The Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) will continue in 2025-26, with £50m available to fund therapies and specialist assessments for children formerly in the care system.

Children’s minister Janet Daby made the announcement today after being called to the House of Commons to confirm whether the ASGSF had a future, one day after it expired.

The announcement ends months of speculation about the ASGSF’s future, during which Daby – and on one occasion, Keir Starmer – have repeatedly failed to confirm whether the fund had a future beyond 31 March 2025.

Significant uncertainty for children and families

The situation had created significant uncertainty for thousands of children and families, led to some having their therapy brought to an abrupt end and delayed applications for support for those whose needs had been newly assessed by councils or regional adoption agencies (RAA).

Campaigners and therapy providers warned that this had exacerbated the trauma experienced by the children concerned, all of whom were formerly in care and, in most cases, were now in adoptive or special guardianship placements.

When funding ended yesterday, the Department for Education maintained the line ministers had kept to for two months – that it would set out details on the ASGSF “as soon as possible”.

Liberal Democrat spokesperson for education, children and families Munira Wilson then tabled an urgent question in Parliament today asking the government to confirm whether the ASGSF had a future.

Surprise announcement of £50m for 2025-26

To her surprise, Daby responded by saying: “I’m very happy to confirm today that £50m has been allocated for the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund for this year. I’ll be sharing further details with the House in the next few days and opening applications.”

The funding is broadly in line with levels over the past three years, during which £144m was allocated to the ASGSF.

Funding beyond 2026 is subject to the government’s spending review, which will report this summer.

However, Daby said that ministers had “no plans” to end the ASGSF in March 2026, pointing to councils’ duties under the Adoption and Children Act 2002 to assess needs for adoption support and then decide whether to provide services.

Minister ‘appreciates’ impact of delay on children and families

Daby added: “I very much appreciate that the delay conforming continuation has bene a very difficult time for many. I’m especially concerned for children and families as many of those who the ASGSF supports are in great need of continued help.”

She said she also recognised the impact on therapy providers, some of whom have had to seek other sources of work, prompting warnings from adoption leaders of reduced capacity for ASGSF-funded services.

In response, Wilson said: “I welcome the announcement we’ve just heard form the minister, which none of us were accepting as many of us on all sides of the chamber have spent the last few months asking question after question and being batted away and told that an answer was forthcoming.”

Children ‘left in limbo’

She said the fund was for children who had suffered the “deepest trauma”, but they had been “left hanging and in limbo”.

Wilson and several other MPs shared stories of the anxiety experienced by constituents because of the delay in confirming the fund’s future.

Concerns were also raised about the significant backlog of ASGSF cases that will need to be considered by consultancy Mott MacDonald – which administers the fund on behalf of the DfE – when applications reopen.

Conservative MP Julia Lopez asked if there would be resource put into clearing the backlog, but Daby did not answer the point.

No commitment to putting funding on longer-term basis

Though Daby suggested funding would continue beyond 2026, MPs also asked for it to be placed on a longer-term basis.

Currently, funding for therapy is only provided for 12 months – or until £5,000 has been exhausted – meaning councils and RAAs must reapply on behalf of children and families who need longer-term support. However, Daby did not respond to this point.

At one point during the debate, Daby appeared to imply that the fund would be extended to those kinship families who are currently not covered by it, but she later said its remit would not be expanded.

‘What has happened has been really unforgivable’

Sector bodies welcomed the continuation of the fund but heavily criticised the delay in making the announcement.

For Adoption UK, chief executive Emily Frith said: “The fund has transformed the lives of tens of thousands of children and it’s a huge relief to have this commitment for a further year of specialist support.

“Unfortunately the delay has caused great distress for families and has risked further harm to children. There will now be a backlog of applications, and further waits for people in desperate need of support. What has happened has been really unforgivable. The government must open applications immediately, and then announce a permanent Fund so they avoid ever causing such distress again.”

Families face ‘dangerous gap in therapy’

Consortium of Voluntary Adoption Agencies (CVAA) chief executive, Satwinder Sandhu said it was “enormously relieved and pleased that the funding has been confirmed”.

However, he warned: “We now have to redirect our concerns to the thousands of families facing a dangerous gap in therapy, of unknown length, while the fund is flooded with applications (once they re-open the application portal that is).

“It’s a dire situation which needs an emergency strategy from the DfE to identify and fast-track families in most need. There also needs to be consideration of emergency funding to plug the gap or at least reimburse services which have to use their reserves to keep children safe these next few months.”

He added: “What’s clear is that in recent months we have witnessed a shortsighted approach from government towards adoptive families. They recognise the urgent need for more prospective adopters, yet they undermine this by failing to provide adopters with assurances of support which is essential for all children being placed.”

Kinship, which advocates for kinship families, issued a similarly qualified message.

Delay ‘has led to immense worry and stress’

“This news will come as welcome relief to all of those kinship families who were deeply concerned about their children losing access to vital therapeutic support,” said its director of policy and communications, Rhiannon Clapperton.

“However, we remain deeply frustrated that this clarity has only come after the fund had expired and after a lengthy period of unnecessary uncertainty.

“The absence of any information about the future of the fund has led to immense worry and stress amongst the kinship families we support and campaign alongside.”

She added: “It is vital the government now works at pace to mitigate against the negative impacts of the delay and ensure that applications for therapeutic assessments and support can proceed as quickly as possible.”

Call to extend fund to more kinship families

Family Rights Group’s chief executive, Cathy Ashley, said the government had “extended a vital lifeline for families to access therapeutic support for adopted children and some in kinship care arrangements”, but urged ministers to extend the ASGSF’s remit.

“Family Rights Group has long urged the government to remove the requirement for kinship children to have been in the care system to be eligible, and to include those in informal arrangements.

“Longer-term funding security and improving the application process would be a boost to families too.”

Parliament’s All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Kinship Care made a similar point in response to the news, saying: “The minister was unclear on whether further children in kinship care could become eligible for this support. Our group, alongside families and the sector, has been calling for this to ensure all children in kinship care who need this are able to access it.

