Before putting children in care, we should look to the extended family

With proper financial and practical help, relatives can provide a secure base for a child, says Cathy Ashley

Martin Narey, chief executive of Barnardo’s, accepts that “indisputably, in the past, we have had too many children in care” (Our duty of care, 12 March). He praises the reduction in numbers since 1981: “Such a transformation … should be seen as a triumph.”

But he then says “I fear we have gone too far”, implying that we are now taking too few children into care. He suggests that an appropriate level would be somewhere between the current figure of 64,000 and 1981’s 92,000. Narey is making a significant error in assuming there is an ideal number of children who should be in state care. What is right for each child depends upon their circumstances and needs.

Our charity advises thousands of parents and family members each year about the welfare and protection of their children. We are under no misapprehension that some children cannot remain with their parents. We are also clear that considerably more could be done to safeguard children within their families.

Narey states “there has long been an absolute conviction among social workers … and politicians … that taking a child into care is to be avoided almost at all costs”. The implication is that our child welfare system is structured to prevent a child ending up in the care system. Yet we know, from calls to our advice line as well as a barrage of research reports, that the threshold for accessing specialist help, such as child and mental health services, is set so high and the delays so severe that children and parents often can’t get the assistance they need when things start to go seriously wrong. This is despite the evidence showing that the right interventions at the right time can determine whether a teenager remains in the family home or ends up in foster care, or even a youth offending institution.

Narey focuses on the need for children to be removed from “inadequate parents” but makes no mention of the wider family as a resource for a child. We estimate that 200-300,000 children who cannot live with their parents are living with relatives or friends, often with no support from the state. Most of these carers are impoverished grandparents, left to deal on their own with traumatised children.

The evidence is that family and friends’ care arrangements often work best for the child. Yet, despite Narey’s comment that decisions about placement of children are “not, as some would believe, about money”, we know of placements that have faltered or broken down because of lack of support from authorities. The most significant step any government could take would be to introduce a proper financial and practical support system for family and carers.

Similarly, when children return home after being in care, support is often inadequate. A recent research study found that 40% of children returned to a parent without any in-depth assessment of their needs, let alone practical help. The conclusion to draw from this is not that children shouldn’t return home if possible, but that the right steps have to be put in place so it can work for the child.

Practical measures like these – rather than a panic reaction to high-profile cases – could ensure that many vulnerable children could grow up safely in their own families.

• Cathy Ashley is chief executive of the Family Rights Group