Читать книгу Social Work and Foster Care - Helen Cosis Brown - Страница 32

I end this chapter with the Foster Carers’ Charter (Department of Education, 2011c), which is neither Guidance nor Regulation, but is included here as an important document devised by a number of organisations, and published by the Department of Education to signal the Government's goal to raise the status of foster carers, and foster care, and thus the life chances of fostered children. Tim Loughton, the Children's Minister at the time of the Charter's publication, in the Charter's foreword notes the interrelatedness of the role of foster carers and the outcomes for foster children when he writes:

It is essential therefore that foster carers are at the heart of arrangements for looked after children and must be fully engaged, supported and consulted at every stage. Without understanding how important the role of a foster carer is and what they can expect from others, it is so much harder to do the best for these children and young people. At the same time everyone needs to be focused on what is best for the most important people of all – the children in their care.

(Department of Education, 2011c, foreword)

Fostering services, responsible for the supervision and support of foster carers, have a key role in helping foster carers be equipped to care for foster children in such a way that helps contribute to them having happy enough childhoods and potentially fulfilled lives.