“We are encouraged by the extension but will scrutinise the details including any expansion when they are available.”

After this article was published, the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund was confirmed for another year, with £50m in funding. Get the latest on the ASGSF here.

The Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) has expired today (31 March 2025), with no news on its future.

The Department for Education said today that it would “set out more details on the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund as soon as possible”, while children’s minister Janet Daby reported that announcements on ASGSF funding from April 2025 would be made “shortly”. 

The statements echo several issued by Daby in response to written parliamentary questions over the past two months, and Keir Starmer’s response to a question on the ASGSF in Parliament last week.

Therapies cease for thousands of children

The lack of a decision means therapy for thousands of children and families will cease, with large numbers of new applications for services left on hold, as the government continues to defer an announcement on the ASGSF’s future.

In 2023-24, 16,970 therapy applications were approved for services including creative and physical therapies, family therapy, psychotherapy, parent training and therapeutic life story work.

Therapy providers and adoption leaders have warned that abruptly ending support for former looked-after children with significant levels of trauma poses significant risks to them and their parents and carers, and would likely trigger large numbers of placement breakdowns.

While therapy is continuing for some children and families whose services started in the latter part of 2024-25, they represent a small minority, say providers.

And though some regional adoption agencies (RAAs) have developed multidisciplinary teams that deliver therapeutic support, they are not resourced to replace ASGSF-funded provision.

‘Devastating for children and families’

In a written parliamentary answer published today, Daby said the DfE would “shortly be finalising business planning decisions on how we will allocate the department’s budget for the next financial year. All decisions regarding the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) are being made as part of these discussions.”

However, should the DfE provide ASGSF funding for 2025-26, families will face long waits for support because of the backlog applications, warn campaigners. At the same time, therapy providers have taken on other work, risking a loss of capacity to provide ASGSF-funded provision should it restart, according to Adoption England, the national support body for RAAs.

Sector charity Adoption UK described the lack of news on the ASGSF’s future as “devastating for children, and for the families and the professionals who care for them”.

After this article was published, the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund was confirmed for another year, with £50m in funding. Get the latest on the ASGSF here.

Keir Starmer has failed to confirm the future of the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF), with the scheme to provide therapy for children and families just days from ending.

He was questioned about the ASGSF – worth £50m a year – at prime minister’s questions (PMQs) this week by LLiberal Democrat spokesperson for education, children and families Munira Wilson.

She said the adopted daughter of one of her constituents had been receiving “much-needed therapy” through the fund to help her recover from “immense trauma”, but was now among “thousands” who did not know whether they would get more help, with the ASGSF due to expire on 31 March.

Starmer fails to confirm fund’s future

Wilson said ministers had “repeatedly refused to confirm” whether the fund would continue and asked Starmer: “Can the prime minister give a cast-iron guarantee to vulnerable children, adoptive parents and kinship carers that he will not cut that fund?”

However, in response, the prime minister merely said the government would “set out the details just as soon as we can”, an answer that has been given repeatedly by children’s minister Janet Daby in response to multiple parliamentary questions.

The ASGSF funds specialist assessments and therapy for adopted children, those placed for adoption, former looked-after children cared for under special guardianship or child arrangements orders, and those whose permanence placements had broken down.

Prime minister links ASGSF and welfare reform

However, Starmer appeared to characterise it as part of the welfare system and link its future to the government’s reforms to disability and incapacity benefits.

“The welfare scheme overall is not defendable on terms, but it must be one that supports those who need it,” he told Wilson, adding that this should be on the “basis of the principles that I set out earlier”.

The “principles” appeared to be those Starmer gave in response to an earlier question from the SNP’s Stephen Flynn related to the government’s plans to tighten eligibility for the main working-age disability benefit, personal independence payment, and cut the level of incapacity benefits.

“We need to give support to those who need it, we need to help those who want to work into work, and we need to be clear that those who can work should work,” the prime minister replied.

In a post on X following PMQs, Wilson described Starmer’s failure to confirm the fund’s continuation as “very disappointing”.

The fund’s rules stipulate that therapy can be provided for up to 12 months – or until a £5,000 annual limit has been exhausted – after which the relevant council or regional adoption agency (RAA) must reapply on behalf of the relevant child or family.

‘Small proportion’ will therapy services beyond 31 March

In her responses to parliamentary questions, Daby has repeatedly pointed to a provision that enables families whose ASGSF funding was agreed in the latter part of 2024-25 to be able to continue therapy into 2025-26, meaning their services would not end on 31 March.

However, this applies to a very small proportion of recipients, said Jay Vaughan, chief executive of Family Futures, a voluntary adoption agency and therapy provider.

“What [Daby] is referring to is that, for about 2% of families, if they got funding in the latter part of the financial year, they can get split funding [carried over into the next financial year],” she said. “But that’s not allowed for 98% of families. Their contract and their work ends on 31 March.”

It is not known how many are affected, but 16,970 applicants were awarded therapy in 2023-24.

A similar point to Vaughan’s was made by sector charity Adoption UK, whose chief executive, Emily Frith, said: “The promise of funds for therapy being rolled over into the next financial year was welcome, but in reality applications have been backing up for some time and this does nothing for those who didn’t get their applications extended in time, or for many making new applications in the run up to March.”

‘The most traumatised children in society’

Family Futures, Adoption UK and several other organisations have been raising increasing concerns in recent weeks about the impact on children with significant trauma, and their families, of uncertainty over their ongoing therapy or services abruptly coming to an end.

Vaughan said there were the “most traumatised children in society”, and a withdrawal of services risked placements being disrupted and young people re-entering the care system.

“Some of those families are in a terrible state, really close to the edge of disruption. We’re talking pre-order, where they’re not even sure if they can proceed with the adoption.

“Some of them we’ve got have a high level of violence, where the parent doesn’t know if they can keep going. Some are children who are suicidal, who are self-harming, who somehow don’t meet the criteria for Camhs. All of those have nothing [come 31 March].”

