Third of councils yet to draft kinship care policies

All councils are required to have a policy in place on how they support children who live with family members and friends, and the kinship carers themselves.

But in a letter to directors of children services and lead councillors Timpson said he was “disappointed” that so many had failed to do so.

He added: “The requirement is for local authorities to develop and publish equitable and transparent policies for these children and their carers across the range of legal arrangements that underpins family and friends care.”

Support can be financial to help the kinship carer meet the cost of looking after the child as well as advice and guidance on how best to do this.

To support those councils that are struggling to develop a policy, the Department for Education is organising two training days in the autumn looking at current case law and primary legislation related to family members and friends who are carers.

He hoped that those taking part in the training days would also be able to contribute to a study into kinship care arrangements being commissioned by the grant-giving charity Buttle UK and carried out by Bristol and Oxford Universities.

Councils are also being called on by Timpson to share their policies nationally via the DfE’s website.

Timpson hopes that by spring 2014 all councils will have family and friend carer policies in place that are well promoted locally.

Grandparents Plus, which has been campaigning for councils to develop such policies, has welcomed this latest move by Timpson.

A spokeswoman for the group, said: “Support is very patchy so why these policies are important is that they can clearly set out to local kinship carers information about what they are entitled to, the support on offer and to give a named person at the council they can contact.”