Today I had a call from an approved foster carer who wanted to discuss whether she should move across to my fostering agency, Sparks Fostering. We spent over an hour on the phone talking about the reasons she wanted to move, and much of the time was space for her to vent and process her experiences since joining her current fostering agency. She is an Asian Muslim foster carer who has faced several instances of discrimination within the year and a half that she has been with her current fostering agency.
As with most experiences of discrimination, she talked about a pattern of upsetting treatment. It starts with comments, or unexpected reactions that are excused and explained away. People who are new to organisations lack confidence in challenging inappropriate comments or reactions. For this particular applicant, she was at a training course run by her current agency where they were talking about the demographics of children and foster carers: The foster carer asked if the agency collects data about the number of Muslim foster carers the agency has. She was told that ‘a loving home is a loving home’ and one member of staff said that it was their understanding that ‘Muslim teachings discourage fostering’.
I have extensive experience and knowledge about the Islamic perspective on fostering (I will write in detail about that another time) and I can assure you conclusively that fostering is highly commended in Islamic teachings.
The foster carer let this experience pass, thinking that she will address it when she is settled and more confident in her role; however, as she went through the foster care assessment, her assessor made several disparaging comments and judgements about her cultural background and her religion, which almost prevented her from getting fostering approval. This has now escalated to the foster carer reaching her annual review without having any placements – this is highly unusual considering she is a very articulate, enthusiastic and well trained foster carer. She has previously worked with complex children and has completed voluntary training on trauma recovery. In the short time I had known her I could tell that she is very intelligent, capable and driven to help children recover from trauma.
My advice to the foster carer was to request a copy of all of her records. From this she can get a deeper understanding of what the agency has written about her. She could also review the quality of the risk assessments and how strong her foster carer profile is. I suspect that the profile that is shared with local authorities is not as positive as it could be, which is why she hasn’t been offered care of any children.
The foster carer told me that her emails and calls were being ignored by the agency, but I assured her that a data request under GDPR is a legal obligation for the agency, not a casual conversation. She drafted the email, read it to me and sent it. She later told me that a manager called her within 5 minutes of sending the email and the manager has promised to carry out a full file review.
I stressed to the foster carer that knowledge of law, regulations and policies and procedures is the greatest tool that anyone can have, but this is particularly important for minority groups who face discrimination. I have personally faced several adversities and barriers to my career, from senior staff who tried to block my progression; however, my knowledge of regulations and policies has empowered me to be able to run my own fostering agency.
On a final point, the foster carer has sadly experienced the trauma of discrimination and now needs support and care to move past this so that she is in a good emotional space to care for children. It is a tragic reality that the poor support offered by some fostering providers leaves foster carers in a worse position to care for children and that ethnic and religious minority foster carers are at particular risk of poor treatment from their fostering providers.
If you want to discuss these issues further, or if you would like to learn more about becoming a foster carer, see www.SparksFostering.org
