“Trailblazing” new support scheme approved for the Special Guardians of the children of Wrexham

Wrexham Council’s Executive Board have given the green light to a plan to give extra incentives and support to Special Guardians, in a move that is also planned to help save the authority money.

A ‘Special Guardian’ is someone who is not the child’s birth parent, but has made an application to the court for a Special Guardianship Order (SGO). This order gives the special guardian parental responsibility for nearly all the decisions which affect the child, and limits the right of the child’s parents to intervene or challenge the order without the leave of the court. Special Guardianship provides a legal status that offers greater security than long term fostering, but without the legal break with the child’s birth family provided by adoption.

The Council say the reserves fund will be used to fund the development of a Special Guardianship Support Team to ensure ongoing support to those individuals acting as guardians and to the children supported, adding “Within 18 months we are confident that this policy will yield savings to repay the
initial investment and overtime generate savings beyond that”.

The plan is that foster carers who convert to being a special guardian will continue to receive the special guardianship allowance until certain circumstances exist such as the child reaches 18 years of age or the special guardianship order is no longer in effect

The actual individual offer to each special guardian will differ. They will all receive fostering allowance minus appropriate benefits in each case, with the council also now planning to ensure they will receive council tax discount at 75% as in fostering.

Lead Member Cllr Andrew Atkinson presented the report and explained, “This offer provides no detriment to those foster carers supporting children through this offer. For individuals caring for a child through fostering agency, they will receive the equivalent to what they’re paid now through an allowance from the council and through normal child benefits, but they won’t receive the council tax relief. Foster carers, our own reps and council foster carers converting to an SGO will receive their SGO allowance until the child is 18 years old and not just for two years as is normally the case. Wrexham council foster carers converting to an SGO will also receive Council Tax Relief at 75% from next April and again until the child is 18. I think that’s a really positive aspect.

“Once this offer is in place, we believe we’ll be able to increase the numbers of those becoming special guardians.”

“I believe that this is a really exciting development for Wrexham and a hugely positive step for our local families. I’m really, really grateful to our brilliant team in Children’s Services for all of their hard work on this. This is another excellent policy coming forward.”

Cllr Dana Davies asked if an information report to “clarify how those needs of the children have been met how they’ve been identified, because I’m assuming complex needs children will not feed into special guardianship “, which was forthcoming with extra information and briefing notes promised.

Cllr Davies also asked about collaboration between other authorities and Wrexham Council, with the reply from Leader of the Council Mark Pritchard indicating Wrexham Council will be going it alone with the policy for at least the first 12 months when a further report comes back, “We wanted to be trailblazers in this, we want it to be leading the way in North Wales, and Wales, and across Wales”.

Cllr Pritchard added, “I think it’s it’s a fantastic report, and I can’t wait till it to get started. I really think you can make a massive difference for the quality for these children on their quality of life.”

Cllr Atkinson echoed the comments, adding “I think for me, the Leader’s comments nailed the point about collaboration with other authorities. We will always look for opportunities to collaborate, there is strong regional work at Lead Member level and Officer level, this is an area where there is great collaboration. But, on this particular area, I think we really are leading the way and to use the language of the Leader, we are trailblazing on this across Wales, which I think is a massive feather in our cap in Wrexham”.

“We are always happy to look at any opportunities that we can but I think on this one, it’s the fact that we are forging our own path and doing everything we can to create the best opportunities and as quickly as possible.”