Foster carers

[mamath]

what are mums' views on foster carers?

I dont know if its because its late and I am a bit tired but I am finding it really hard to understand your posts.

mamath, just to clarify my point: by definition children cannot be being taken from families that are 'by all accounts' loving and caring. There will be at least one account that those children were being abused or neglected, and it will be that account that convinces the courts that the child should be removed. The problem with threads is that some start from the assumption that families are generally telling the truth; others that social workers are generally telling the truth; and few of us ever get to see the full picture.

Love your suggestion that those of us who disagree with you are merely scared of facing up to tricky issues . Though not as much as I laughed at ISNT's image of nananina and johnhemmings' batphones - I bet they'll have joined the thread by the time I post this

mamath- how the hell would you know that those mothers in the articles have no issues? We are only privy to what they wished to share with journalists (who lets face it, as most mners have experienced, write whatever they feel like anyway, frequently bearing no resemblance to what interviewees tell them )

Stable partners cannot be abusive then?

I used an extreme (fictional) example, because I am not comfortable with detailing real childrens' lives on an internet forum.

we have seen extremely abused children, seen over and over and over again by a host of professionals who did not act upon any perceptable discernment in their role.

Huh?
Are you talking about Kyra Ishaq and Baby P? 2 cases?
These are not children who were done a dis-service by foster carers though, were they? Oh yeah- both of them were abused, neglected, and dies at the hands of their own families.

"Then the news comes in in the midst of these discussions about raised status and pay for FCs. There is quite reasonable lack of enthusiam from parents who have had tehir children taken from them and watch their children deteriorate in state FC, whilst they themselves may have been accused of not having enough money, but whilst their children never went without in thier birth home."

Surely people who have experienced poor quality foster care themselves would welcome standards in foster care being raised?

There are some wild extrapolations and non-seqiturs going on in this thread to avoid engaging in a debate

Thank goodness! I was wondering if I wasn't reading straight.
Mamath- is english actually your first language? (genuine question)

Ok, mamath, what exactly is the point you want us to debate?

Whether significant numbers of children are being removed wrongly and unfairly from loving, caring families?

Whether the State cares about the problem of substandard or abusive foster care?

What should be done to improve standards of foster care?

Whether improved foster care increases the risk that children will be wrongly taken into care?

Perhaps we are 'avoiding engaging in a debate' because we're struggling to identify the debate you wish to have?

Mamath I would love to engage in debate with you but I am struggling to understand your position. Could you please clarify your points?

We are not convinced that raising status and pay improves standards.

There is much evidence to suggest that this is not guaranteed

foster care like child care
is never going to have the status of teaching
which will never have the status of nursing
which will never have the status of etc

becuase it is too close to parenthood

and parenting other people's children, although if done well for a child in need is laudible

what are the chances of it being done well with a dirth as you say of good foster carers set against an excess supply of good parents separated from their own children.

How ironic. You sound like a really bad social worker. All that turning things round and accusing people of avoiding uncomfortable issues.

BTW using lots of clever words is not the same as making an intelligent point.

I am not sure what your experience is. Are you a birth parent? A carer? Have you any personal experience of the system? Do you write for the Daily Mail?

I am talking about supply and demand

ImSoNotTelling - lol
mamath, you seem to have had 1 personal experience that has tarnished your veiw of all fc. If the children you talk of were fostered long term they must have had countless oppertunities to talk to sw, reviewing officers, court guardians ect. Did they tell anyone about the abuse?. I'm not saying there are no bad fc I have twice been very verbal to ss of my opinion that carers I know shouldn't be doing the job. They were not abusing children in any way but were not giving the children the high level of care I would expect.
Your examples seem to be mainly based on newspaper articles that only tell the parents version of events.

Have watched this thread and determined not to get sucked in, but Mamath's last post makes me ask one question - who is 'We' as in 'we are not convinced that raising status and pay improves standards'?

Birth parent with care

Not a social worker

Don't work for the Daily Mail

Have outlined fair bit of experience above

Don't know about clever words

Just trying to have a discussion with some other mums around some issues of concern

Who is "we"?

And who, for goodness sake, chooses between placing a child with a foster carer or a good parent? That choice is NEVER made - only the choice between a foster carer and what is perceived as a bad parent. You may argue that that perception is wrong, but if you want a good debate you need to tone down the rhetoric and the assumptions. This is too serious an issue for rhetorical flourishes.

While I don't dispute that there are some shocking foster carers, the majority are amazing. Most of them end up subsidising the children they care for out of their own pockets because the pay is dismal if you do it right.

I think the campaign is a good thing. If there are more foster carers, then a greater number of them are likely to be good. And SWs won't struggle so much to find fosterers so they're less likely to put them with crap ones.

Are there really that many really good, loving parents whose children get snatched and taken into care? Really? I've never quite got this. On the Today programme this morning they interviewed someone who said they have to leave children with unsuitable parents much longer than they'd like because there simply aren't the foster places for them

Examples Not Based on newspaper articles

Newspaper articles posted upon one request above

Birth parent with care - I repeat - who is 'we'?

"We"? who is/are "we"?

Supply and demand of what? FCs? Children?

Dearth

I believe that raising pay, status and training does improve standards - it's happening in childcare at the moment with post-graduate qualifications for people working with under 5s which is raising it's status nearer to that of teaching (though pay hasn't quite caught up).

How else would you suggest raising standards in foster care?

By supply and demand, do you mean that if there are X number of foster carers "demanding" children, then social services will supply X number of children?

So sorry about my grammer and spelling. It's getting late but I need to see where this thread is going

Don't know about rhetorical flourishes

Trying to raise an important speccific issue in context of how we would like things to be and like to think that things are

If that is not possible, then there is no justice for some children in this society