Fostering Connections

Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 1 Fostering Connections Fostering Connections Ltd Warlies Park House, Upshire, Essex EN9 3SL Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this independent fostering agency

Fostering Connections is a small independent agency. The agency registered with Ofsted on 30 June 2021. The suitably qualified and experienced registered manager has been in post since the agency registered.

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Information about this independent fostering agency

There are 13 approved fostering households offering emergency, short-term and long-term placements for children. At the time of this inspection, the agency had 24 children in placement. Three foster households have young people living with them under ‘staying put’ arrangements.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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good

How well children and young people are helped and protected good

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good

The effectiveness of leaders and managers good

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good

The independent fostering agency provides effective services that meet the requirements for good.

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good

Date of last inspection: 20 February 2023

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 2

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children are settled and thriving in foster families that love and care for them. Children said they like living with their foster carers, who are always there to support them, keep them safe, cook them nice meals, help with school and look after them when they are ill. One child said, ‘I like it here. I like what happens; nothing could be changed to make it better.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Most children have lived with their foster carers for several years and are valued members of the family. The agency positively supports foster carers through ‘staying put’ arrangements to continue to support the children as they move into adulthood. The agency is currently exploring options to operate a regulated shared lives scheme so that children with the most complex needs can continue to stay with their foster families well into adulthood with the ongoing support of the agency. Foster carers are motivated and aspirational for the children in their care. They provide children with good-quality educational support and a variety of opportunities to try new things, and they support them to explore their passions and talents. One social worker said the carers ‘know the children like the back of their hand. They are thoughtful carers who want what is best for the children. We talk about cloning the

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

carers as they are so great’. Foster carers support children to live active and healthy lifestyles. They advocate effectively to ensure that children receive the help and support they need to enhance their physical and emotional well-being. The carers value the guidance of the therapist the agency commissions to help them better support children’s emotional well-being.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

When children do not share a cultural background with their carers, the foster carers positively encourage and support them to explore their heritage to ensure that children develop a keen sense of self and a positive identity.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Many of the foster carers are providing care to children who are neurodiverse. Carers know their children well and develop support strategies that are responsive to the child’s individual needs. They are inclusive and sensitive to individual differences. One social worker said, ‘I loved how they explained the diagnosis to [name of child] as their superpower. [Name of child] has a strong sense of identity because of this.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The children are well matched with their foster families. Most of the time, children experience well-planned moves into their new homes, with opportunities to meet their fostering family before they move in. This has helped to reduce anxiety for children and foster carers alike. On one occasion, through no fault of the agency, a child experienced a distressing move. The foster family immediately recognised the trauma experience and provided responsive wraparound care to the child with the support of agency staff. The carers and agency swiftly raised their concerns about the child’s experiences with the placing authority and have secured positive support Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 3 to help sustain the child with their carers. One social worker said the carers ‘advocate well, and it’s always for best interests of the children, every single time’.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The support for the foster families is a strength of the agency, and as a result, there have been very few occasions when children have needed to move on in an unplanned way.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

All foster carers and staff undertake appropriate training in safeguarding children. Carers are clear on how to keep children safe and what actions they should take if a child were to make a disclosure, go missing from home or become vulnerable to exploitation.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Most children have lived with their foster carers for a number of years, and trusting relationships have been established. Agency staff and foster carers understand children’s individual needs and work together to help keep the children safe. Foster carers encourage children’s natural inquisitiveness and openly talk to the children about positive relationships, navigating social media, the online world and keeping safe generally. This open, responsive and non-shaming approach helps children learn about and develop skills to keep themselves safe.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Foster carers and agency staff have helped children become safer. The agency funds a psychologist to support foster carers to deliver therapeutic-informed parenting approaches. This has helped address specific needs for children, such as reducing frequency or levels of self-harm. Foster carers and agency staff work well in partnership with other agencies to ensure an effective team around the child approach.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

There have been few safeguarding incidents. When incidents have happened, foster carers, staff and managers have taken swift and appropriate action to safeguard children. Carers find the agency effective and responsive when they need advice and assistance. However, some relevant significant events have not been notified to Ofsted. There is no concern about practice and how the agency responded to keep children safe. However, the failure to notify significant events to Ofsted potentially undermines the ability of the regulator to ensure that appropriate action is consistently taken to safeguard children.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

The managers who are designated leads for safeguarding are experienced, qualified social workers. However, they have not undertaken recent safeguarding training that keeps them up to date with professional, legal and practice developments.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The suitably qualified and experienced manager has continued to oversee purposefully slow, careful and well-managed growth of the agency. Foster carers describe senior leaders as highly child focused. The emphasis has been on recruiting the right carers to meet children’s needs and supporting those carers well. The Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 4 manager and senior leaders are respected by the carers, who feel valued and motivated to care for children. One foster carer said, ‘They make us feel wanted, special and have delivered on all counts.’ Another carer said, ‘Brilliant agency, without a shadow of doubt.’ Most foster carers are experienced foster carers who have transferred to the agency from other fostering agencies. They have chosen to transfer due to their established trusting relationships with senior leaders. New foster carers have come to the agency through word-of-mouth recommendations from existing foster carers.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The foster carers value the selection of relevant good-quality online training. They are able to explore further relevant specialist training in therapeutic approaches to support the therapeutic training provided as part of the core training. All foster carers complete their training and development standards in the first year of fostering.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