She said the situation had been exacerbated by therapists not being able to prepare children and families for sessions coming to an end, because providers had repeatedly been given assurances over the past few months that an announcement confirming the fund’s continuation into 2025-26 was imminent.

Level of uncertainty ‘unacceptable’

Frith issued a similar message, saying that the situation was “creating additional anxiety and distress for children and families dealing with complex trauma”.

“This level of uncertainty is unacceptable when we are talking about children who have already experienced so much disruption in their lives,” she added.

Should the fund continue, councils and RAAs have pre-loaded applications onto the ASGSF’s portal, which could then be considered, said Adoption England, the national support body for RAAs.

However, Vaughan said there would be a “huge backlog” of applications for the fund – delivered by consultancy Mott MacDonald, on behalf of the Department for Education – to go through.

Therapists taking on other work, leaving potential gap in provision

Meanwhile, therapy providers who have historically delivered support through the fund are taking on other work, potentially leaving a gap in provision should the ASGSF continue.

“RAAs do have providers who are moving to take alternative work and reduce the capacity they hold for ASGSF, and therefore we are at risk of losing sufficiency in the local market that RAAs have worked hard to achieve,” said Adoption England.

“RAAs are undertaking work, funded by the DfE, to look at regional sufficiency and commissioning arrangements, and providers are clear that the delay in decision making regarding ongoing funding of the ASGSF does risk being able to achieve this.”

Vaughan added: “I’m aware of other agencies making mass redundancies. I’m aware of lone providers, who have mortgages and children, who are thinking, ‘I have no work’, because we’re all dependent on one funding stream.”

Alternative sources of funding and provision

Adoption England said there were “no other streams of funding for therapeutic support, other than the local NHS provision that is available for all children”, though RAAs were “continually developing their adoption support provision” and some had multi-disciplinary teams who deliver ASGSF-funded work.

Vaughan said that Family Futures had been given a donation to help continue services for children and families post-31 March 2025, while one RAA had offered the agency interim funding.

However, she added: “But that’s one out of the country.”

For Adoption UK, Frith said: “We would like to see the Department for Education communicate clearly with families about the support they are entitled to and to issue clear guidance to therapists and agency staff so that they can effectively advise parents and carers on the best course of action.”

ASGSF ‘must be extended’ – directors’ body 

The Association of Directors of Children’s Services, meanwhile, joined the calls for the fund to be renewed.

Nigel Minns, chair of the association’s health, care and additional needs policy committee, said the ASGSF provided “essential therapy” and “must be extended to provide longer term certainty for all those involved, including children, families, providers and local authorities”.

“Alongside this, the fund needs to be made more accessible and widened out, to avoid breaks in therapy and ensure more children and families get the help and support they need when it is needed,” he added.

The children’s minister has said she is doing everything possible to “push forward” a decision on the future of the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF), which expires at the end of this month.

Janet Daby told MPs that she understood the “uncertainty and insecurity” created by the government’s delay in confirming the future of the ASGSF, which largely funds therapeutic support for adopted children and those who left care under a special guardianship order (SGO), along with their families.

The delay has meant that councils and regional adoption agencies (RAAs) cannot make applications for therapeutic support for newly assessed children and families, nor to continue therapy for those currently in receipt of it. ASGSF awards last up to 12 months or up to the point when a £5,000 limit has been reached, meaning RAAs and councils must reapply to the fund to ensure continuity of support.

‘Thousands of children at risk of losing therapy’

As a result, therapy providers say thousands of children face a break in their therapy, even if the Department for Education eventually does confirm the renewal of the ASGSF, which is currently worth just under £50m a year.

Providers and adoption bodies have warned that this will be very damaging for children for whom the therapy is designed to support recovery from trauma.

Daby was quizzed on the issue by Liberal Democrat MP Manuela Pereteghella, in an appearance this week before the education select committee as part of its inquiry into children’s social care reform.

Perteghalla said the uncertainty around the future of the ASGSF was causing “a lot of distress” to families and asked the minister if she could provide reassurance to them that the fund would continue.

Minister ‘doing everything to push forward’ decision

In response, Daby, a former fostering social worker and manager, said: “I am aware of the uncertainty and the insecurity that that is causing because, obviously, the announcement has not been made. The announcement will be made very soon about the adoption and special guardianship funding, and as soon as that information is available, then it will be made known.

“But I absolutely understand, and I hear and I do get it. I am hearing from organisations as well around this, and I am doing everything I can to push this forward.”

The charity Kinship, which supports and campaigns on behalf of kinship families, voiced its concerns about the ongoing uncertainty around the fund and “the detrimental impact this is having on kinship families who desperately need therapeutic support”.

Risk of ‘catastrophe of more children going into care’

Chief executive Lucy Peake said the fund was a “vital lifeline for many kinship families, often helping children in kinship care to navigate complex challenges with their mental health, identity and family relationships”.

She added that, in its 2024 annual survey, 13% of carers said they were worried about whether they could continue caring for their children, with nearly three-quarters of this group saying this was due to difficulties managing the children’s social, emotional and mental health needs.

“If we are to avoid the catastrophe of children being placed back into an already overstretched care system, it is essential that additional funding for the ASGSF is confirmed as soon as possible,” Peake added.

Kinship has long campaigned for the fund to be extended to kinship families other than those where a child had left care under an SGO.

Earlier in her evidence session before the select committee, Daby hinted that not only would the fund continue, but that the DfE was exploring extending its scope to children in other kinship care arrangements.

Potential extension of fund to kinship families

In response to a question from Labour MP Amanda Martin about support to kinship carers, Daby said: “We are looking at other ways and other areas in which we can support kinship carers. And we are looking at the adoption and special guardianship funding to enable kinship children to benefit from that.”

Martin had earlier asked Daby about when further detail would be announced on the government’s plan to test the payment of allowances to kinship carers in 10 local authorities, announced in last year’s Budget.

