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The Government has allocated £6.8m over the next four years to run two new children's homes "to meet the unanticipated urgent needs of children in care", after more than £3.5m was spent last year on placing local children into homes off-island.
This week's draft Government Plan – which proposes firm spending plans for next year and estimates for the following three – revealed that the money would go towards "running additional specialist Children's Homes to support our most vulnerable children".
If approved, the £6.8m – the total of £1.7m each year from 2024 to 2027 – would "provide the resources required to staff and run the extra two children’s homes".
It is hoped that this funding will ensure "sufficient capacity for children’s residential care" and "increase the number and range of homes available for children".
The Government Plan explained that the pandemic had a "significant impact on children, young people, and their parents/carers with increased levels of complexity of need and referrals to services supporting children with vulnerabilities, emotional and mental health issues and or risk".
Earlier this year, a response to a request made under the Freedom of Information law revealed that, in 2022, there were 20 children in placements off-island – a figure that has changed little over the past three years.
Costing an average of £178,000 per child, the number of placements last year was only one fewer than the year before, but two more than in 2020.
Specialist care providers putting up their prices and a need for more intensive support contributed to an extra £1m being spent on funding these homes outside the island last year – despite little increase in the number of children being sent away.
Pictured: A 2018 report found that as many as a quarter of children in care had to be sent off-island to receive appropriate care.
This year to date, there have been 17 children being looked after in the UK, the figures showed.
This was despite Children's Minister Inna Gardiner launching an urgent appeal for intensive foster carers last year, stating that Jersey "not seen a crisis like this in fostering and adoption for 10 years". Just four people came forward as a result.
Efforts to reduce the number of children being placed off-island stretch as far back as 2018, when an inspection of Children's Services by Ofsted found that, despite it being a "last resort" option, as many as a quarter of children in care had to be split from their families and friends and sent away from Jersey because there weren’t enough appropriate placements in Jersey.
This, they found, was mainly due to a lack of appropriate facilities locally and fostering placements – despite multiple campaigns by the Fostering and Adoption team.
Concerns over the lack of appropriate care facilities have also been raised numerous times by Jersey's Royal Court, which has to approve such placements.
In 2019, the Government created a new 'intensive fostering' service in an attempt to avoid having to send the island’s “more challenging children and young people” to care institutions off-island.
Pictured: Last year, Children’s and Education Minister Inna Gardiner described a "crisis" in foster care.
This summer, the Government launched a fresh campaign for full-time intensive foster carers, offering a salary of over £56,000 a year for those willing to take on the role.
However, only three "firm" enquiries had come through to the Fostering and Adoption team by the end of July.
In her annual report publish in June, the Acting Children's Commissioner also called on Government for more "robust safeguards and legal protections in place for children who are placed off the island".
"It's not just like moving down the road; it's a different country. Children are on their own there. They should be afforded all those protections to ensure their rights are upheld."
She explained: "In the UK, distance placements don't lead to good outcomes for children. What will that say for Jersey children? How will we make sure they can see their families? How can we make sure their care plan will be continually reviewed, because situations can change? It's all about putting those policies in place and ensuring good practice."
Ms Le Saint also said that she would like to ensure that "what we provide in the island is suitable as well" and would support the Government in any further campaigns to recruit foster carers.
Over £3.5m spent sending children off-island as care "crisis" continues
Extra £1m spent on children in off-island placements last year
"Robust safeguards" needed to protect children in care off-island
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