Ahead of the General Election, The Fostering Network launched our 2024 manifesto!
Use our manifesto to make sure your prospective parliamentary candidates prioritise the needs of the children, young people and foster carers in your constituency. Find out how to get involved below.
Scroll to the bottom to see the main political parties' manifesto commitments for fostering and children's social care.
Our manifesto
We are calling on political parties to:
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Focus on care experienced children and young people.
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Support fostering families.
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Invest and reform in the wider system supporting care experienced children and young people.
We want:
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Children and young people coming into care to maintain relationships with their families and communities. We need enough highly skilled foster families locally that can care for children where they need them.
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Foster carers to be recognised as having a key role in decision making for children and to be treated as equal and valued members of the team around the child. Their skills, knowledge and expertise should be respected and valued.
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A well-funded children’s social care system that truly values foster care and can support families at the point of need before their needs escalate.
With the right support, every child and young person with care experience can thrive in foster care. The Fostering Network is calling on all political parties to commit to taking bold, urgent action to tackle the challenges care experienced children, young people and foster carers are facing. Our manifesto provides achievable solutions to meet these goals.
We will be sending our manifesto out to political parties and working with them in the run up to the election to ensure that improving the children's social care system and fostering is a top priority of the incoming Government.
Write to your prospective parliamentary candidate
Who are the prospective candidates in my constituency?
There are many new prospective candidates who are running to be MPs in the upcoming General Election. Learn who the candidates are in your area here: https://whocanivotefor.co.uk/ppcs/ .
You can go to the bottom of the page and type in your postcode to find your constituency.
How do I speak to my local candidate about foster care?
There are currently almost 70,000 children and young people in foster care living with 53,000 foster families across the UK. Now is the time to make sure that prospective parliamentary candidates are aware of the challenges that foster carers and children in care are facing and are prioritising the needs of the children and young people in your constituency.
The Fostering Network is calling on all political parties to commit to taking bold, urgent action to address the instability and poor outcomes which exist for care experienced children so our care system can provide stable, loving homes close to children’s communities.
Write to the prospective candidates in your area using this template and ask them to commit to the pledges in our manifesto to improve fostering!
How do I use campaigning resources from The Fostering Network?
The Fostering Network is the UK’s leading fostering charity, bringing people together to make foster care the very best it can be. We are a politically neutral organisation, so we ask that you do not endorse any particular candidate whilst campaigning with our manifesto. We would encourage you to ask all your prospective candidates to make fostering a priority to address the challenges faced by children, young people and foster carers in your area.
What are the main political parties’ commitments to children’s social care and fostering?
These are based on the manifestos published so far, we will update the rest as they come out.
Labour
“Every child should have a loving, secure home. Labour will work with local government to support children in care, including through kinship, foster care, and adoption, as well as strengthening regulation of the children’s social care sector.”
“Sadly, too often we see families falling through the cracks of public services. Labour will improve data sharing across services, with a single unique identifier, to better support children and families.”
Conservatives
“We will improve the experiences of children in social care, because every child deserves to live in a safe and loving home. We will create more places in children’s homes while prioritising keeping families together where that’s best for the child through our Kinship Care Strategy and helping children grow up in loving adoptive families where that is a better option.
“We will also support those leaving care with housing, education and employment, in addition to expanding befriending and mentoring programmes for care leavers.”
Liberal Democrats
“We will support children in kinship care and their family carers by introducing a statutory definition of kinship care and building on the existing pilot to develop a weekly allowance for all kinship carers.”
“Make care experience a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010 to strengthen the rights of people who are in or have been in care”
“Protect and support the rights and wellbeing of every child by Incorporating the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into UK law.”
Greens
“The scandal of inadequate and under-funded care for looked-after children cannot be allowed to continue. Elected Greens will push for an additional £3bn to be provided to local authorities to enable them to provide high-quality children’s social care.”
“Elected Greens will also push for children in foster care or who have been adopted to have consistent access to a trained counsellor until it is no longer required. We would fund councils to extend staying put arrangements, so fostered young people can choose to stay with foster parents until they are 21.”
Plaid Cymru
“Plaid Cymru is committed to the consultation on the elimination of profit in children’s services provision. Our aim is to work towards the gradual expansion in capacity of direct provision, in both children’s services and adult services to achieve this.”
