Children waiting over a year for suitable long-term placement, health watchdog finds

Foster services in Sligo, Leitrim and West Cavan struggled when it came to placing siblings together. Photo: Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland

Health watchdog Hiqa has again highlighted the difficulties posed by a shortage of qualified foster carers, with a new report into fostering in Sligo, Leitrim and West Cavan showing two children had been waiting more than a year for a suitable long-term placement.

The inspection report by the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa) also showed there were an estimated 26 'unmet' requests in 2020 and that the foster service available in the area was limited in some ways, including being able to place siblings together.

The report said the service was otherwise working very well and was almost completely compliant against all standards, while the children in the service painted a positive picture of their experiences.

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But it said: "There remained areas of ongoing organisational risk and challenge that were impacting on the service area’s capabilities to provide a consistently high standard of safe, effective and child-centred foster care services.

"At the time of this inspection, the foster care resources team had 16 foster care households that were unallocated who were being supported on a duty cover basis; and there were delays in the completion of foster carer assessments. There were also four children in foster care who did not have an allocated social worker; although this represented significant improvement from the position 12 months previously."

It said the Tusla service area did not have "sufficient, suitably experienced foster carers to meet the diverse and complex needs of children entering care".

"The service area had limited capacity to provide long-term placements, with just one placement available at the time of this inspection," it said. 

Two children had been waiting for over a year for a suitable long-term placement. The area also had very limited capacity to place siblings together. 

"These organisational gaps had been clearly recognised by the service area; with evidence of work in progress to explore alternative models of provision; including actions to strengthen its relative foster care capacity."

It also said: "Key ongoing gaps in service provision included the adequacy of respite foster carers and permanent care placements, capacity to place teenagers and larger groups of siblings together, and recruiting carers from other ethnic backgrounds."

Tusla has been striving to address the shortage of foster carers around the country and the chief executive of the Child and Family Agency, Bernard Gloster, recently said there may be a greater focus on supporting relative foster carers, where possible.

According to the Hiqa report: "The capacity of the service area [in Sligo, Leitrim and West Cavan] to meet demand for long-term care placements or respite care was limited. This led in a few cases to children remaining in placements that were not best placed to meet their needs over time, or their being placed in residential care.

"There had been five placement disruptions in 2020, involving four children; all placed with general foster carers. Five children were placed with relatives outside the local area, and three were placed locally with non-statutory agencies."

Both foster carers and children were positive about their experiences but did highlight some concerns, including gaps in the area’s respite care provision. One foster carer said: "I have asked for respite, but it is not available."