Foster carers beg for support as record numbers quit the system

NSW’s foster carers are leaving the system in droves, with nearly 1000 authorised carers quitting in the past year.

Foster carers interviewed by The Sun-Herald say they are struggling with low payments, limited support for children with behavioural issues, poor communication from agencies which place the children in their care and the lack of an independent body to oversee the sector.

They have also flagged concerns that children are spending longer than two years as a ward of the state are being placed in a succession of homes, and that the pathway to adoption has remained difficult.

There are about 11,000 households with one or more registered carers and nearly 15,000 children in need of care and protection. Just one-third of these children are placed with foster families.

Nearly 1000 foster carers left the system in the past year.Credit: iStock

NSW Minister for Families and Communities Kate Washington said she was aware of the concerns of foster carers.

“Coming into government, we inherited a child protection system spiralling out of control, where foster carer numbers have plummeted and vulnerable children are paying the price,” she said.

“The system depends on foster carers but they’ve been walking away in droves for years.

“The NSW government is embarking on significant reform of the child protection system, and a critical element of that reform will be more support for foster carers.”

Washington has previously conceded the child protection system is “broken” and pledged to reform it, but she is yet to detail what changes will take place.

The NSW Department of Communities and Justice estimates that an extra 1000 foster carers are needed each year to take care of children who cannot live safely at home. Washington made an urgent plea last September for more parents to sign up.

Washington commended foster carers for their compassion and dedication.

“Foster carers give a lot of love – but for too long, too many have not been feeling the love from the child protection system,” she said.

Foster carers say they’re struggling with low payments, limited support for children with behavioural issues, and poor communication from the Department of Communities and Justice and the non-government organisations that place the children in their care.

NSW legislation bars media from identifying children or young people who have been in out of home care until they turn 25. Foster carers also cannot be identified to protect the children in their care.

The Sun-Herald has protected the identity of five foster carers to highlight their experiences.

“I can’t do this any more”: Grace quits as a carer

After caring for children for more than a decade, Grace has decided to quit the foster system.

“My experience was just really, really tough,” she said. “I honestly couldn’t say I would recommend it to many people. I can’t do it any more.”

The single mother, who works full-time, said she struggled with the lack of support she received.

The children in her care – some who were only supposed to come for a weekend but have stayed for years – have come with severe behavioural difficulties and disabilities, and require sessions with psychologists, psychiatrists and speech therapists. She also had to facilitate visitation with their biological family members, some of whom are in prison.

Grace said there are rarely other carers available to give her foster children a weekend of respite care, while caseworkers were stretched so thin they were unable to help her take the kids to their many appointments.

About one in five children in out-of-home care received a respite placement in 2022-23, according to the department.

“The experience that I’ve just had with the system is so bad [but] they just don’t have any other carers,” she said.

Multiple placements too common

Tina has looked after at least 40 children while working on and off as a foster carer, both in Australia and abroad. She said she’s felt “instant connections” with several children and would have pursued adoption.

But she said that the department and agencies are too quick to move children on if there is any form of conflict in the home.

“Say you want them to hand their phones in at 10pm, and you get into a big disagreement about it, that kid can be picked up and removed,” she said.

“The kids know what words to use in the system, and will threaten to say that you’ve hit them. Instead of teaching the child that things can go wrong, and you can work through them, the child is just picked up … it’s teaching that young person that abandonment is how to solve problems.”

Of the 15,000 children in need of protection, about one in three have had three or more placements during their time in state care.

Tina said that she often does not know where the child is moved, while the high turnover of caseworkers meant that staying in contact with the kids was difficult.

NSW’s caseworker vacancy rate spiked by five percentage points to 12 per cent between July and September last year as caseworkers struggle with low budgets and high caseloads.

Under legislation introduced in 2017, children are supposed to either be returned to their families or be placed in a permanent home under the guardianship of their foster carers, or adopted. However, a review of the system released by the department last year, found a low number of children who were within the permanency support program were placed in a permanent home within two years.

A department spokesperson said children were moved to an alternative placement if the child is unsafe and the issues cannot be addressed by a safety plan following an assessment.