Daby said the DfE would be seeking expressions of interest from councils to take part, adding: “We will be looking to roll this out towards the autumn, and as soon as we have more information and more detail, we will make that known.”

In response, Peake said Kinship was pushing the government to use its forthcoming spending review, which will set public expenditure plans for 2026-29, to “accelerate its plans to trial a kinship allowance and invest in delivering a national offer of financial allowances for kinship carers”.

“At minimum, the Department for Education must work at pace to confirm plans for the trial so that kinship carers across England can understand how it might impact them and how it will build the case for a wider rollout in the future,” she added.

Thousands of vulnerable children risk losing access to vital therapy with the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) set to expire at the end of this month.

That was the claim from psychological support providers in a statement that warned that the breaks in therapy that many children now faced risked deepening their trauma and undermining placement stability.

ASGSF therapy funding lasts for up to 12 months, or when the typical £5,000 limit has expired, and local authorities and regional adoption agencies (RAA) must reapply each year to continue support for children and families.

In 2023-24, 16,970 therapy applications were approved for services including creative and physical therapies, family therapy, psychotherapy, parent training and therapeutic life story work.

‘Too late’ to apply for funding

However, with no Department for Education (DfE) funding committed beyond 31 March 2025, such applications can only be made for services starting or renewing before the end of this month.

According to charity Adoption UK, it is already too late to make an application before the deadline, meaning many existing services are set to stop even if DfE funding is announced for 2025-26.

Last week’s statement was issued by six therapy providers: Anna Freud in London, Beacon House (West Sussex), Family Futures (London), The Family Place (the Midlands and Devon), Gateway Psychology (Staffordshire) and TouchBase (East Sussex).

They said the AGSCF had been “crucial” in helping adopted children and those who left care under a special guardianship order (SGO) recover from trauma, neglect and abuse.

‘Emotional toll of uncertainty is immense’

“Trauma recovery work is all about facilitating safety, security and stability, “said  Louise Michelle Bombèr, founding director of TouchBase.

“We are being prevented from providing this with breaks in therapy now expected. The families we work with are committed to their children but gravely concerned about the impact this break will have upon mental health and wellbeing.”

Jay Vaughan, chief executive and co-founder of Family Futures, added: “Our experience demonstrates that delays in therapy have a direct and detrimental impact on the safety and stability of adoptive and special guardianship placements, placing the children we support at significant risk.

“The emotional toll of this uncertainty is immense. Our families are experiencing a significant and unnecessary increase in stress and worry, exacerbating their already stressful home lives which will have long-lasting consequences for their wellbeing.”

They urged the government to confirm funding arrangements for the ASGSF for April 2025 onwards.

‘Most families set to lose support’

Separately, Surrey-based occupational therapy provider The Sensory Smart Child Ltd said that just 18 of the 123 children it supports through ASGSF funding had support confirmed beyond April 2025.

In an open letter to education secretary Bridget Phillipson, children’s minister Janet Daby and local MPs, its director, Karen Garner, said: “This means that 105 families are now in limbo, fearing the devastating impact that a sudden loss of support will have on their children’s progress, wellbeing and stability.

“This uncertainty is unsettling for everyone—the families who do not yet know if they will have access to funding beyond March, the children who we need to prepare to avoid an abrupt end to their therapy, and the therapists who dedicate themselves wholeheartedly to supporting these young people.”

She called for an “immediate and clear update on the status of this funding”, warning that “families cannot wait any longer”.

ASGSF support ‘a lifeline’

Adoption UK has also issued an open letter to Phillipson, which delivered a similar message.

Chief executive Emily Frith said the charity was receiving an increasing number of calls and emails from families worried about their children’s futures should therapy cease.

She quoted one family as describing the fund as a “lifeline” in supporting their adopted daughter, with their placement on the verge of breakdown.

“If the ASGSF was to discontinue it would have very serious repercussions for our family – and in the end would cost the government thousands of pounds more when we can no longer look after her at home,” the family said.

Urging Phillipson to confirm future ASGSF funding “without further delay”, Frith added: “There is a significant economic imperative in investing in therapeutic support as well as a moral one. There should be no doubt the cost to the Treasury will be far greater if the number of adoptive families facing crises continues to rise.”

MPs raising questions about fund’s future

The concerns come with MPs increasingly raising the issue in Parliament.

In a response to a parliamentary question from fellow Labour MP Rachael Maskell, issued on 29 January 2025, children’s minister Janet Daby said a decision on the fund would be made “as soon as possible”.

“The department will shortly be finalising business planning decisions on how its budget will be allocated for the next financial year,” she said at the time. “All decisions regarding the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) are being made as part of these discussions. An announcement will be made as soon as possible.”

On 6 March, in a written response to three MPs’ questions about whether the fund should be made permanent or renewed, Daby referred them to the answer she gave on 29 January. On 7 March, she reiterated the statement from 29 January in response to a question from Liberal Democrat MP Freddie van Mierlo and referred his fellow Lib Dem Manuela Perteghella to her previous answer.

Research into ASGSF’s impact

Daby gave a fuller response, last week, to a question from Lib Dem MP Cameron Thomas on the DfE’s assessment of the impact of the ASGSF so far, along with whether funding would continue beyond March 2025.

Daby cited a DfE commissioned study from 2018-21, which found that most parents or guardians felt the support received through the fund had been helpful or very helpful and were positive about the extent to which positive changes had been sustained six months after services finished.

She added that the department had started collecting data on outcomes from ASGSF-funded therapies at the end of 2023, which would “give an overall picture of their impact and adequacy”.

However, in relation to future funding, Daby reiterated the line she gave on 29 January.

Sector bodies have voiced concerns about the future of the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF), with the government having failed to confirm funding beyond March 2025.

Under the ASGSF, currently worth £48m a year, councils and regional adoption agencies (RAA) apply for funding for therapeutic support for adopted children, those placed with a family awaiting adoption or those who have left care under a special guardianship order (SGO) or child arrangements order (CAO).

