 |
answer text |
<p>Lincolnshire County Council is participating in the £45 million Families First
for Children Pathfinder, which came out of the department’s children’s social care
implementation strategy Stable Homes, Built on Love. The pathfinder aims to rebalance
children’s social care away from costly crisis intervention to more meaningful and
effective early support.</p><p> </p><p>As part of the pathfinder, the department is
working with a select number of local areas to test significant changes to how local
areas help children and young people. This includes increasing support at the earlier
end of the system, with the aim of keeping children with birth parents or wider family
where safe to do so. This will help to reduce the number of children looked after
and therefore drive down demand for foster care or other placements.</p><p> </p><p>There
is support available from the department where children are unable to stay with their
birth families and foster care placements are sought. Lincolnshire County Council
are being supported by the Fosterlink support service. Fosterlink provides support
for local authorities to improve the way they recruit foster carers by reviewing current
processes to identify areas for service and practice improvements, as well as creating
a national network in which to share best practice.</p><p> </p><p>More broadly, the
department is investing over £36 million this parliament to deliver a fostering recruitment
and retention programme, so foster care is available for more children who need it.
This will boost approvals of foster carers, as well as taking steps to retain the
foster carers we have.</p><p> </p><p>Greater financial support for foster carers will
help improve the experiences of all children in care. For the second year running,
the department is uplifting the National Minimum Allowance (NMA) above the rate of
inflation. For 2024/2025, the NMA will increase by 6.88%. This is on top of a 12.43%
NMA increase in 2023/24.</p><p> </p><p>In addition, the department estimates that
changes to tax and benefit allowances will give the average foster carer an additional
£450 per year as well as simplifying the process for self-assessment returns for most
foster carers.</p><p> </p><p>The department will also build on this investment since
2014 of over £8 million to help embed the Mockingbird programme, an innovative model
of peer support for foster parents and the children in their care where children benefit
from an extended family environment.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
</p>
|
|
