I have called the social services and they are going to put him in a children’s home

[ByArtfulBird]

If you have not seen the first thread about it don’t reply you will get confused. I have called them up and they said we are going to put him in a children’s home but not until Wednesday so he will be staying at mine till then just thought I would let you know how it’s going.

@Kinneddar

So why not update that thread rather than start a new one that most folk have no.clue about what's going on 🙄
You know there are hundreds of threads in MN. If one starts by expressing it's for those who already know the background why are you so annoyed? Just go elsewhere. It's not complicated

You've done the right thing calling for help. It's what social services is there for.

I'm sorry he has such awful parents.

Thank you for caring for this child. It doesn't matter what the reasons are for wanting to kick him out, his parents are illegally abandoning him. It's child abandonment. I hope they also take his brother from them, too. The sad thing is, they will get split up in the foster/adoption system.

They usually try and keep them together, but my in-laws are foster parents, and I work in safe-guarding.

Honestly - Evil bastar*s. I hope they get what's coming to them.

Well done you for helping out ❤

The OP did the original referral to SS as her DD's 14 yr old BF had been kicked out of his home by his parents. He is currently residing at her home whilst waiting for a placement.

The boy is currently safe and I imagine SS have got section 20 approval from the parents.

I believe this is right from what I read of the original thread (not all of it)

You can ignore my post @OKNerd as I've now seen your post where you've caught on to what's happening.

This thread is an awful insight into how messed up things are.
OP and @itsallabitofamystery well done to you both for doing the right thing and trying to prevent vulnerable young people being on the street.
@itsallabitofamystery the level of support you've had is appalling - I'm so sorry you've now been put in the position of having to consider making your "guest" homeless yourself. SS's behaviour is shameful. It's enough to discourage anyone from stepping up in an emergency.

Poor kid, how can anyone kick out a 14 year old, l don't understand. What chance will he have in life.

I don’t think he is being removed. He is being kicked out. In that situation it’s an emergency placement.

I also think putting a 14 year old on the street is illegal. What are they doing about the parents.

@itsallabitofamystery trust me when I say CS won't be withholding a placement for the hell of it.
Once they know a child needs somewhere - which is the case for you and for the OP - it's entirely dependent on having somewhere for them to go. There is a system where (anoymised) referrals go out to a huge network - internal foster carers, independent fostering agencies, and if relevant, children's homes. Calls are made to try and negotiate eg if we know one child is moving on from a home we'll get in early and try and see if they'll commit to the child we need to move. It's entirely dependent on what offers come back. I've known of children having 50+ searches and not had a single offer of interest. I've had children as young as 8, with no particular additional needs, regular kids, go into private children's homes because they had absolutely no where to go that night. Even had children put up in hotels with a staff member from one of our children's homes who was not on shift and agreed to do the overtime. Had school staff come forward and agree to take a child in for a couple of days because they couldn't bear for them to have nowhere to go.

It's not always that bad for every child, but there's more children than ever coming into care, and fewer foster carers than ever. Cost of living, people not having spare bedrooms etc - it's been a huge impact. It's really really sad. We want to find foster homes that are a good match for a child, not put them in the first place that comes up while telling them we've got no news day after day.

In the last few places I've worked there isn't really anything of 'emergency placements' any more, because the homes that should be emergency bed for a night or two are full of children who are waiting for somewhere suitable to go - they can't be kicked out because it was only supposed to be an emergency bed.

Yes they do!

There were 83,630 children in care in England (70 for every 10,000 of children aged 0-17 or 0.7%) on 31st March 2024.

8,640 (10%) of those children were in children's homes or secure units (majority will be children's homes, very few are in secure units)

16,240 (19%) were accommodated under section 20 - this is the 'voluntary' legal status where parents agree for their child to be taken into care (or if the child agrees if they are 16 or over).

