Government launches new fostering recruitment campaign
CoramBAAF welcomes the launch of the Department for Education's new national fostering recruitment campaign. The campaign highlights the vital role foster carers play in the lives of children and young people and provides an important opportunity to encourage more people to consider fostering.
Foster carers provide children with stability, care, support and a sense of belonging. These relationships can have a lasting impact, helping children and young people to thrive and maintain important connections throughout their lives.
Increasing the number of foster carers is an important priority. However, our members are clear that recruitment must be matched by a strong focus on retention.
Experienced foster carers bring valuable skills, knowledge and relationships that benefit children every day. Supporting carers to continue fostering through high-quality training, effective support and positive partnership working remains essential.
We also believe that diversity must remain at the heart of fostering. Children need foster families who can understand, support and reflect their backgrounds, identities and experiences. A diverse pool of foster carers helps children maintain important connections to their culture, heritage, language, faith and community. Alongside recruitment and retention, we must continue to strengthen anti-racist practice across the fostering system.
The launch of this campaign is a positive step forward. To achieve lasting change, recruitment efforts must be supported by continued investment in retention, diversity, inclusion and high-quality support for foster carers.
CoramBAAF will continue to work with fostering services, agencies and the Government to support these ambitions and help ensure that more children can grow up in stable, loving homes where they feel safe, valued and connected.