Dorset asked to take in more refugee children

Dorset has been asked to take in more refugee children after councils in the south and south east said they are no longer able to offer places.

The county’s social services has already taken an additional five in the last month after Kent and Portsmouth said they could take no more unaccompanied refugee children.

Dorset executive director of children’s services Theresa Leavy said it was likely that more authorities would also stop taking refugee children – putting pressure on the county to take more, although she said there is also a limit on what help could be offered locally.

She told councillors on Monday that the authority already has its own problems in looking after the county’s own children with foster carers places and residential care in short supply since the pandemic.

'Shortage in foster placements'

She revealed that around a quarter of all foster placements were no longer available either because carers, many of which are older people, were shielding, or because they did not want to take children on because of Covid.

Ms Leavy said the problems have been compounded by a shortfall in the number of residential placements for children across the country with Dorset having no general residential homes of its own, having closed centres in Dorchester and Cattistock.

A new children’s centre is planned for Dorchester Road, Weymouth, but that will not be ready until next year at the earliest and will only offer a handful or places.

Dorset currently has 195 children in residential care, a slight fall from the previous 199 at the end of June.

Almost all are being looked after outside the county contributing to an overspend of £5million in that budget.

Around 60 children are also currently experiencing delays in moving to or from new placements, or out of care, primarily because of backlogs in the courts.

Ms Leavy told the council’s audit and governance committee on Monday:

“We have a log jam in our courts, we have a log jam in our external placements and an absence of family placements locally, more than we would normally have….our level of provision remains a real challenge.”