If parents do not agree to the child becoming cared for where there are concerns over neglect or abuse, then the only way social services can take the child into care is through an interim care order from the court (or in emergencies through a police protection order which can be applied for up to 72 hours to allow time for an interim care order to be sought)

Well done for caring for him. I hope he gets some decent support, his parents should be ashamed.

@MellersSmellers thank you, and OP has done amazing too. I just think it's natural (or at least it should be), to want to care for a child in need.

In my case, the young man made his way back to mine after school. I tried calling his social worker to no avail, and in the end had to resort to the duty team. They've begged me to keep him another night, and his social worker will be here to collect him in the morning.

How did you deal with this OP? I'm absolutely heartbroken as they've said he will be going out of area as there is nothing here. So away from his friends, things he knows - and school. His reaction tonight was to lash out, and it's not been a nice home this evening, but I understand that this
Is incredibly frightening for him and the prospect of him moving away is so so daunting even for me.

@itsallabitofamystery - has the LA not offered to assess you as a connected carer?

If he has been with you for a few weeks they really should have done an initial Reg24 assessment and been paying you connected carer fostering rates while either looking for a more permanent place or undertaking a full assessment if you were prepared to keep him.

Would you be prepared to keep him if they paid you the proper rates and helped to ensure the summer house was properly habitable?

A lot of LAs are now realising that it is cheaper to support a foster carer to make the required changes to their home to enable them to keep fostering than it is to place a child in a residential placement.

It would certainly be cheaper, and more importantly, better for the young man in your care, for them to pay for a better insulated cabin than it would to place him out of area in a children's home.

What are you talking about? The child has been living with the OP. Of COURSE she can call his social worker and be given an update. Accommodating a child under section 20 isn't a 'legal process' and it's not confidential information to tell the adult who has been caring for a child that they are going to place him somewhere on a certain day!

This isn't true if it's a private family arrangement, only if the local authority placed him with the OP. I haven't read the original post but if you just take in an unconnected child it doesn't automatically become a placement, only if social services ask you to take them in on a medium to longer term basis.

Yes they do

This isn't how it works

@BloominNora no they haven't offered anything. Only thing they did request was whether my two teenage girls could share, to allow him to have my youngest daughter's bedroom. They have never shared before, and sharing as teens would be difficult as they're just so different (one quiet bookworm and one a performer), so it just wouldn't work. I'd be sacrificing their home life for someone who isn't even related to us.

I feel I'm hijacking OPs thread a little, but would be interesting to see how things have gone. My lad absconded for a little last night, I couldn't find him but eventually he turned up at 2am crying. He's gone with the social workers no to look at "plan A", which is a children's home but they want to meet him first. I've asked what plan b was, but they don't have one as yet. So now it's just a case of sitting and waiting to hear.

You are referring to private fostering - except neither the OP or @itsallabitofamystery have taken these young people in based on a mutual arrangement with their parents - they've taken them in out of the kindness. Both of them have asked Social Care to get involved, which means both should become placements under section 20 (unless the child is 16 or over and does not consent to it - but either way the LA has a duty to find suitable accommodation - whether section 20 or not)

If the LA are deeming @itsallabitofamystery situation as Private Fostering and are not planning to accommodate they should have started to undertake a PF assessment (which is more in depth than a Reg 24), including DBS checks, given that the arrangement is coming up to 28 days - but they can't just decide its PF without agreement.

Reg 24 assessments are for emergency foster care placements with connected carers for up to 16 weeks, with Reg 25 allowing for an further 8 week extension - the idea being to allow social care time to either assess fully or find an alternative placement and connected carers who are looking after children under Reg 24 should be paid.

Because @itsallabitofamystery has not received the support she needs, it is now going to cost the LA a lot more to find a residential placement for the young lad than it would have done if they had just acknowledged and formalised the connected carer placement.

Good luck - hope it gets sorted for him and you.

Oh yes they do. In all sorts of different sizes and locations. Many are family homes that have been converted. There are far more than you imagine. The company I work for own 75 different homes

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