“DCJ’s policy requires a caseworker to respond to any risk of harm reports for children in out-of-home care and take protective action for all reports,” the spokesperson said.

Need for more information about behavioural and medical histories

The lack of communication between the department, different agencies and parents has been a key issue for Jim and his husband Wayne, who have fostered eight children across five years.

A program aimed at placing kids back with their families or into permanent homes within two years has failed, an evaluation has found.Credit: iStock

They have had children arrive with undiagnosed infections and illnesses and have not been told of past violent behaviour, Jim said, amid a high turnover of caseworkers who fail to pass on key information.

“We wouldn’t have said no to these children, but we would have had more open eyes and ears to what’s going on around us,” Jim said.

A department spokesperson said it’s a requirement that “foster carers are provided with as much information as needed to provide appropriate care”.

Jim and Wayne mostly rely on Wayne’s income: NSW doesn’t recognise parental leave for foster parents, so Jim quit his office job to be able to care for the young children in their care.

The pair receive $220 a week payment for babies under four, which Jim says barely covers the necessities of formula, nappies and clothes, and it was often a fight to be reimbursed for expenses the department should cover.

“Money isn’t why anyone does this, but a lot of people would find it very hard,” Jim said.

Despite the challenges, the pair would not trade the experience for anything, and encourage anyone in a position to do so to consider fostering.

They have four children in their care, including a newborn, and are hoping to pursue adoption with the biological parent’s support.

“Children in no man’s land” as foster carers fight for recognition

After more than a decade of caring for a group of four siblings, Harry still has no official title other than “foster carer”.

Attempts to adopt the children have been blocked by the foster agency, he said, due to the eldest children’s behavioural issues. It means a caseworker still visits every month, which Harry says reminds the children that they are different.

Adoption rates in NSW have plummeted by 60 per cent since 2020, with just 60 children adopted from out-of-home care in 2022-23.

“The four kids have been living in no man’s land for all their lives. They know they’re not going back to their birth parents, yet they don’t have the certainty the security of knowing that they’re staying with [us],” he said.

“We don’t have any parental control or status.”

Harry said he and his partner clashed with a new caseworker assigned to the children a few years ago over views on how to best raise the children.

The situation escalated to a formal complaint to the non-government agency which was responsible for placing the children in their care. His partner’s carer’s licence was revoked and children removed from her care.

Harry said the incident highlighted the need for an independent complaints process.

“There needs to be an independent body to issue carers with their licence and investigate allegations – the agencies become the complainant, investigator, judge and jury,” Harry said.

A department spokesperson said caseworkers will carry out regular reviews of a child in care, including holistic assessments about reported experiences of abuse, neglect or other safety issues.

“Caseworkers have regular meetings involving the people who are important in a child’s life, including their carer, to discuss and plan for all areas of the child’s wellbeing,” the spokesperson said.

Carers call for departmental consultation

Luke and his wife Ruby have cared for about 50 children across their 25 years as foster parents. They now offer emergency and respite care, and Luke volunteers as an advocate for other carers.

Luke believes carers are not given a seat at the table about system reform. Successive governments, he said, have failed to listen to and respect carers.

“A lot of experienced carers like myself and Ruby who have been in the game for a while, have had their fingers badly burned by the system,” he said.

“[Carers] are leaving because of the poor way in which they are treated by the system, and the lack of respect and support from agencies.”

He said key issues were the lack of carers available to offer respite care, the lack of caseworkers to provide information and support, and the lack of authority carers had over the children in their care, with caseworkers intervening to override house rules on screen times, and children moved around after spending years with a family.

“I think the greatest travesty of justice in the out-of-home care system in NSW is the poor treatment of children in our foster care. It doesn’t protect children, it upholds the political regime of the day,” he said.

A department spokesperson said the government supported all eligible families who want to adopt or foster children in NSW.

“The department … is focused on improving carers’ lives by tackling the issues that matter most to them, such as improving decision-making, addressing communication issues, and strengthening carer support,” the spokesperson said.

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