FionaK |
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| Today there is report from a government inquiry which states that more children should be taken into care. They say that care homes are valued by the young people who live there and are a good option for many. They even grasped that comparing the educational and other outcomes of children in the care system with those of the general population is silly; and mentioned the part that experience before coming into care plays in determining those outcomes. All stuff I have been saying with increasing rage and frustration for a long time.
So this is good, right? Well not unless they actually do something. As I have pointed out many times, one of the performance indicators for child care social work departments is the incidence of children in care: and lower is better. There is no rational basis for that indicator which can be defended: no understanding of the complexities of such decisions: no evidence that "success" can be measured in that way. But it is a tick box and it is a standard against which departments are judged.
In addition there is another measure: foster care is always better, according to the rules. So that is another measure used to judge agencies: more foster care and less care homes: despite the fact that some children do not want to be in foster care and will not allow that to succeed, for a variety of complex reasons. That is a fact: some kids are better served by good care homes. But that is not taken into account in performance measures either
Nor is it just the distorting effect of bean counters' measurements: this affects the possibilities which are open because the report says we give parents too many chances: and more kids should be removed. Oh yeah? Well you try to persuade the courts. The courts, like the social work departments, are bound by the default committment to keeping families together where possible; the bar for intervention is very high and based on standards of proof which cannot be met. The delays in adoption and in child protection are not down to the social work practice, either: court delays are a fundamental problem which is seldom mentioned
I welcome this report because it does at least recognise some of the simplistic rubbish which underpins the current situation: but unless they widen the focus to the whole system it is not going to make any difference at all. I can't tell you how frustrating this is!
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