Campaigner for expansion

It was first-hand experience that attracted Andy Elvin to the position of chief executive at voluntary fostering and adoption agency The Adolescent and Children's Trust (Tact).

While taking part in a social worker exchange scheme in the United States in the 1990s, Elvin fostered a total of three children, each with profound emotional and behavioural issues.

Elvin, who was previously chief executive at Children and Families Across Borders (CFAB), which identifies and protects children separated from family members as a result of trafficking, immigration, divorce, conflict or asylum, says fostering was "the hardest job I have ever done".

"I've worked in residential care at senior level in a local authority and this is the third charity I have run, but no matter how hard those jobs have been, you go home at the end of the day.

"If you are a foster parent, your work is your home. It's tough."

Despite this, he found the work immensely rewarding.

"There was one child with quite distressed behaviour," Elvin says. "By the time he left, he was in mainstream school, playing sports for the school team and had a good group of friends.

"Seeing that transformation was astonishing. It was a sense of achievement you rarely get as a social worker."

Elvin is now in charge of an organisation that works with 650 children in foster care, and assists with between 20 and 30 adoptions each year. At CFAB, he increased local authority business and income by more than 300 per cent. He has already decided to pursue ambitious plans to expand Tact's work in the same vein.

He tells CYP Now that new powers allowing councils to contract out parts of social care could allow Tact to work more closely with local authorities - potentially providing entire service functions for them.

"I know that Tact can provide fantastic services - both fostering and adoption," he says. "My view is that more children should be able to benefit from the excellent services we offer.

"I think there's a strong argument for local authorities to test out what can be done more effectively and cheaply by contracting out adoption and fostering services."

Elvin says there are significant issues to be tackled around the transfer of council employees and responsibilities for foster carers, but wants to link up with "one or two" authorities to test the idea.

"Once we have a model that works, I think other authorities will be interested in exploring how it would work for them," he says.

"There's probably a lot (of authorities) looking around thinking 'who goes first then?'

"As with any change, it is daunting at first."

Greater responsibility

Elvin points to the fact that Tact is responsible for more fostered children "than most local authority looked-after populations" as evidence that it has the ability to provide entire services.

"In terms of scale and being able to do this effectively, we do it now," he explains.

And he says Tact can do the work just as cost effectively as local authorities. This issue of cost was recently a central theme in a report by public sector services firm Impower, which suggested that local authorities should deliver more fostering services "in-house" in order to save as much as £150m a year across all English councils. Elvin, like other critics, says the calculations were based on a false premise.

"Local authorities tend not to count an awful lot of cost of fostering and adoption services," he says.

"It is foolish accounting to think that they are currently cheaper.

"What is absolutely clear is that contracting out a service from the local authority to a social enterprise or charity saves at least 15 per cent, if not more, simply through saving the costs behind the salary, such as pension costs.

"We can also pull in money from elsewhere to pay for services over and above what the state pays for."

He says there are further savings to be made from the authority having less responsibility within the children's services department, allowing it to reassess the management structure and see how large it needs to be.

"Hopefully, the money can be reinvested in frontline child protection services, or offered up as savings," he adds.

Elvin is also keen to pursue lobbying work. Last month, Tact flagged up concerns about a 20 per cent rise in the use of special guardianship orders (SGOs), warning that foster carers are being pressured by local authorities into permanently caring for children. An SGO gives legal status for non-parents, meaning a child or a young person can live with them permanently. Crucially, the child is no longer the responsibility of the local authority.

The potential advantage to councils is the cost of supporting a child on an SGO is considerably less than if they were in foster care.

"We are interested in how decisions are made and where financial interests and the best interests of children clash," Elvin says.

"The rise in SGOs is a concern. Research shows they are twice as likely as adoptions to break down.

"We want decisions to be made based on a lifetime rather than this year's budget or next year's budget."

In the run-up to next May's general election, the charity is looking to create a manifesto for looked-after children. Elvin says one of the elements of this will be a call to refine so-called "staying put" arrangements for children in foster care.

Since May, a new legal requirement set out in the Children and Families Act 2014 requires local authorities to offer young people the option of staying in foster care up to the age of 21. Under previous legislation, they were only required to support foster parents until a child in their care turned 18.

The finer details

"They need to look at some of the finer details," Elvin says, giving the example that young people must claim housing benefit to stay with their carer.

"The government says it wants work to pay, but it is making the first experience of adulthood for one of the most vulnerable groups - looked-after children - that of claiming benefits.

"It sends out a terrible message if you are trying to encourage them to go to higher education or university.

"The money all comes from the same pot anyway. Why are we wasting people's time?"

The organisation is also looking into other ways that children in care are "made to feel different" and will be calling for other changes, such as making it easier for children to change their surname to that of their foster parents if they so wish.

Elvin also wants more attention paid to the national roll-out of the government's Adoption Support Fund, announced last September, through which local authorities will be able to provide therapeutic services such as cognitive therapy, play and music therapy, and intensive family support.

The aim of the initiative is to try to help adopted children recover from previous experiences. Ten local authorities are trialling how the support fund will work, ahead of the national roll-out next year. Tact is working with The Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, a specialist mental health trust based in north London, to look at how the fund can work, based on international evidence.

"We are looking at what frameworks are needed to make sure the money is spent on things that can have an impact," he says.

But Elvin is concerned that there is a scarcity of suitable specialist provision available.

"There isn't a market out there," he says. "There is very little by way of evidence-tested and robust post-adoption support."

Andy Elvin CV

• Graduated from Liverpool John Moores University with a degree in media and cultural studies
• Worked as a residential childcare worker and foster parent in Portland, Maine, for two years for the Spurwink Foundation
• Spent time as a children and families social worker at two London boroughs - Richmond and Westminster
• In 2001, became director of childcare, early education, family support and community projects organisation, the Soho Family Centre
• In 2006, became the strategic director for children's centres and extended schools at Richmond
• In 2009, joined Children and Families Across Borders (CFAB) as chief executive
• He joined Tact in September 2014