If applications are approved, families may receive up to £2,500 per child for a specialist assessment and £5,000 per child for therapy annually, limits that can be exceeded in exceptional circumstances.

Funding lasts for up to a year, with councils and RAAs having to reapply to continue services for families. In 2023-24, almost 19,495 funding applications from RAAs and councils were approved, mostly for therapies.

Delay ‘very tough on families’

As things stand, the Department for Education, via delivery partner Mott MacDonald, will approve applications for services that start before the end of March 2025 – and extend for up to a further year – but not beyond.

“The delay in confirming funding for the ASGSF for the next financial year is very tough on families,” said charity Adoption UK’s director of public affairs and communications, Alison Woodhead.

“Thousands of children could be facing a sudden break in support, which is likely to mean many backwards steps in the difficult journeys they are on to understand and recover from their experience of trauma and loss.”

Funding ‘cliff edge’ leaves ‘uncertain future’

Woodhead referred to the fact that previous extensions to the ASGSF – for 2021-22 and 2022-25 – had been announced towards the end of the previous financial year.

She added: “This cliff edge in support every Treasury spending round can also impact the trust a child has worked hard to develop with their therapist. Waits for ASGSF funded support are already lengthy, but families waiting to start therapy are now facing an even more uncertain future.”

The concerns echo those voiced by the Consortium of Voluntary Adoption Agencies (CVAA) in a report published in October last year.

This warned that the uncertainty around the ASGSF was “causing much anxiety for families parenting children with complex needs” and widening gaps between children’s treatment sessions, which it described as “destabilising and wasteful”.

The same message was relayed by Ofsted in a report last year based on inspections of six RAAs. It said that uncertainty over the future funding of the scheme had prevented adopters from making long-term plans for their children’s needs.

Announcement on funding due shortly – minister

In a response to a parliamentary question, issued last week, children’s minister Janet Daby said a decision on the fund was due shortly.

“The department will shortly be finalising business planning decisions on how its budget will be allocated for the next financial year.

“All decisions regarding the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) are being made as part of these discussions. An announcement will be made as soon as possible.”

‘Vital’ importance of therapies in helping children make sense of past

Children’s charity and adoption agency Coram, which hosts London-based RAA Ambitious for Adoption, stressed the “vital” importance of therapeutic services that understand the needs of children who have “faced sudden losses, being separated from their birth parents and their homes and have had additional abusive experiences within these relationships”.

Dr Anna Harris, clinical psychologist and head of Coram’s creative therapies team, said: “Often, the pain they’ve experienced is stored in their bodies and minds in ways we don’t always see. This can show up in emotional reactions, behaviors, and relationship struggles, even if they don’t have the words to explain what they are going through.

“These services provide the right support to help children make sense of their past experiences, and more importantly, help them find hope for their future.”

However, the fund has also faced criticisms.

Criticisms of support fund

Practitioners have described the administrative process as a “burden”, according to report on adoption support commissioning published by RAA support body Adoption England in November 2024.

This included completing a complicated and time-consuming application process, finding and vetting providers, handling invoices and overseeing contracts and the quality of services, the report said.

The paper also reported criticisms of the fact that funding could not be extended beyond a year, even when therapy was ongoing, and said eligibility criteria were “restrictive and inflexible to the emerging and evolving needs of children and young people”.

The report urged the DfE and Adoption England to review eligibility criteria, the application process and interventions accessible through the fund.

ASGSF ‘needs radical reform’

Meanwhile, the charity Kinship, while calling on the DfE to confirm funding beyond March 2025, said that the ASGSF needed “radical reform”.

From 2019-24, 84% of approved applications were to fund support for children in domestic adoption placements, with just 14% for those on SGOs, despite more children leaving care via the latter route during this time. In 2023-24, just 37 of approved applications (0.2%) were for children under a CAO.

“The most recent figures on applications show that although applications for kinship families are increasing, they remain considerably lower than for adoptive families,” said Kinship chief executive Lucy Peake.

“As a minimum, government should ensure all local authorities and RAAs record the split of awarded funding between SGO/CAO and adoptive families. Research into the therapeutic support offered by the fund to kinship families should proceed at pace to inform future delivery and development, and the government should confirm the future of the fund beyond March 2025.

“In addition, local authorities should ensure professionals working with kinship families have sufficient knowledge and capacity to support effective applications for eligible kinship families, and should ensure any delivery providers understand the specific needs and experiences of kinship families and how they differ to adoptive families.”

Children are staying longer in the care system due to inequalities in payments to kinship carers, a report has found.

While increasing numbers of children are in family and friends foster care in England, there has not been a similar increase in numbers leaving care to find permanence with their kinship carers, according to analysis of government data by the charity Kinship.

Based on separate research with kinship carers, the charity said a key cause of this was the loss of financial support for carers that came from moving from a foster placement to a special guardianship order (SGO) or child arrangements order (CAO) providing them with parental responsibility for the child.

In its report, Kinship said this demonstrated the need for carers with SGOs or CAOs to receive allowances at least on a par with those received by foster parents.

Children spending longer in kinship foster care

The number of children in kinship foster care rose by 24% in England from 2019-23, from 10,450 to 12,920, with their share of the care population rising from 19% to 23% over this time, according to Department for Education data.

However, there was a far smaller rise in the number of children leaving kinship foster care for an SGO over this time, with this figure rising by 10%, from 2,270 to 2,500 over this time.

And while the number of children leaving care on a CAO remained stable from 2018-19 (1,130) to 2022-23 (1,110), the percentage leaving from kinship foster care fell from 37% to 26%.

In addition, DfE data obtained by Kinship through a Freedom of Information request revealed that the average length of a child’s final placement in kinship foster care rose by 4.3 months from 2018-19 to 2022-23, to just over one year and ten months (676 days).

While this was shorter than the average duration of all final placements for children leaving care in 2022-23 (880 days), the latter figure had grown only by 2.4 months (73 days) over this time.

Loss of financial support

Drawing on result from its 2023 survey of carers, Kinship said that, while they desired permanence for the children in care, this was being stymied by the prospect of losing financial support as a result.

