0 used to refer to children who are taken care of by social services because their own parents are unable to look after them:
Around 12% of looked-after children were in residential homes.
One of these was the non-completion of written care plans by social workers during the supervision of looked-after children.
Overall, the average time taken to adopt a looked-after child is three years—an eternity in a child's eyes.
Adoption must become a first-choice option for looked-after children who cannot return home.
One of the six key priority areas for the programme is to improve the supply and choice of placement options for looked-after children.
One of the key priorities of the quality protects programme is to improve the supply and choice of placement options for looked-after children.
An increasing realisation of that has changed the population in care, and made it conversely more difficult to place looked-after children with adoptive families.
It is misplaced to put the recommendation simply in the context of the report itself, which is about looked-after children.
That must be considered in the context that the vast majority of looked-after children now live in foster homes, not care homes.
