Responding to the Westminster Government's response to the fostering stocktake report and the Education Select Committee’s inquiry into fostering - Fostering Better Outcomes - Kevin Williams, chief executive of The Fostering Network, said: 'The Fostering Network is disappointed with the Government’s response to the fostering stocktake and education select committee enquiry in England, Fostering Better Outcomes. Put simply, although there is very little in the report that we fundamentally disagree with – and indeed a range of proposals that we support - it lacks teeth.

'While the report does lay out a vision for foster care – it begins with five excellent over-arching ambitions – it fails to set out an ambitious plan that will create the much-needed systemic change in the fostering sector, and we do not believe that it will achieve the improvements that are desperately needed to ensure that foster care is the best it can be for children and the families that look after them. We believe the continued insistence of referring to ‘foster parents’ ignores the wider role and responsibilities of foster carers and the skills and experience they bring.

'This was a chance to radically overhaul the fostering system to make foster care better, but it feels like an opportunity missed. There is no sense of the Government taking ownership of improving fostering, nor of the urgent need for change. The voices of foster carers have been largely ignored and the tens of thousands of children and young people in their care have been let down.'

Notes to editors

For a more detailed response please click here.

For more information or interviews with a spokesperson from The Fostering Network please email media@fostering.net or phone 020 7620 6441. For local case studies and foster carers please contact your local fostering services.

• The Fostering Network is the UK’s leading fostering charity. We are the essential network for fostering, bringing together everyone who is involved in the lives of fostered children. We champion fostering and seek to create vital change so that foster care is the very best it can be.
• The Fostering Network's State of the Nation's Foster Care survey is open until the end of September.