A real strength of the agency is the level of support they receive. Foster families appreciate the small ‘family feel’ of the agency where everybody knows them. Senior leaders have clear expectations of the standards they expect and support carers to deliver these. Carers describe being cared for by senior leaders, which in turn helps them care for the children to the best of their ability. One foster carer said that senior leaders and agency staff always demonstrate that ‘the children are paramount and are everything’. Foster carers say that there is always someone there, no matter what time of day or night, to help them. One foster carer said, ‘I don’t think we would have managed it without Fostering Connections.’ Another said, ‘They have been really good. Honestly, I couldn’t have asked for any more from them and the support for us.’ Carers value the newsletters, theatre trips and events that are open to everyone connected with

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

the agency, which help keep them connected despite the geographical spread. Foster carers said they and the children, whether fostered or not, also really value the activities, such as the adopting an elephant scheme.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The agency provides additional therapeutic support for carers to help them reflect on how to care for the children. The foster carers also value the regular therapist-led reflective support group. This helps them to provide effective trauma-informed therapeutic parenting.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The agency ensures thorough assessment of potential foster carers before approving them to foster for the agency. All relevant checks are completed and a detailed assessment of suitability completed before prospective foster carers are presented to panel. Panel processes are effective. Panel fully explores the strengths and potential vulnerabilities of prospective foster carers before any recommendation for approval is given.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Records held by the agency do not evidence that safer recruitment standards are consistently met. Some staff recruitment files do not contain a full employment history, and some gaps in employment are not explored. Records of Disclosure and Barring Service checks do not always evidence that these have been at a suitable Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 5 level or whether information regarding suitability was identified. There is a lack of professional curiosity when verifying references and checks on staff’s suitability in respect of their physical and mental health are not undertaken. On occasion, evidence of qualifications is not held and the date the person took up their role is not clear. These shortfalls in recruitment mean that the manager does not have all of the appropriate information about staff and panel members’ suitability before employment.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

There are systems in place to monitor the care of children and support of carers. The manager knows each of the fostering families well, and the quality of care and support children and carers receive is good. Records held do not always demonstrate the quality of care and support provided. Important records, such as children’s care plans and foster carer agreements, are sometimes inaccurate or missing. In most, but not all, cases, the children have been living with their carers for some time and therefore the impact of this is reduced. However, there is lack of effective follow-up with children’s placing authorities to secure these documents. Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 6

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Statutory requirements

This section sets out the actions that the registered person(s) must take to meet the Care Standards Act 2000, The Fostering Services (England) Regulations 2011 and the national minimum standards. The registered person(s) must comply within the given timescales.

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Requirement Due date

The fostering service provider must not—

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Requirement Due date

employ a person to work for the purposes of the fostering service unless that person is fit to do so, or

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Requirement Due date

allow a person to whom paragraph (2) applies, to work for the purposes of the fostering service unless that person is fit to do so.

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Requirement Due date

For the purposes of paragraph (1), a person is not fit to work for the purposes of a fostering service unless that person—

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Requirement Due date

has the qualifications, skills and experience necessary for the work they are to perform,

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Requirement Due date

is physically and mentally fit for the work they are to perform, and full and satisfactory information is available in relation to that person in respect of each of the matters specified in Schedule 1. (Regulation 20 (1)(a)(b) (3)(a)(b)(c)) 4 November 2025

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Requirement Due date

If any of the events listed in column 1 of the table in Schedule 7 takes place in relation to a fostering agency, the registered person must without delay notify the persons or bodies indicated in respect of the event in column 2 of the table.

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Requirement Due date

Any notification made in accordance with this regulation which is given orally must be confirmed in writing. (Regulation 36 (1) (2))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, notify Ofsted of the instigation and outcome of any child protection enquiry, any serious illness or serious 4 November 2025 Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 7 accident of a child, any allegation that a child placed with foster parents has committed a serious offence and any incident relating to a child placed with foster parents necessitating calling the police to the foster parent’s home.

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Recommendations

 The registered person should regularly monitor all records kept by the service to ensure compliance with the service’s policies, to identify any concerns about specific incidents and to identify patterns and trends. Immediate action should be taken to address any issues raised by this monitoring. (‘Fostering services: national minimum standards’, 25.2)  The registered person should ensure that if provision of the care plan by the responsible authority is delayed, the fostering service follows this up with the responsible authority. (‘Fostering services: national minimum standards’, 31.2)  The registered person should ensure that there is a good-quality learning and development programme that all staff and managers undertake, which equips them with the skills required to meet the needs of the children, keeps them up to date with professional, legal and practice developments and reflects the policies,

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Recommendations

legal obligations and business needs of the fostering service. (‘Fostering services: national minimum standards’, 23.1)

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors have looked closely at the experiences and progress of children and young people using the social care common inspection framework. This inspection was carried out under the Care Standards Act 2000 to assess the effectiveness of the service, how it meets the core functions of the service as set out in legislation, and to consider how well it complies with The Fostering Services (England) Regulations 2011 and the national minimum standards. Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 8

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Independent fostering agency details

Registered provider: Fostering Connections Ltd

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Independent fostering agency details

Registered provider address: Warlies Park House, Upshire, Essex EN9 3SL

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Independent fostering agency details

Email address: fosteringconnectionsltd@gmail.com

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Inspectors

Joanna Heller, Social Care Regulatory Inspection Manager Inspection report for independent fostering agency: Fostering Connections 9 to achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children’s social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, further education and skills, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for looked after children, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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