Three in four councils appeal for more support to reunite families, survey finds

The survey of 75 councils found that 78 per cent want help for family reunification schemes.

The support is needed amid continuing funding constraints due to central government funding cuts over more than a decade. Seven in 10 councils said funding concerns are a barrier to increasing support to reunite children with their families.

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Challenges recruiting and retaining staff were also cited as a barrier to reunifying families.

The survey has been carried out by children’s charities NSPCC and Action for Children who say support is needed to help families after they have been reunited to ensure children are not taken back into care.

They point out that more than a third of children who are reunited with their families return to care within six years.

Just under a third of councils said they would like to offer more post-reunification support. Among these four in five said funding constraints were a barrier to this form of help to families.

As well as greater investment in family reunification support, councils are also calling for better guidance from the government “who have not so far given reunification enough attention”.

This guidance is needed as currently “many local authorities in England who responded lack strategies to help children leave care and return home”.

Swift action is needed by ministers to halt escalating costs of placing children in care, the two charities add.

They cite a warning in the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care that without action the number of children in care in England will rise from 80,000 to 100,000 in a decade. Due to “high costs of placements” this is set to leave councils facing £15bn costs.

“We were just bouncing them into more and more high-cost placements,” said a representative of one responding council that is spending “close to £4m” on 11 children.

Another said: “These ridiculously expensive placements that every authority has, so costing £7,000 to £8,000 a week minimum - you only need to have one or two of these children go home and you pay for a service that can support 10,15,20 children to reunify.

“So, it doesn't take much to make it stack up financially… it's one of those win-win things, you get better outcomes, it's better for the children and it saves the local authority money.”

Among local authorities that have launched a reunification project for families is Coventry City Council.

Mother Emma and her son Kyle, who has returned home after being placed in residential care, have been helped by the project.

“The team were so supportive and took everything at our pace,” said Emma.

“They helped us reflect on our relationship, mediate tricky situations, and develop skills to navigate challenging times. I was able message the team whenever I had a concern. They would tailor the level of support they gave us according to what we needed.

“Now, Kyle and I are back at home together, he has just started school and I have started a college course.”

NSPCC head of policy and public affairs Abigail Gill said that councils “urgently need to invest in an effective, joined-up system which has the tools to accurately assess what a family needs”.

Action for Children head of policy and research Joe Lane added: “Going home is the most common way for children to leave care but too many reunified children end up back in care.

“More children could return to their families and fewer of them would come back into our over-stretched care system if local authorities had the means to make family reunification work better.”

With this year's general election in mind, he is calling for all political parties to commit to prioritising the reuniting of families.