering to be considered as a carer for the child. The Family & Friends Team have produced guidance on viability assessments. These assessments involve undertaking basic social services, checking the list for children subject to a child protection plan and CRB checks and will involve a full medical plus need to nominate 3 referees. It will involve discussion of their connection to the child and understanding of the needs of the child and reasons why the Department intervened to initiate care proceedings. It is essential to look at issues relating to their accommodation and financial situation at this early stage of the assessment. A basic analysis of the risks and potential strengths of a possible placement needs to be considered. If it is felt that there are no reasons not to proceed with an in-depth assessment of the family or friends carer then this will be agreed within the court proceedings and decisions made about how this work will be undertaken and by whom and what the arrangements will be for this relative or friend to have contact with the child. The social worker undertaking the assessment from the Family and Friends team should be instructed within the court proceedings.

Any agreement to use an independent social worker to undertake this assessment should be made by the Area manager and there are guidelines for independent social workers in relation to such assessments.

If a family member is in a position to provide a safe and stable placement for a child and the outcome of assessment work with birth parents is that rehabilitation is not possible then discussion must be undertaken with that relative about legal routes to secure permanency for that child. The relative may care for that child on a short term basis as a family and friends foster carer if it is felt that further assessment is needed with the child in placement or that the family and friends foster carer is not yet in a position to commit to a permanent placement.

As with adoption plans, the carers for a looked after child that are offering a potential permanent placement should have access to support services irrespective of the legal status of the child. A support plan will need to be drawn up that considers the financial needs and the access the carer and child will need to other types of support services. Please see guidance on Residential Allowances Procedure to follow and Special Guardianship allowances to follow.

The Department in some circumstances will assist with the legal fees incurred by a relative in making an application for a Residence Order and will make an assessment in respect of a Residence Order allowance. Decisions about the financial support plan will be made following a financial assessment of the carer.

If a child is to remain with a family and friends foster carer the plan for the child will be considered at every LAC review and the option of permanence via Residence Order or Special Guardianship will need to be actively re-evaluated.

9. Support Services to Family & Friends Carers, Family & Friends Foster Carers and Carers that Proceed to Offer Permanence Through a Residence Order or Special Guardianship

It is essential that family and friends carers are provided with access to support services as appropriate to enable them to continue to provide safe and stable care for a child.

Family and Friends foster carers will have a separate supervising social worker from the Family & Friends Team and will have access to training and support services provided to other foster carers. They will be paid an appropriate foster care allowance.

Family and friends carers that are caring for a child outside of the LAC system will have a support plan as part of the original assessment which will need to be kept under regular review by the appropriate Area team.

Most family and friends placements that are either supported by the Department for children outside of the LAC system by Section 17 or within the LAC system by the foster care allowance should be regularly reviewed with the presumption that if the child is to remain the placement should be secured by a legal order conferring parental responsibility on the carers.

Family and friends carers should not be discouraged from applying for a Residence Order or Special Guardianship Order because they do not have confidence in the support services that will then be provided for them and the child.

End