How Gloucestershire County Council is putting young people first

With a national shortage of foster carers and over 780 children and young people of all ages currently in care in Gloucestershire alone, it can be daunting for a new carer to decide which council or agency to go with.

But Gloucestershire County Council is making the process staightfoward, while putting the happiness and welfare of young people first – offering local foster carers for local children and making ethical considerations such as being not-for-profit, as well as providing the Mockingbird model in which foster children join an extended family system. 

Every mile matters for children in care and GCC Fostering encourages people to foster in your own community to help protect children's sense of identity, stability and wellbeing – especially during a time of major change in their lives. 

Fostering with Gloucestershire County Council means that all children stay local — local to schools, to communities, to their birth family. Whereas fostering via independent fostering agencies (IFAs) could mean you have a child from Sussex or Weston-super-Mare, for example, even though you live in Gloucestershire. 

And – alongside 24/7 support from the council team - the Mockingbird model of fostering is championed, which is based around the concept ‘it takes a village to raise a child’. 

Hubs are formed with six to ten fostering families which acts like an extended family, providing practical and emotional peer support, planned and emergency short breaks (including valuable sleepovers), and social activities, offering children in care and foster carers a more positive experience.

GCC also aims to keep fostering within the public or not-for-profit sector wherever possible, so that the focus stays squarely on the child's needs and the community’s capacity to care for them.

On average, fostering arrangements made through independent fostering agencies cost local councils significantly more than those made with in-house council carers. While some IFAs provide good care, these higher costs are often driven by the need to generate profit for private owners or shareholders — money that could otherwise be reinvested in children’s services.

For more information, visit gloucestershire.gov.uk/fostering or email fostering@gloucestershire.gov.uk.