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Knowledge and Skills Statement: Achieving
Permanence
Permanence means making a long-term plan for how a child will be cared for which lasts throughout their childhood. There are a range of options for permanence, inside and outside of the care system. All should deliver good outcomes, giving children a sense of security, continuity, commitment, identity and belonging to ensure future positive life chances.
Permanence options for children include: returning home to their families; living with kinship carers, including special guardians; living with adoptive families; living with long-term foster carers; or living in residential care. They also include where an existing short-term placement is being made permanent.
A social worker responsible for permanence planning and support should be able to:
1) Decide on the best permanence option
Eliminate drift for children by reaching the right decision within a timeframe which meets the child’s best interests. Build a strong knowledge of all permanence options, so as to effectively explore all realistic options concurrently to secure a good outcome. Change direction if it becomes evident that the proposal being pursued is not in the child’s best interests. Confidently defend decisions under scrutiny, effectively deploying evidence to demonstrate why a preferred option is favoured.
Use research to draw evidence-based conclusions about the best permanence option for a child. Consider a range of realistic permanence options and the strengths and risk factors of each. Use research on the outcomes of different options and knowledge of child development to weigh up the pros and cons of the options available. Draw on research that is relevant to an individual child’s specific circumstances and use it to inform how their short and long term needs, including their sense of identity and belonging, can best be met. Recognise that some children may require a placement with therapeutic treatment provision before a successful permanent home can be found. Maintain a focus on the rights, safety, needs, health,
wellbeing and developmental recovery of the child and the circumstances that promote this.
Produce high quality case records about the child’s permanence process which are well-argued and sensitively presented. Cite any research which has been influential. Draw on lessons learned locally on placement breakdowns, adoption breakdowns and long-term care outcomes. Assess the child’s current and future needs by building effective relationships with children and families, any current or previous carers, professionals, including health and education professionals and social workers, and others directly involved in their care. Draw on the views of those who have knowledge and experience of the child, such as family members or foster carers. In the case of unborn children, conduct a good quality pre-birth assessment. Address complex questions where the needs and circumstances of a number of people, organisations and institutions are in conflict with each other.
Assess the impact of trauma, abuse, neglect, separation and loss on a child’s development, and how this affects their capacity to build and maintain relationships. Take account of the child’s developmental stage and the likely impact of different transitions, as well as the support the child may need along the way. Identify and harness the wider services the child may need to recover from previous experiences and to achieve stability. Take into account: the age of the child, recognising the different challenges that older children face and understanding the impact of adolescent neglect; the importance of existing relationships (including the positive and negative impact of these relationships) including friendships; and the potential benefits of maintaining peer relationships for a child’s sense of identity and belonging. Acknowledge how adversity, inequality and limited life chances may impact on the plans for the child’s future, and ways in which the impacts may be mitigated. Encourage the child to express their views, wishes and feelings with regard to permanence. Listen sensitively to the child to understand their preferences and involve and engage them when making decisions about their future.
Assess the risks of a return home for the child. Ensure that parents have received the support they need and, where necessary, have demonstrated the changes required to care for the child throughout their childhood. Assess: the parents’ capacity for further or sustained change; and the impact of placing siblings together or separately and in various placement types. Pursue the child’s best interests and identify ways to express their views even when contradictory to the views held by parents, family, other professionals, employers or other influential organisations such as the courts.
Be prepared to provide feedback on processes and procedures.
Produce accessible, high quality, well-argued, evidenced and sensitively presented assessments of a carer’s/home’s strengths, difficulties, experiences and current and likely future needs, and of their wishes and hopes. Build and maintain effective relationships with parents, prospective carers or residential homes to assess their suitability. Recognise: the extent to which carers will be able to act in the best interests of the child and promote their health and wellbeing; and the different qualities, capacity and support carers might need to look after a child who presents behaviours associated with negative early life and childhood experiences. Understand the legal entitlements to support for different types of carers.
Provide high quality communications. Listen to the child to understand their long term aspirations, and assess a potential carer’s abilities to support the child in achieving these goals. Produce child and carer profiles that present an accurate summary of current and likely future needs, as well as a balanced picture of the child including their likes and dislikes, how they behave and their wishes and feelings. Engage in clear, open and timely communication with carers, which is honest about children’s needs and the impact that any negative early experiences have had on their health and mental health, whilst being positive and solution-focussed about how these might be met. Provide a professional and high quality service where potential carers are treated with respect.
4) Support children and families in transition
Undertake sufficient direct work to help children, and current and future carers, prepare for a successful transition. Communicate clearly, openly and sensitively with children, their families and carers about the planning process for moving into a permanent home or back to their birth home. Ensure that the reasons for any move are communicated in a way that is appropriate to the child’s age and understanding, and that any questions or concerns the child has are listened to. Support children and carers to set realistic expectations and prepare children thoroughly for the different stages of that journey.
Support carers to: promote a child’s sense of identity, self-worth and belonging; understand how best to share a child’s history and the events that led to previous and current care arrangements - for example, through life story work (in digital or other formats appropriate for the child); and understand how a child’s behaviour is dependent on their experience of both past and present parenting. Co-create with carers helpful strategies to meet a child’s needs, and in particular where carers may find behaviour challenging.
Demonstrate professional expertise in managing potentially distressing transitions, recognising the complexity of family dynamics and the potential impact of loss and change. Provide support and advocacy to children, parents and/or carers, demonstrating sensitivity and empathy. Help current carers and birth families to cope with the transition, remembering that this may be a period of great loss and disappointment.
Develop high quality plans to support the transition process. Work collaboratively with all parties (including multi-disciplinary and interdisciplinary colleagues) to plan and deliver a smooth transition that causes as little distress and disruption to the child as possible. Recognise that for some children a stable transition should take place over a period of time to ensure that the best outcome is achieved.
Where a child is not returning home, assess, plan and support the appropriate level of contact with their birth family based on the individual child’s specific needs. Support children, their siblings, carers and the child’s birth family to understand, engage with and contribute to plans for successful contact with each other. Recognise when contact is likely to be problematic, and provide appropriate support and review. Recognise the significance of a child’s support network to the likely future success of permanence arrangements, and take necessary steps to ensure sustained participation of that network in a child’s life, appreciating the particular imperatives for those older children in residential care.
Develop high quality support plans that recognise the child’s current and likely future needs, the capacity of the carer to meet those needs and the additional support that might be required. Develop plans for delegated authority.
Where the child is returning home to a parent or family member, develop support strategies that are flexible and responsive to changing circumstances and the individual needs of the child and their family. Assess both the effectiveness of the help provided and management of risk, taking action to provide additional support to families and protect children effectively.
5) Support the placement, including managing disruption and
breakdown
Identify the most effective types of support using the best evidence, and apply this to the provision of flexible, on-going arrangements. Build a professional network of expertise to help families get the short and long-term support they need. Know what therapy options are available and their application, and support families to identify accessible resources that will respond in time. Build helpful relationships
