Abstract

Foster carers look after two-thirds of the children cared for by English local authorities at any one time. The recruitment and retention of these carers is one of these authorities' central concerns. Against this background, Foster Carers examines the joys, sadnesses and strains of fostering, the support carers want and need, and the reasons why they continue or cease fostering.

Drawing on questionnaire responses from a thousand foster carers across seven different local authorities, the authors highlight the importance of providing support that:

* is adapted to the carers' families

* contains the basic elements of reasonable payment, relevant training and reliable social work support

* responds sensitively to serious crises and treats carers as part of a team

* meets the specific needs of carers such as carers' groups and relief breaks.

Foster Carers forms one part of the largest recent study into foster care in the UK. It is an invaluable resource for policy makers and practitioners, as well as local authorities formulating policies for the support and training needed by foster carers, and is essential reading for social work professionals, academics and foster carers themselves.

Using evidence from the three studies, the authors carefully detail exactly who foster carers are, and why they do their job. It also explores the strains and satisfactions of fostering and the support that carers feel they need. I commend this to all social work professionals and policy makers involved in foster care. Foster carers themselves may also be interested in order to hear their views and values reiterated, echoed and evaluated throughout this comprehensive book.
Children Now
Ian Sinclair is Co-director of the Social Work Research and Development Unit at The University of York, where he has been responsible for a large programme of work on children's homes and foster care. His research interests include attachment theory and the evaluation of social work and social work services. Ian Gibbs is a Researcher at the Social Work Research and Development Unit at The University of York. His main research interest is looked after children, particularly those in residential care and foster care. Kate Wilson is Professor of Social Work at the Centre for Social Work, University of Nottingham. She has researched and published widely in the fields of therapeutic work and child welfare, including books on social work with couples, social work in a legal context, non-directive play therapy, and child protection.
This study is a timely contribution to the debate about carer shortages and the need for a national framework of allowances.
Community Care
The engaging tone and style of this book ensure that it is accessible to the lay reader as well as the professional and academic. This inclusiveness is evidenced in the coupling of clearly written text with statistical research findings and an easy-to-follow logical structure. It is possible to dip in and out of this text according to your particular interests, with each chapter containing concluding thoughts and some discussion of implications for practice. Foster Carers should therefore appeal to policy-makers and senior staff in local authorities as well as foster carers, social work professionals, social scientists and, more generally, anyone with an interest in foster care.
Adoption and Fostering
The wealth of data contained in the book ensures that it will be of great interest to practitioners, policy makers and researchers in the field of fostering. This is a very welcome addition to the literature and a recommended read for those with an interest in foster care.
Child and Family Social Work
This publication presents the findings of a study of a thousand foster carers across seven local authorities, and should be of interest to policy makers and practitioners alike.
Care and Health
This book comes at a good time for foster care services throughout the UK. There is useful information about what makes carers want to continue and what they need to do so. A key component is imaginative, practical and prompt responses to the issues carers see as needing attention, not any imposition of a standard form of support. The book contains a series of questions and scales for studying the levels of satisfaction which agencies could use... I would recommend this book to all fostering providers and children and families managers to consider the positive impact their support can have.
Rostrum
This book presents the findings of a comprehensive study of the complex lives of foster carers. The findings are illustrated by moving and informative quotations from the questionnaires that they completed. The detailed suggestions for changes to local authority fostering services, which could lead to greater retention of foster carers, should be heeded and acted upon by Social Services Departments.
British Journal of Social Work