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How the care system is letting down black children

OUT IN THE COLD: Research suggests that the emotional needs of young black people in care are too often overlooked

"SOMETIMES, I wish I was like other kids, because being in care messes with my emotions. I’ve always wanted my own family, friends, room, and most of all my own privacy in a home I can call my own. Instead, I’m moved around the country until carers are fed up of me.

“I’ve been with carers who have hit and abused me and I’ve cried so many times I’ve lost count. They all say the right things and put a show on in front of social workers, but when they actually get a kid like me, it’s a different story. It’s not my fault my parents couldn’t manage, but now because of them, I’m just another kid in care.”

This is the experience of 16-year-old Ayesha Richards, a looked-after black child from Walthamstow, east London. She was taken into care at the age of seven when her parents’ marriage broke down in 2008. Unfortunately, since then she has not been in a stable home.

Sadly, Richards' case is not unique. Statistics taken from the Department for Education (DfE) last year suggest that black and minority ethnic (BAME) children like Ayesha are hugely over-represented in the care system, making up just over 16 per cent of all Looked-after Children and Young People (LACAYP) even though people of African Caribbean descent make up three per cent of the population as a whole.

Breakdown

Often, children enter the care system as a result of family breakdown, abuse, neglect, alcoholism, domestic violence or refugee status, yet instead of the care system being a safe haven for these kids, their lives are turned upside down.

Due to the difficulties of accessing culturally sensitive and inclusive services, BAME families often experience the escalation of minor problems which cause family breakdown. Single parenthood and an unstable home environment are likely to bring BAME families into contact with children’s services more often than families from other groups. Studies have shown that when they do enter the care system, they often have to contend with racial and cultural stereotypes which in turn feed into institutional racism.

According to the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE):

"Foster children from ethnic minority groups have particular emotional and behavioural needs in addition to those of other children”.

However, new research suggests the social care system is hugely failing to meet those needs.

Dr. Sinclair Coward, from Buckinghamshire New University, who conducted the research by interviewing black and dual-heritage LACAYP as well as black social workers, identified a range of challenges. According to his research, three issues need immediate attention: the first is the lack of genuinely warm relationships that BAME children experience with foster carers and social workers, which negatively impacts on their emotional well-being.

Insensitive

The second is the ‘horrible’ school experiences black and dual-heritage LACAYP suffer, especially in their relationships with teachers who are described as being ‘insensitive’, ‘prejudicial’ and ‘judgmental’.

Finally, there is a lack of attention paid to the cultural and ethnic background of these young people by the social work professionals whose job it is to care for the ‘whole’ child, and not just their physical needs.

“These issues have come about as a result of the system’s inability to focus on the particular needs of different groups under its care and protection. This universalising of experience treats all looked-after young people as homogenous whereas some groups have specific needs that need addressing,” Coward says.

Warmth

“Why is it that some foster carers – irrespective of ethnic background – fail to provide genuine care to black children?

“The young people themselves suspect that foster carers are motivated more by the money available for the job than a wish to genuinely care for them. It also raises the question of how keen are caregivers to form emotional bonds and have young people feel that they belong to their substitute family?

“Carers urgently need to find culturally acceptable ways to communicate warmth and affection to black looked-after children and young people.”

He adds:

“My work has taken me to children’s homes around south London. Here I witnessed children who had emotional and behavioural difficulties and it struck me how the needs of this group were being overlooked. Government reports later confirmed this and that sparked an interest for me to look into this deeper and get the perspective of the young people involved.

“These young people deserve better. It’s up to those who can help to do so. It’s a moral imperative.”

According to Leah Bailey, a social worker from west London, there are many actions social workers can take in their everyday interactions with looked-after children to make a difference.

Therapy

“People [social workers, carers and policy makers] don’t put enough emphasis on the emotional damage about separation and loss. These kids leave care and can’t move forward. I think black children need therapeutic input from day one, from the day they go into care. Social workers and foster carers need to be trained in a way that they are constantly working in a therapeutic way.

“I don’t mean that the kids are sent to therapy, but in your everyday interactions you need to be using therapeutic talk.”

Coward says:

“There is a lack of will and lack of recognition that it is needed which is why this training is not happening. These children, if they are lucky, get referred to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services for therapy, which is another story altogether as that service is described as being in a state of ‘crisis’ and is struggling to meet the needs of the large numbers of young people now presenting with mental health issues, let alone meeting the needs of black and dual heritage young people.”

The term ‘looked after’ also includes unaccompanied asylum seeking children, those children placed with friends and family, children who are compulsorily accommodated through being remanded or those subject to a criminal justice supervision order with a residence requirement.

Over the last year, there has been a significant a rise in the numbers from some minority ethnic groups, in particular ‘any other ethnic group’, ‘African’ and ‘any other Asian background’ – excluding Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi – who fall into the looked-after category. Recent research suggests that there is likely to be an increase in the numbers of unaccompanied asylum seeking children arriving in England, who make up six per cent of the numbers of LACAYP.

SCIE recommends that these children are placed in an environment where they can develop an understanding of their own culture and receive support in dealing with racism and discrimination. It also recommends that black and dual heritage children need to make sense of their history and will need extra help with this if placed with white carers. In line with this research, the Voice of Child in Care, a 2004 report, noted the positive impact of black young people in care expressing pride in their heritage.

Emotions

“They want to know about their history, to learn about black achievers and to have positive black role models who have not subjugated blackness for achievement and status.

“They want to keep links with their families and to feel secure and comfortable in their skins and in the company of other black and minority people. But sadly, for many young people, the realities of living in care are not pretty.

“They say foster carers are not meant to be emotionally attached to the child. Rubbish,” says 17-year-old Lamont Teale.

“You can’t have a child and not be attached to them. That’s why many kids in care are so messed up – they lose touch with their emotions.

“You don’t feel things – you don’t feel happy, you don’t cry. For me it’s proper weird.

“I haven’t cried for 10 years.

“When I see people crying over a death I say ‘why are you crying?’ – and then I say to myself I’m pretty messed up.

“A good friend of mine died recently. I’d known him since he was a child and I couldn’t cry. I was at the funeral just standing there and I couldn’t feel anything.”

Coward intends to continue sharing the findings of his work in a bid to start a much-needed conversation about the care system. Most importantly, he aims to liaise with local authorities in an effort to implement changes on the ground that can inform practice across the social care sector and positively impact on the experiences of young BAME people.

“The hope is that through this research I can raise awareness and understanding on this issue, which in turn will influence policy and practice, and impact meaningfully on the outcomes for black and dual heritage looked-after children.”

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