Stability for children. Stability for carers. Many foster carers may prefer short-term placements, but the benefits of long-term fostering can be huge – for everyone involved. In this post, we explore those benefits, and the support you can expect from your local authority.

In fostering, short term is common. The average UK fostering arrangement lasts around 20 months. Inevitably, since that’s an average, lots of placements are for much less than that. Short term fostering plays an important role. For young people, it offers a safe haven and a ‘buffer’ that gives children the support they need while removing them from risk. It also gives time for long-term plans to be put in place.

For foster carers too, short term can offer advantages. You get a chance to help more young people, often at an acute crisis point in their life. It gives you greater flexibility. Some foster carers simply prefer short term.

Yet as valuable as short term is, long term fostering offers more. More for carers. And a huge amount more for looked after children.

Long-term foster care – the benefits for children

A place to belong: Belonging matters. We all need a place to put down roots, a place we come from that acts as our base. Belonging is part of a person’s identity. It supports self-esteem and feelings of security and stability. Short-term care or children’s homes can’t offer that. But long-term foster care can.

A solid foundation for life: Fostering long-term reduces or removes the need for a young person to switch schools. That means they get continuity of education (which increases their chances of achievement) and have a chance to build a network of friends. That can have a huge difference not just on their childhood but on the rest of their life.

Relationships that endure: Imagine not having a single long-term relationship in your life. Imagine the difference that would make to your confidence and to your ability to connect with others. Long-term relationships are so important to building the moral and social framework we use to navigate life. They’re vital to building trust and developing empathy. And whether it’s having a shoulder to cry on, a source of advice, or someone to share a laugh with, they play a huge role in shaping us.

That’s the difference long term foster care can make.

A chance to heal: For every looked after child, there’s trauma. Somewhere in their story there’s loss, or hurt or harm. Fostering in long-term placements means there’s a greater chance for that trauma to become history, and that means there’s a chance to heal.

Long-term fostering – the benefits for carers

The impact on looked after people from long term fostering is huge – but the benefits aren’t just one way.

A bigger role: Fostering long term means your input, together with the help of your social worker and wider local authority team, will have a greater impact in shaping a young person’s life.

Seeing the difference you make: Every foster carer, whether their involvement lasts weeks or years, makes a difference. But fostering long term means the difference you make can be so much greater.

A sense of achievement: Short-term foster carers never see the long term outcome of their efforts. But with long-term placements, foster carers do get to see the young people in their care grow and develop. That can be enormously rewarding.

Stronger bonds: To the young people you’ll care for, their foster family often becomes the only family they truly know. The bonds and connections you build could last a lifetime, which can be a huge benefit for you, as well as them.

Why we don’t have enough long term foster carers

We need more foster carers. Ofsted data shows that the number of foster care households across the UK has fallen by 11% since 2019[1].

We understand the reasons for that. More young people are staying in the family home for longer, so there are fewer spare rooms available for fostering. Since 2019, lots of people have started working from home, which again means the space that might once have become a young person’s bedroom isn’t available.

But we desperately need more people to choose fostering, because we know that, where a child needs to be looked after, it’s the best option.

That’s why we’re offering lots of help and support.

How we’re supporting long term foster care

No one fosters alone when you do it with Foster for Greater Manchester. You’re part of a team that works together to ensure children and carers are looked after. Broadly speaking, we offer support in three ways:

Pay for fostering: You’ll get weekly allowances, and most foster carers don’t pay tax on their earnings. Find more about what we pay our foster carers.

Training and support: From the skills you need to be a foster carer, to ongoing training that helps you build specialist skills, to a support network of other carers, there’s lots of help available.

Fostering stories: What’s being a foster carer really like? We’re sharing the stories of real foster carers, so you can get an authentic feel for what to expect. Explore fostering stories here.

Talk to us

Thinking about long-term fostering? To talk things over (without making any commitments!), please get in touch.

[1] BBC