Lack of carers for at-risk kids costs £2.5m a year

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A SHORTAGE of foster carers to look after vulnerable and neglected children is costing the council £2.5 million a year in payments to the voluntary sector. The local authority is increasingly relying on organisations such as Barnardo's and St Andrew's Children's Society to plug the gaps in its own service. It currently has 80 children in the care of voluntary organisations - up from an average of 57 last year. It has run several campaigns to attract more foster carers, but those who have been taken on have failed to deal with the increase in demand. A recent inspectors' report said the city council's child protection service was too slow and uncoordinated to protect properly youngsters at risk of harm. It revealed the council had too few beds in residential homes and too few foster carers and families willing to adopt on its books to meet the growing demand. Council chiefs have blamed drugs and alcohol problems among parents for the rise in the number of children needing the service. Councillor Marilyne MacLaren, the city's education leader, said: "This is one thing the department is trying hard to sort out. We've just had a foster and adoption recruitment week. We try hard to advertise and have improved our number of foster carers, but there are still not enough." The council turns to outside agencies when it does not have any of its own foster carers able to take on more children. Cllr MacLaren said: "If we've got a child who is at risk then we have to move that child, and if we have to use an independent agency then that is what we have to do, there's no other option. Sometimes it costs an awful lot of money to keep a child safe." The council estimates that in the voluntary sector, the cost per child can be up to £60,000 a year, with an average cost of between £35,000 and £40,000. That compares with a starting salary of £18,000 for foster carers. In the first six months of this financial year, the council spent more than £1m on foster care through voluntary agencies. It expects to spend the same amount again in the next six months.

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