Foster Care Fortnight 2023

Foster Care Fortnight is the UK’s biggest annual fostering awareness campaign, delivered by The Fostering Network.

This year the campaign theme is #FosteringCommunities and it will run from Monday 15^th May – Sunday 28^th May 2023.

Fostercare Fortnight is a chance to come together and celebrate the commitment and passion of fostering communities all over the UK.  It’s a chance to educate people about fostering and encourage more people to consider becoming foster carers.

There are thousands of children and young people coming into care each year, and with that comes the urgent need for more people to step forward and foster.

*The facts

• Across the UK a third of children in care are given a home outside of their local authority
• Currently, 70,000 children are living with 56,000 foster carers across the UK

A child comes into care every 15 minutes – historically this was 20 minutes
30,000 more children will come into care in the next 12 months.

*How many foster carers do we need?

Currently, across the UK, we need 7,200 foster carers to come forward. We need 6,000 in England alone, 500 in Scotland, 400 in Wales and 300 in Northern Ireland.  These statistics do not include foster carers that are looking after the children of their friends or family.

What we’re doing to help

In support of The Fostering Network, and to raise awareness of this growing need, our agencies are hosting an abundance of activities including walks and breakfast mornings with their foster carers.

We’ll be adding their activities to this page, so if you want to see what they’re getting up to, keep checking this page.

If you would like to find out more about fostering, you can do so here.

*Statistics provided by The Fostering Network.

Here’s what our agencies have been up to.

Carer Recruitment Officer Sarah, and Supervising Social Worker Emma from our Fostering Solutions team in the Midlands, held their foster walk at Cannock Chase in Staffordshire ️ ‍♀️

Our Next Step team and foster carers had a wonderful time supporting The Fostering Network this #fcf23

They went on their own foster walk in Thames Valley, followed by a delicious lunch afterwards

Great work team

On Saturday, our Fostering Solutions team in Merseyside collaborated with LFC Foundation in support of The Fostering Network and together they held a walk and fun day in Sefton Park.

The sun was shining, and there was a fantastic turnout. A big thanks to LFC Foundation for supporting the walk and providing some fun activities for our foster families and team to take part in.

Our Carer Recruitment Officer Nic also spoke to Sean Styles on BBC Radio Merseyside about the growing need for more foster carers in the Northwest.

You can listen to it here from 28 minutes http://ow.ly/3e3v50OtwwA