The Supply of Foster Families for Children in Care

Abstract

The family circumstances of 2694 foster homes in England are compared with representative families from the 1985 General Household Survey. Foster families typically include a woman in the 31–55 age group, live in homes with three or more bedrooms, are two parent families with one parent working full-time and the other not, and they have older children only. The incidence of families with these characteristics is used to develop an estimator of the relative supply position of local authority areas for foster care, from which a number of conclusions are drawn. Over the last thirty years some social changes have improved the supply, others decreased it, and on balance the national supply position is little changed. Ironically, supply is best in those areas which have the lowest need for fostering services. Ways in which local authorities can improve their supply position are considered. The supply estimator reveals that the average boarding out payments made by authorities show clear signs of responsiveness to the local supply position for foster families.