While kinship foster carers are entitled to an allowance of at least the national minimum set by the DfE, the charity found that 76% of kinship carers looking after at least one child under an SGO special received an allowance from their local authority, with the same being true of just 28% of carers caring for a child under a CAO.

Of those who received an allowance, special guardians were given £148 per week and carers with a CAO £133 per week at a time when the minimum fostering allowance outside London ranged from £175 to £199 per week.

About half (49%) of children in kinship foster care arrangements were expected to move to a different arrangement – nearly all (97%) to special guardianship – found the charity’s 2023 survey. However, 38% of these children expected to stay in the care system.

Regarding the latter group, the majority of comments left by kinship foster carers justifying this decision noted the likely loss of support from moving away from their existing arrangement.

Kinship described this as a “perverse incentive in the current system for the child to remain looked after in local authority”, even where carers perceive it to be in the best interests of the child to have the stability and secure parental responsibility provided by an SGO or CAO.

Kinship carers ‘feel pushed into SGOs’ by children’s services

Among those kinship foster carers who expected to move to an SGO, some reported that they felt pushed to do so by children’s services.

“Rather than this being a free and informed decision, many kinship foster carers felt they had no choice in the matter and resented the constant pressure they felt from social workers to agree to
a new arrangement where support was likely to cease or reduce,” said the report.

Some of those who had already become special guardians reported being pushed into it against their wishes, including by the suggestion that the child might otherwise be placed with unrelated foster carers or adoptive parents.

Piloting equalised allowances

In its kinship care strategy, published in December 2023, the previous Conservative government announced it would pilot providing special guardians of former looked-after children with allowances equivalent to those received by foster carers, in eight areas from 2024-28, backed by £16m in 2024-25.

No further announcement was made before the July 2024 election, and the incoming Labour administration is yet to comment on whether it is taking forward the kinship strategy in general and the so-called financial allowances pathfinder in particular.

In the recommendations from its report, which also covered Wales, Kinship called for governments in both countries to provide a non-means tested financial allowance to kinship
carers at least equal to the national minimum fostering allowance.

In relation to England, it said the new UK government should “accelerate the financial allowances pathfinder” and ensure that it “does not paralyse progress towards a wider rollout of allowances”.

Kinship also called for carers – and those considering the role – to be offered free and independent advice, including legal guidance, on the different care arrangements and their implications for financial and other forms of support.

Kinship families ‘a priority’ – minister

In response to the report, minister for children and families Janet Daby, a former fostering social worker, said: “For too long, kinship carers have not been recognised for the vital role that they play or the challenges they can often face – whether financial or emotional.

“We will drive change right across the children’s social care system, prioritising reform to support kinship families.”

The Association of Directors of Children’s Services highlighted the importance of councils’ funding levels in tackling the issues raised by the report.

Policy on kinship ‘needs sufficient funding’, say directors

“The varying way in which kinship arrangements have been developed in local authorities so far will be linked to levels of funding, amongst other things,” said Nigel Minns, chair of the ADCS’s health, care and additional needs policy committee.

“Above all else, it is important that the needs and best interests of each individual child always remains at the heart of decision making. The kinship care strategy offers a blueprint to change the way we work with and support a significant number of children for the better.

“We await new government guidance on kinship care for local authorities, however, this will need to be backed by sufficient government funding to ensure all children and families get the same access to the financial and practical support they need to thrive.”

Significant disparities in access to support for kinship carers have been laid bare in a survey of councils, whose results were published last week.

The availability of support differed by locality, whether the child had previously been in care or not and by the type of kinship arrangement or legal order they were cared for under, showed the study by evidence body Foundations, released to coincide with Kinship Care Week.

The findings come with a separate survey of almost 1,700 kinship carers, also published last week, having found that one in five never received any local authority support, while 44% of those who did rated it as ‘poor’ or ‘very poor’.

One in eight of those surveyed for charity Kinship’s Breaking Point report said they were concerned they may have to give up caring for their kinship child in the next year if their situation did not improve.

The Foundations study, based on survey responses from 80 councils (52% of the total), interviews with staff from 35 of these and round table discussions with 31 kinship carers, examined how far authorities provided support to the different types of kinship carer.

Hierarchy of support

Overall, it found that authorities were most likely to support to family and friends foster carers, followed by carers with a special guardianship order (SGO) for the child and then those with a child arrangements order or residence order (CAO/RO) giving them parental responsibility.

For those with an SGO or CAO/RO, support was greater when the child had previously been looked after.

Family and friends foster carers are entitled to the national minimum fostering allowance.

Differences in financial support and training offer

However, while 89% of councils provided an ongoing financial allowance to special guardians of children previously looked after, 63% did so where the child was not previously looked after. For carers with a CAO/RO, 69% provided ongoing financial support where the child was previously looked after, with 34% of authorities doing so where the child had not been in care.

Councils were also much more likely to offer special guardians of children previously looked after the equivalent of the national minimum foster care allowance than other groups of kinship carer, so long as there were no exceptional circumstances. However, most authorities that did so subtracted child benefit from the allowance.

There was a similar hierarchy in the provision of training to kinship carers. In relation to ongoing training, Foundations found that:

• 98% of councils provided this to family and friends foster carers.
• 78% did so for carers with an SGO for a previously looked-after child.
• 60% did so for special guardians of children not previously looked after.
• 38% provided it for carers with a CAO/RO for a previously looked-after child.
• 28% did so for carers with a CAO/RO for children not previously looked after.

And while almost all councils (93%) offered emotional or therapeutic support to family and friends foster carers, this fell to 86% for special guardians of previously looked-after children and 59% for special guardians of children not previously in care. For carers with a CAO/RO, 46% of councils offered this support where the child had previously been looked after and 30% did so when the child was not previously in care.

‘Need to end postcode lottery’

Foundations also asked councils about provision for informal kinship carers, who do not hold parental responsibility and are frequently unknown to councils despite. Half of respondents (51%) said there were no activities to identify these carers, while a further 30% were unsure about whether there were any such activities.

