Voluntary post-18 fostering is failing, says charity

The criticism follows the release of latest Department for Education figures that show just 330 looked-after children who were in care at 16 were living with foster carers by the age of 19 between March 2012 and March 2013.

This is a rise since 2012 of just 10 and means that only five per cent of this age group of looked-after children remained in foster care after their 18th birthday.

The Fostering Network said the minimal rise shows the government’s voluntary approach to providing foster care for looked-after children beyond 18 is failing.

The network wants to see an amendment to the Children and Families Bill calling for all councils to be required to allow looked-after children to remain in their foster home until they are 21, if that is what both the carer and child want.

Vicki Swain, Fostering Network campaigns manager, said: “If you do not compel them to do it then local authorities, which have tremendous financial pressures, will not prioritise it.”

Children and families minister Edward Timpson wrote to councils in October last year calling on them to ensure children in care could stay in their foster placement beyond 18.

A DfE spokeswoman anticipates that figures for 2013/14 will show that the minister’s message has filtered through with a significant rise in post-18 foster care. 

But Swain is less optimistic. She said latest research by the Fostering Network of councils involved in the previous Labour government’s post-18 care pilot, called Staying Put, shows they are cutting their support in 2013.

“We found that half were scaling this support down either through reducing the criteria, or only making it available until the young person is 19,” said Swain.

Robert Tapsfield, chief executive of the Fostering Network, added: “Sadly, care leavers are over-represented in prison populations, and are more likely to be unemployed, single parents, mental health service users and homeless than those who grew up within their own families.

“We know that the longer young people stay with their foster carers, the better they do. Yet the vast majority are currently forced to leave their foster family by their 18th birthday, despite the average age for all young people leaving home being 24.”

The latest figures for looked-after children also show that 3,980 children in care were adopted between April 2012 and March 2012, a 15 per cent increase on the previous year.

Timpson has said councils not doing enough to find adopted homes for children in care could be stripped of their role in recruiting adopters.

Local Government Association children and young people board chairman David Simmonds said these latest figures show councils have been “working hard” to recruit more adopters. He added that removing councils from the recruitment process “risks jeopardising the significant progress being made.”