Ms Catherine Bond:

In terms of our aftercare proposal, several of our foster carer members have been fostering for many years and the children in their care are coming into adolescence and young adulthood. It is an emerging trend for many of these young people, while they might be chronologically 18 years of age, to not be at that level developmentally or emotionally because of their adverse early years experiences. As Ms Charles of EPIC said, a person's chronological age should not be the cut-off date for deciding on their future needs. In the recent past, several of our foster carer members faced that dilemma. When Tusla's aftercare policy was developed, the lead implementation person for Tusla came and met with those foster carers to hear of their most immediate needs. One situation involved a young person with mental health needs who was coming up to legal adulthood and required mental health services. It went right to the wire, the week of her 18th birthday, before her onward placement was identified. We are aware from the development of the aftercare policy that aftercare planning will start when the young person is 18 and it is very clearly identified that it is not a one-time life event but a progression. We need to normalise foster care and children in foster care homes. We need to ask ourselves whether, if it is good enough for a child in care, would it be good enough for one's own child? All families naturally have a conversation with their own child regarding what subjects he or she will take after the junior certificate, what his or her interests and hobbies will lead to and what he or she thinks about the leaving certificate and what will happen thereafter. Those conversations need to be had with all family members in a very natural home environment. Unfortunately, children in care, when they reach the age of 18, unless in full-time education, are not the responsibility of the State. However, responsibility must be taken for them because many young people do not have the capacity to be independent at that stage. The experiences of our foster carers is that such young people stay in the foster care home placement and do not move out because they are still part of the family even though they may not be in full-time education. That is the dilemma because aftercare is very much centred on the young person remaining in full-time education until he or she is 23. There are one or two very good models that foster carers have initiated on their own behalf. A foster carer in Wicklow has built an annex onto the back of her home and has two young women living there who grew up in her foster care and are now mothers themselves. They are living their own lives independently but still have the wider family network that most families enjoy. Many children in care do not have the same depth or density of family networks. We propose that a cost-effective solution be found. Several years ago, a grant for childminders was made available under the Equal Opportunities Childcare Programme. The Government was trying to increase the number of childminders. Small grants were made available to modify, for example, a garage at the side of a childminder's house or perform another modification to allow them to provide a childminding facility. This would be a good solution to the continued support of these young, vulnerable people. Currently, if they move out of home and it is not successful, they become homeless. Sometimes they go into apartments and forget to pay their rent because they have not developed self-management skills. We must remember that sometimes the journey for these young people is longer and that while they may be chronologically 18, they are not quite there in terms of their development. It is a solution in terms of protecting the most vulnerable in our society.

Deputy Ó Laoghaire asked about the foster committee. It is charged with the responsibility of approving foster carers. Once a foster carer is approved, he or she is allocated a link social worker or that is how it should happen. The social worker links the fostering department of Tusla and the foster carer.

The role of the link social worker is to provide support to the foster carer, identifying the carer's needs in terms of meeting the needs of the child and also his or her own ongoing training and development needs. The training of foster care committees was mentioned. Tusla has just conducted a review of the foster care committee procedures and policies. Again, IFCA made a comprehensive submission to the development of that policy, highlighting a number of issues in respect of the previous policy. One of them was the 40-year age gap rule which the Minister, Deputy Zappone actually directed be removed from that policy. The foster care committee has responsibility for approving foster carers, hearing the outcome of allegations made against foster carers and reviewing placement breakdowns. It does not have responsibility for day-to-day work with the foster carer. When a foster carer runs into difficulty, the link social worker is the point of contact. They play a significant role if we find ourselves in the position of placement breakdown or of an allegation being made against a foster carer.

The new revised foster care guidelines for foster care committees were mentioned. There is one per Tusla area. We would certainly recommend that training takes place for all foster care committee members. When the original policy was developed in 2014, training was rolled out but of course membership of the committees will have changed since then. It is critical that foster care committees are trained regularly because they play a critical role in deciding whether a foster carer can remain on the panel or whether someone can be approved as a foster carer. Does Ms. O'Donovan want to add anything?