Foundations said that “the level of disparity in support across different kinship care arrangements does not reflect a differing level of responsibility required from carers”, and that there was a need to end the “postcode lottery” in support between areas.

It was not able to identify what types of support for kinship carers were most effective.

In order to do so, the evidence body has commissioned a systematic review of policies, programmes and interventions designed to improve outcomes for kinship carers and children in their care.

This will interrogate what interventions work in improving outcomes such as permanence, child wellbeing and carer-child relationships, common success factors and enablers and barriers to their  implementation.

DfE to produce kinship strategy

Meanwhile, the Department for Education is planning to produce a kinship strategy before the end of the year, which will include an update on its promise to explore the case for introducing a financial allowance for kinship carers with SGOs and CAOs.

As part of its children’s social care reform strategy, Stable Homes, Built on Love, the DfE has also promised to introduce a national kinship training, information and advice service by spring
2024, backed by £9m in funding over the subsequent year.

Kinship, which contributed to the Foundations study, said: “Every day, we hear from kinship carers who are fighting to get help from their local authority and navigating a complex landscape of support based not on their family’s needs but on legal order and where they live. Currently, too many kinship families are being pushed into arrangements which don’t come with a right to the support they and their children need to thrive.”

‘Risk of arrangements breaking down’

The charity warned that its Breaking Point report suggested that 19,000 children were at risk of entering the care system because of a breakdown of kinship care arrangements.

“This isn’t inevitable, but it demands action, leadership and funding from government. The forthcoming kinship care strategy must clarify how kinship care fits into the wider children’s social care system.

The Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) said the use of kinship care arrangements was increasing and that variations between councils would be linked to local priorities, resources and need.

“The continuation of existing relationships with extended family members or friends can help children navigate their early childhood experiences, but there is a lack of understanding about the nature and status of kinship carers and some variation in how these arrangements are delivered,” said Nigel Minns, chair of the ADCS’s health, care and additional needs policy committee.

“The government has committed to publish a kinship strategy which, if successful, has the potential to change the way we work with a significant proportion of our children for the better.”

The Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board (ASGLB) will close this month, the Department for Education has confirmed.

The DfE said it was considering the creation of new structures to deliver on the recommendations of the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care, including its focus on kinship carers not covered by the ASGLB’s remit.

The government set up the then Adoption Leadership Board in 2014, bringing together senior figures from local authorities, charities and the sector, to provide leadership and drive improvements, in line with ministers’ objective of increasing adoption numbers. It was renamed the Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board in 2018, as its remit was widened to special guardianship arrangements for children formerly in care.

The board’s role has included publishing quarterly data, covering metrics such as the numbers of placement, adoption and special guardianship orders (SGOs) granted, and the number of children with a placement order – and the number of prospective adoptive families – waiting to be matched.

It also supported the development of regional adoption agencies (RAAs), from 2015, to take over local authorities’ functions, and the adoption support fund. This was established in the same year, to provide therapeutic support to adoptive families, with its scope extended to special guardians in 2016.

The board has also produced good practice guidance and investigated issues such as racial disparities in the adoption system.

Outgoing chair praises board’s record

In a statement, its outgoing chair, adoptive parent and charity leader Krish Kandiah, said it was his “pleasure and privilege” to serve in the role for the past two years, and thanked the “excellent support” of fellow board members and the management support provided by the charity Coram-i.

Kandiah said that during that time, the board had campaigned for increased financial and practical support for kinship carers, included the voices of care-experienced young people and kinship carers in its work, collected and analysed “high-quality data on the adoption system” and informed the 2021 adoption strategy.

The strategy established a leaders’ group for RAAs and a national strategic lead for adoption, to support the now 32 regional agencies to work more closely together and, over time, deliver services on a national level.

Kandiah said he believed these structures would help the adoption reform agenda continue to move forward, while he also backed the care review’s proposals to provide much greater support to foster and kinship carers.

Care review plans 

With regard to the latter, the review recommended that councils provide special guardians and kinship carers with a child arrangements order (CAO) with a financial allowance equivalent to that for foster carers and that legal aid be extended to all those considering or going through the process of securing an SGO or CAO.

The review also called for councils to provide peer support and training for all kinship carers, including those without a legal order.

The DfE is due to respond to the care review, and set out an implementation plan, early in the new year. It explained its decision to close the review’s focus on kinship carers not covered by the ASGLB by referencing the care review’s focus on a wider group of kinship carers than just special guardians.

A spokesperson said: “Every child deserves a loving, stable home. This remains a priority for this government, whether through adoption, fostering, kinship care or other forms of permanence.

“We are considering what structures best support the next phase of crucial reform to deliver on the recommendations of the independent care review, which include a greater focus on kinship carers that goes beyond the current remit of this board.

“We are grateful for all the work that the Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board has done to improve the lives of children in care.”

Special guardianship ‘felt like an add-on’

In response to the decision, board member, and Family Rights Group chief executive, Cathy Ashley thanked Kandiah and other members for their “commitment to children and young people“.

But while she said she and other board members had championed the role of special guardianship, it had “frustratingly always felt like a late add-on to a board that was constituted around adoption”.

She also said the board’s focus on permanence did not extend to supporting family reunification.

Ashley added: “The system reset proposed by the independent review must be a catalyst for a better system; one where the government’s strategy for children’s social care can be influenced and scrutinised to ensure it meets the needs of children and families. The voice of young people and adults with direct experience, including kinship carers, must be central to that.”

First rise in adoption numbers in seven years

Latest DfE statistics showed a first rise in the number of children adopted from care in seven years in 2021-22, with a 2% uptick from 2,850 to 2,950.

However, the average time taken for a child to be adopted after entering care increased by a month, to two years and three months.

There was also a 1% increase, to 3,870, in the number of children who left care on an SGO.

Story updated 8 March 2022

The decline in the number of adoptions since 2015 is continuing while children are waiting longer on average to be placed despite an expanding pool of approved adopters, official figures show.

