My Placement may be Breaking Down

A Placement support meeting will be arranged by the fostering team, alongside the child's social worker when difficulties arise, to look at what can be offered to try to enable the placement to continue, and if this is not possible, to talk about how the ending should take place. The meeting will be chaired by a team manager and your supervising social worker and child’s social worker will take part. Other relevant professionals or people who support you, could also be invited. Therapeutic providers or other services who may be able to contribute to support, may be useful to be contribute.

A support plan with timescales and people responsible for different actions will be drawn up at this meeting. This plan will be reviewed after 4 weeks.  

See also: Placement Support Protocol and Meeting Template.

It is recognized that not all foster care placements work out.

A disruption can occur when Children's Social Care feel the placement is no longer meeting the child’s needs or you decide that you are no longer able to care for a child or the child decides they do not want to stay in the placement.

Placements ending in an unplanned way nearly always leave all those concerned feeling bad. Your Social Worker will want to work with you to make sure that everything is done to support you with children and young people living with you and to manage difficulties.

It is vital that for whatever reason the placement ended, you make the move for the child as positive as possible. When endings are unplanned, the welfare and well-being of the child is paramount and your Fostering Service should support you to act at all times with this in mind. It is also important that the needs and feelings of other children living in your home are taken into account.

After the placement has ended, a disruption meeting may be held. This may be particularly relevant if the placement had been matched as a long-term placement and would be chaired by the fostering team manager. The meeting is an opportunity to consider all aspects of the placement in an attempt to understand what happened. Disruption Meetings can sometimes feel threatening, but it is important to recognise that their purpose is not to blame anyone but to reach a better understanding of what happened, including whether more support should have been provided. Most carers who have been through a placement breakdown have found the Disruption Meeting helpful.

At the end of a placement, a CA22 (end of placement report) will be sent to the child’s social worker to gain their feedback about how and why the placement ended. This is then shared at the foster carers next annual review. If practice issues are raised about the foster carer in the CA22, your social worker and possibly the fostering team manager will discuss the issues raised with you in your supervision and additional training may be provided.