Guidance and Terms of Reference for the Fostering and Adoption Finance Panel

Current Financial Delegation arrangements as of April 2012 allow:

Current Approval Limit / Future Approval Limit
Head of Service
CSDM Fostering & Adoption
Team Manager Fostering & Adoption
CSDM Fieldwork
Team Manager Fieldwork / No limit
£20,000
£500
£2,500
£500 / £20,000
£500
£500
£500
£500

Terms of Reference

  1. To deal with the exceptional/unusual financial requests in relation to the following placement of looked after and previously looked after children::

-Adoption – pre and post order

-Kinship Care

-Fostering

-Special Guardianship

-Residence Order

-Post 18 years payments

  1. To determine which budget any agreed payments should be allocated to
  1. To provide a consistent approach to decision making across the city
  1. To meet on a regular basis to ensure speedy decision making
  1. To provide administrative support to ensure decisions are recorded and actioned appropriately and any monitoring of decision making is done
  1. To have a balanced membership across fieldwork and resources.

Panel membership

-Head of Service (Chair)

-CSDM Fieldwork

-Team Manager Fieldwork

-CSDM Fostering & Adoption x2

-KInship care manager

-Adoption support manager

-Fostering support manager

-Minute Taker

Reports for Panel

All reports should be discussed and agreed by the Social Worker and Fostering / Adoption Officer before being presented to panel. Where the care is complex it may be helpful for the Social Worker / Fostering / Adoption Officer to attend the panel. Adoption placement reports and adoption support assessments should be included in the paperwork for adoption carer. Pathway planning reports should be included in the paperwork for post 18 requests. Where the request is for an extension or for a car, a delegated decision report should be completed instead of the usual finance report pro forma.

Examples of situations which should be referred to Panel

Kinship Care

-Set up costs which entail more than the usual essential items of furniture which cost over the current CSDM approval delegation, e.g. carpets, decoration, house move, house adaptation, house extensions, car, washing machine etc

-Ongoing financial assistance to support the placement other than weekly maintenance payment, e.g. reimbursement of carer’s wages, long term nursery or childminding fees

Fostering

-Requests for housing adaptation/extension, house move (N.B. delegated decision reports (DDP) should be signed off by Finance Panel before proceeding to the Head of Service or Chief Officer. If agreed in principle by the Finance Panel, the DDP report should be submitted for formal approval to the Head of Social Work Service.

-Post 18 requests for young people to stay with carer

Adoption (before matching panel)

-Financial support package required in respect of single payments over and above £500 settling in grant and weekly adoption allowance e.g. for items such as a car, nursery fees, house extensions etc

Adoption (post order)

New

-Requests to provide weekly maintenance allowances following an adoption support assessment

-Specific one off or series of payment requests over £500.

-Continued adoption allowances post 18 where young person still in school or in sheltered education and training

Special Guardianship

-Requests for allowances / fees to be paid after the 2 year transitional period following the court order.

-Housing extensions/large items e.g. car.

-Leaving care provision

Residence Orders

-Requests for allowances / fees to be paid after the 2 year transitional period following the court order

-Housing extensions/large items e.g. car.

Post 18 requests

-Requests for continued weekly payments to foster carers looking after young people who remain in education and training, either on board and lodging arrangement or fostering based allowance and fee.

-Unusual one off payment requests.

Examples of financial requests which are not dealt with by the finance panel

  1. Ongoing weekly allowances for SGO/RO payments for up to 2 years post court order. These should be dealt with by HOS as part of the SGO / RO planning and support report.
  1. Situations which are unlikely to be long lasting and which can be signed within normal financial delegations e.g. short term arrangements for nursery fees, arrangements covered in FN16, or attendance at a course.
  1. Ongoing adoption, allowances. These are recommended by adoption panel and agreed by the agency decision maker.
  1. Section 17 payments

Panel Administration

  1. All reports should be submitted to the Fostering Admin Inbox one week prior to panel meeting. All reports must be endorsed by your manager
  2. Kinship requests should be seen prior to panel by Kinship Care Team Manager who may be able to present the case to panel
  3. Adoption support requests to be overseen by Adoption Support Team Manager
  4. Minutes to be provided to all panel members along with the agenda
  5. Copy of signed and agreed report and copy of the minute to be sent to the author(s) of the report in order that they can convey the decision(s) of the panel to the carer / applicant
  6. Copy of the decision and minute should be kept on the child and carer’s file
  7. Copy letter to social worker / fostering / adoption officer
  8. Copy of signed and agreed report to be sent to Foster Carer Payments for their records
  9. Electronic copies of all minutes and agendas will be kept in G drive, Fostadoptman, Financial Review Panel folder.

Date: 16/4/2012


FAO Head of Service

Financial Support Requests including Fostering, pre and post Adoption, Kinship Care, Special Guardianship
Kinship Fostering
Fostering
Special Guardianship
Adoption Attach Adoption Placement Reportor Adoption Support assessment to this report
Please specify if request for finance is (please tick as appropriate)

Pre-placement

Post placement

Post order
Post 18 yrs Attach Pathway Plan to this report
Note – Welfare Benefit checks must be completed prior to panel & details included in the report. This is achieved by contacting the Welfare Benefits section who will contact the carer to ensure all benefits are being claimed
Child’s name
Date of Birth
Legal Status / Care Plan
Name of Foster Carer / Adopter
Address
Name of Social Worker/Author of Report
Name of Fostering/Adoption Officer
Date of Report
Name of Team Manager
Team Manager’s comments
Agreement Yes / No
Head of Service
Decision
Date
  1. Purpose of this report – (Brief outline of financial request)

  1. Background – (Include brief details of child’s / family situation including legal status of child, significant factors in case, child’s needs & case planning)

  1. Main issues –(As they relate to this request and whether other sources of funding have been
considered)
4. Legal and resource implications – (Provide detailed breakdown of costs; Including time period required, any contributions to be made by the carer; review arrangements and any ‘payback’ arrangement e.g. for large sums of monies, there is a requirement that funds will be repaid if the child leaves the family within a specific time frame)
  1. Conclusions

6. Recommendation