Background to the Research

• Stability in child care has long been viewed as important. In the late 1990's and early 21st Century, UK child care policy has refocused on providing a stable family life for looked after children. A programme used in England and Wales - 'Quality Protects' - was due to be adopted in NI, bringing to the fore the issue of placement stability.
• This article presents preliminary data from a 4 year longitudinal study, carried out by the ICCR at QUB, examining the extent of stability in the care careers of younger looked after children (younger than 5 years). Other aims of the project are to identify care career patterns, to examine factors influencing stability/instability of care, to investigate the relationship between placement stability and continuity in other areas of children's lives, and to explore the effects of multiple placements (instability) on children's well-being.
  

Research Approach

• The placement histories of all children aged under 5 years (a total of 428), who were looked after in NI on 29th March 2000, were downloaded. Information was obtained from the files of 395 of these children. Key background information was also collected from these children's social work case files.
• Two years later, their care histories for the period March 2000 - March 2002 were downloaded, and data from case files was again collected. (This project was ongoing when the article was written).
  

Main Findings

• Children under 5 years of age make up almost one fifth of the total number of looked after children in NI.
• In 82% of cases, the child's mother was the principal carer before he/she was looked after. 12% of children had been cared for by both parents.
• The majority of children had siblings' details recorded on their files, with 69% of these also looked after by health and social service trusts.
• 56% of the children had health problems recorded, mainly asthma, developmental delays, eczema, visual and hearing impairments and allergies. 24% of children had some sort of behavioural problem.
• The main reasons for the children being first looked after were actual or potential neglect, actual or potential abuse, carers being unable to cope, a carer with an alcohol problem, and the mother's mental health.
• The case files revealed details of extremely adverse family backgrounds, including problems of high rates of unemployment, high incidences of lone parenthood, parental health problems, and a family history of adversity.
• Family histories revealed a multiplicity of deprivation and adversity, often with intergenerational dimensions.
• Where a history of sexual abuse was recorded, the child him/herself was a victim in 3% of cases.
• At the end of March 2000, 70% of the children were in non-relative foster care placements, 11% were living with relatives, 8% were living at home subject to a care order, 7% had returned home, 2% were with their parents in an assessment centre, and 3% were with adoptive parents.
• 88% of the children had experienced two or less placements during the previous year, which meets the Quality Protects recommendations in England and Wales. However, children under care orders were more likely to experience multiple care placements, than accommodated children.
• 67% of children had fully completed care plans. 56% of these had no estimate of an anticipated length of time the child would be looked after, 17% were expected to be looked after long-term or permanently, 12% for 18 months+, 13% for 6 months or less, and 2% for between 7 and 18 months.
• The long-term plan for 21% of children was adoption, for 19% it was foster care, and for 15% it was an eventual return to their birth family. 14% of children had no long-term care plan recorded.
• Initial figures for the supplementary data from case files show that 20% of the original sample had been adopted by the end of March 2002. These children tended to have more stable care careers.

Conclusions

• Stability is an important issue for child care policy and practice. It is not just about stable placements, but also about providing continuity in all aspects of a child's life - family and social relationships, education, after-school activities, and health and social care.
• Stability does not necessarily mean permanence; however placement stability and continuity are important in achieving permanency.