The data was published this week as the Department for Education announced £144m in renewed funding for the adoption support fund (ASF) plus £19.5m for regional adoption agencies, from 2022-25, sparking renewed calls for investment in the rest of the care system.

In 2020-21, the number of children adopted from care fell to their lowest level in 21 years, to 2,870, continuing a year-on-year decline from a peak of 5,360 in 2014-15, showed DfE data released in November.

Ongoing adoption decline

The latest figures, from the Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board (the ASGLB), showed this decline has continued through the first half of 2021-22, with falling numbers of children at every stage of the adoption process. They showed that, in the second quarter of 2021-22 (July to September), there were:

• 720 agency decision maker decisions to place a child for adoption, down 20% on the first quarter of 2021-22 and 20% on the second quarter of 2020-21.
• 600 placement orders granted, a fall of 19% on the first quarter of 2021-22 and 26% on the second quarter of 2020-21.
• 710 children matched with an adoptive family, a 12% drop from quarter one and a 9% decline on the second quarter of 2020-21.
• 750 adoption orders granted, down 13% on quarter one of 2021-22 and 3% on quarter two of 2020-21.

Meanwhile, the average length of time children with a placement order (PO) had spent waiting to be placed rose to 667 days, a number which has gradually increased since April to June 2019, when it was 556.

18-month waits

Though the number of children with a PO waiting to be matched declined to 1,870, its lowest point since at least January-March 2019, the ASGLB said this was due to a decrease in orders granted in 2020-21 rather than more children achieving permanence.

And though the key government target of the number of children with a PO waiting longer than 18 months to be placed fell to its lowest in over two years (970), this group made up 52% of all of those waiting, the joint highest proportion since April to June 2019.

However, more positively, the number of children with harder-to-place characteristics – those aged five or over, disabled children, those from an ethnic minority and sibling groups – increased in the first half of 2021-22, compared with 2020-21.

As adoptions, overall, continued to decline, the number of approved adoptive families waiting to be matched has gradually increased since 2019, to a high of 2,370 September 2021, 23% higher than a year before.

This figure was hailed by the government as demonstrating the impact of the national adoption strategy – which sought to improve adopter recruitment as part of measures to reduce waits for children with a placement order.

However, it is a snapshot taken just two months after the strategy’s publication, while the number of prospective adopters registered during July-September 2021 (860) was the lowest for any quarter since at least January-March 2019.

‘Really troubling’

The ongoing decline in adoptions sparked concerns from adoption leaders.

Dr John Simmonds, director of policy, research and development at CoramBAAF, said the figures showed a “disparity between those that have been approved as adopters and the children who need to be placed with those adopters”.

“It is a troubling picture,” he said. “Those children are typically some of the most vulnerable children with the worst starts in life.”

Regarding the 667 days between children entering the care system and being adopted, he said: “Two years of waiting when those children have already experienced a bad start in life is really troubling.”

Andrew Webb, chair of the Consortium of Voluntary Adoption Agencies (CVAA), welcomed the new funding but added: “Despite studies consistently showing that adoption gives children the best life chances of all forms of care, fewer children are being offered this opportunity for a positive future,” he said.

“We are really worried about what is happening to the children who would have previously been adopted – is a life in care really in their best interests? More attention urgently needs to be given to care planning to ensure children can access the families for life which [voluntary adoption agencies] provide.”

Adoption support funding boost

The funding for the ASF – equivalent to £48m a year, for local authorities and regional adoption agencies (RAAs) – represents an increase on the £46m in 2021-22. The ASF funds therapeutic and other types of support for children in adoptive, or prospective adoptive, families, and those previously in care who are under a special guardianship order, aged up to 21, or 25, if they had an education, health and care plan.

A DfE-commissioned evaluation, released this week, based on a follow-up survey of families who started receiving ASF support from 2018-20, showed most parents or carers found the services helpful and there were positive effects on the wellbeing of school-aged children receiving support.

Adoption UK said the new funding represented “nothing short of a lifeline to families bringing up some of the most vulnerable children in England”.

Anntoinette Bramble, chair of the Local Government Association’s children and young people board, added: “Adopters tell us that ongoing support is vital and we have long called for the adoption support fund to be extended, so we are pleased that adoptive families and adoption agencies now have certainty over this funding for several years,” she said.

The funding for RAAs is designed to support improved recruitment of adopters from diverse communities – a key objective of the adoption strategy – and “national matching” between parents and children. The strategy aims to tackle barriers to matching, including by exploring the value of a national matching service.

Calls for focus on rest of care system

The focus of the funding package on adoption sparked calls for more funding for the rest of the care system.

Though the number of children leaving care on SGOs has outstripped those adopted since 2018-19 – a trend continuing into 2021-22, according to the ASGLB figures – they have historically made up a small minority of those accessing ASF support, with the majority going to adoptive families.

Dr Lucy Peake, chief executive at charity Kinship, said the extension of the ASF was welcome, but added that “we desperately need the government to shift the focus towards supporting kinship carers”.

Peake called on the government to rename the adoption support fund and extend its scope to all kinship families, alongside a funded strategy “so kinship carers get the financial, practical and emotional support they need and deserve”.

For the LGA, Bramble added: “We would now ask government to extend this investment to aid the recruitment and retention of foster carers and the children’s homes workforce, alongside additional support for kinship care, to make sure that every child can live in the home that’s right for them.”

Adoption ‘taking up disproportionate amount of time’

Andy Elvin, chief executive of fostering charity TACT, said: “The number of adoptions is inexorably declining despite the DfE funding various initiatives and adoption is still taking up a disproportionate amount of the time government allot to focusing on the care system.

“Children in foster, adoptive, kinship or residential homes and children who return to their parents from care all need the same support, the same focus and the same access to services.”

Elvin reiterated his call last year for a national care service – independent of local authorities –  “that equally prioritises the welfare and outcomes for all children in families that have been created by the state and does this in the best interests of the child over the lifetime of the child”.