Cuts affecting practice: Use of SGOs

Happy New Year!

And thanks for the many views of my Xmas post – I had almost 200 which is nice for me!

I’m writing today’s blog on a specific issue as it is something I am coming into contact with in practice for the first time. I have learnt about Special Guardianship Orders (SGOs) in our lectures but it’s only recently in the LAC team that I’ve seen how they might fit in.

However, at the moment, I’ve not seen them used in the way they are intended, in the most child-centred way but often for what feels like financial motivations. I’m very aware that in this climate in particular, one of the main frustrations social workers have is the impact of the cuts on their ability to practice as intended, however for me this is the first time I’ve seen a specific example.

To be clear – I have young people I am working with who have been with foster carers over a year and are thriving. These foster carers are agency carers and are paid more than in house local authority carers. When it comes to looking at placement permanency, we have to go to panel to ‘match’ the young person formally with their foster carer until they leave care. For the young people I am working with, this is likely to be for at least another four years. However, for budgetary reasons, our fostering and adoption team are finding it increasingly difficult to get approval to fund many of these agency placements for long term permanency work, only for short term placements. Thus foster carers are asked if they would consider taking an SGO – basically because it’s more cost effective. I’m not saying that SGOs can’t be beneficial to young people, just that this this is not the motivation.

I’m wondering if this is happening in lots of local authorities. In many ways it is child centred, in that questioning the foster carer as to whether they can be a SG, is in order to prevent the placement being disrupted, and working in the best interests of the child to aid stability. It just seems unfortunate to have to put the foster carers in such difficult positions, where many find that despite not having gone into it for the money, money does play an important role, and they can’t afford to take on the less well paid SGO.

All the social workers want the best for the young people, and we’ll all be fighting to advocate and make our case that the young people should remain where they are until they leave care, so as to avoid disruption and another placement move. It’s just incredibly frustrating to see decisions at the top, affecting practice in this way.