Caring for Children and Young People

“There were over 91,000 looked after children in the UK in 2012. ” in this task I am going to describe why children and young people may need to be looked after away from their families. There are many reasons that children and young people may need to be looked after away from their home, one of those are the child’s or young person’s parents. This may be down to bereavement of the parents meaning that they have died, if the parents have died then the child or young person will go to the closest other family member unless there aren’t any in which case the child or young person would be looked after outside the family.

Another reason children are being looked after away from their families is due to abuse. If the parents or guardians are abusing the child or young person in any way then they will be removed from the family home as it’s not safe for them, this comes under the children act (1998, 2004). “Over half of looked after children in England and Wales became looked after because of abuse or neglect in 2011/12. ” (www. nspcc. org. uk) Some children or young people may go into temporary foster care due to parental illness, which is when the parent becomes dependant their self and are unable to look aft6er their child.

For example if a single parent falls very ill then she/he would be unable to take proper care on their dependent child therefore they would go into a foster care setting where they would be looked after until the parent was again able to care for the child. The child or young person may be looked after away from the family if the parents feel they are incapable of taking care of them and have requested that they be adopted or in a foster family. One example of this is financial difficulty as the parents do not have enough money to care for the child and give it even a reasonable standard of life.

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Another example of this could be young parents that feel they are too young themselves to be able to take care of a child they may request that the child be taken into a more suitable family that will be able to take proper care of it. Also children or young people that have parents who have committed offences may need to be looked after if there is no other family as the parent could go to prison, depending on the offence the child may only be temporarily looked after in a foster family setting then would return to the family home when the parent is released.

Although not all reasons that children need to be looked after outside of the family is due to the parents or guardians, some reasons may be due to the child or young person. One of these reasons is a child or young person with disabilities that have complex needs and are unable to be cared for at home as they do not have the right equipment or the money to get it.

For example a child in a wheel chair may not be able to be cared for at home as the household they live in is not wheel chair friendly and the family have not got the funding to move or renovate the house therefore the chid would be looked after outside the family. Another reason due to the child that they are being looked after outside the family is their behaviour. If a child or young person has behavioural problems they may become too much for the parent to handle and need to be looked after outside of the family. An example of this could be a child or young person who is harming he’s/hers family

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