FIFE COUNCIL
Children’s Services Committee
10 March 2005
Agenda Item No
REVISED ADOPTION, KINSHIP AND RESIDENCE ALLOWANCE SCHEMES
1. Introduction
1.1 This report presents to the Children's Services Committee the revised Adoption,
Kinship and Residence Allowance Schemes. The report does not cover fees and
other payments for approved Fife Council foster carers.
1.2 Children who cannot be cared for at home by their parents may be cared for by
extended family members or by friends, or they may be accommodated by the local
authority and placed either in family or in residential settings. It is the policy of Fife
Council, supported by national guidance on good practice, to seek to maintain
children who cannot remain at home in family placements wherever possible. In
addition to the better outcomes achieved for children who can remain in family
settings, the cost of residential placements is excessive, rising and often inconsistent
with Best Value considerations.
1.3 Financial support of families who adopt or who commit themselves to caring on a
long-term basis for children who may otherwise be accommodated in other settings is
an important part of the developing strategy to address high numbers of children “in
care” in Fife and the high expenditure on out of authority placements.
1.4 The law permits Adoption Agencies such as Fife Council to pay an allowance to
adoptive parents. The law also permits local authorities to make maintenance
payments to relatives or friends who care for children (see Appendix 1: Guide to
Financial Allowances). National guidance expects local authorities to have payment
schemes in place, and all Scottish councils have been complying with this
expectation since its implementation. The Scottish Executive’s review of adoption
and kinship care is likely to increase this expectation.
1.3 Fife Council has three allowance schemes:
 Adoption Allowance – for adopted children
 Kinship Allowance – for children who are legally ‘looked after’ and placed with a
relative or friend
 Residence Allowance for children who would have to be 'looked after' and
accommodated by Fife Council if they were not cared for by a relative.
1.4 These allowance schemes required review in order to:
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clarify eligibility criteria
bring a consistent approach to all three allowances
provide staff and service users with more detailed information and guidance
provide a more rigorous financial assessment framework
rationalise the payment amounts
take account of budgetary considerations
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 develop allowance schemes that can support the Social Work Service's plan to
reduce the number of high cost, out of Fife placements and increase the
number of children cared for by relatives.
2.
The revised Adoption, Kinship and Residence Allowance Schemes
2.1 The revised schemes are based on the following principles:
 Adoption Allowance: to enable children to be adopted who might otherwise be
hard to place
 Kinship Allowance: to enable ‘looked after’ children who might otherwise have
to be accommodated by Fife Council to be placed or remain with family or
friends
 Residence Allowance: to prevent children from becoming ‘looked after’ by
allowing them to remain with family or friends.
2.2 For all three allowances, an assessment of the carers' financial circumstances will be
introduced. The Adoption Allowance (Scotland) Regulations 1996 require the
Adoption Agency to take account of the adopters' resources and expenditure, and the
financial needs and resources of the child. The Fostering of Children (Scotland)
Regulations 1996 permit the local authority to take account of the needs and
circumstances of the carer with whom a child is placed.
2.3 The financial assessments will include the following concepts (see Appendix 2):
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financial thresholds, above which the allowance will not be paid
disregarded income, in particular income from certain state benefits
fixed expenditure amounts, whereby certain expenditure items will be capped
disposable income, derived by deducting the weekly household expenditure
from the weekly net income
2.4 There will be three financial thresholds, above which no allowance will be paid:
 capital or savings (excluding property) in excess of £50,000
 combined gross income of more than £50,000 per annum
 disposable income of more than £131 per week.
2.5 The Contracts Section within the Social Work Service will carry out the financial
assessments in order to allow decisions to be made to pay an allowance based on
the child's eligibility and the outcome of the financial assessment. The Contracts
Section will also carry out the annual review of all payments made under these
schemes.
3.
Budgetary Considerations
3.1 At present there are several different levels of payment. There is little consistency in
who receives what level of payment. In future, all three allowances will be paid at the
equivalent of the age-related fostering maintenance payments, less child benefit
where this can be claimed by the carer.
3.2 A number of factors make it difficult to project costs with a high degree of accuracy.
First, there are no clear trends for allowances approved over the last ten years.
Second, current financial assessments are not as stringent as those proposed for the
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new schemes. Third, it is not known how the introduction of more comprehensive
financial assessments will affect the number of payments made.
3.3 The costs of the proposed scheme will be met through a combination of revised
children and families budgets and the Changing Children’s Services Fund.
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Conclusions
4.1 The Adoption, Kinship and Residence Allowance Schemes have been revised to
provide a more transparent and consistent approach, based on a more rigorous
financial assessment.
4.2 These revised financial allowance schemes are intended to support the Social Work
Service's plan to reduce the number of children in high cost, out of authority
placements and increase the number of children placed with relatives.
4.3 The budgetary implications of these revised schemes have been built into future
children and families services costings.
4.5 Subject to Committee approval, the revised allowance schemes will be implemented
on 1 April 2005.
5.
Recommendations
5.1 The Children’s Services Committee is asked to approve the revised Adoption, Kinship
and Residence Allowance Schemes.
Stephen Moore
Head of Social Work
Social Work Service
(Libby Bailey 701 2628)
Fife Council
Fife House
North Street
GLENROTHES KY7 5LT
15 February 2005
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